Obama slams oil companies for bid to kill California's global warming law

President Obama has leapt into the fight over a California ballot initiative to effectively kill that state’s global warming law, slamming oil companies for trying to “gut clean-air standards.”

Obama used a Los Angeles stump speech Friday for Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) to criticize Proposition 23, the controversial ballot question that would suspend the emissions-cutting law until state unemployment drops to 5.5 percent for a year.

“Here in California, oil companies and the other special interests are spending millions on a campaign to gut clean-air standards and clean-energy standards, jeopardizing the health and prosperity of this state,” Obama said in remarks at the University of Southern California.

Obama did not explicitly mention the controversial ballot question. But the president made his opposition to Proposition 23 clear in bashing “special interests” he accused of fighting the Democratic agenda on energy, infrastructure, Wall Street reform and other issues.

The oil refining companies Valero Energy Corp. and Tesoro Corp. have both poured millions of dollars into the campaign. A refining subsidiary of Koch Industries — owned by the billionaire brothers and conservative political donors David and Charles Koch — is also funding efforts to pass the initiative.

Defending the state’s climate law is a top priority for green groups — which are spending millions of dollars themselves to defeat the initiative — especially now that global warming bills have collapsed on Capitol Hill.

Obama praised Boxer, the head of the Environment and Public Works Committee who is locked in a tight race with GOP challenger Carly Fiorina.

“There is only one candidate who’s fighting to make California the clean-energy hub of America. Only one candidate who’s championed clean air and clean water, and the most beautiful coastline in the world. And that candidate is your senator, Barbara Boxer,” Obama said, according to a White House transcript.