Rep. Ro Khanna just got schooled.
The California Democrat recently posted on X:
“Trump’s immoral and reckless war in Iran has shot up gas prices in my district to nearly $6 a gallon. Stop the war, stop exporting our crude oil, and pass my windfall profits tax on Big Oil to give Americans a rebate for their gas bills.”
In reply, the US Oil & Gas Association (@US_OGA on X, run by the association’s president) gave Khanna a jovial drubbing:
“Several people have requested we comment on your post. We will quickly before we take Mrs. USOGA out for date night.”
What followed was a methodical takedown of Khanna’s stance on gas prices.
Mr. USOGA has it right:
The reason California’s gas prices are about $2 (or 50%) higher than those in the rest of the nation has little to do with war and much to do with poor policy made by Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California Legislature.
And Democrats should indeed stand up to Newsom and his climate zealotry, as advised by the Mister.
To reduce gas prices in California, legislators should roll back gas taxes, cut regulations, end the push to shutter California oil refineries, and scrap plans for a counterproductive “windfall profits tax” on oil companies.
As Mr. USOGA noted, runaway gas prices in California are mostly Sacramento’s doing, not Trump’s.
To start, drivers here pay around double the national average in state gas taxes.
Add to that a range of California-specific charges ladled onto the price of gas.
These include: the state’s “cap-and-invest” climate program, its virtue-signaling low carbon fuel standard, and the pricey seasonal gasoline blends required by California air-quality regulators.
In many regions of the state, the summer-blend fuel requirement, which can add 20 cents of cost per gallon, took effect on April 1.
And then there’s the state push to chase oil refineries out of California, thanks to climate purists’ animus toward fossil fuels.
What they seem to miss (or ignore) is that the lost domestic oil supply must be replaced by imported oil, which increases not only pump prices for motorists, but also the very carbon emissions the left decries.
So, yeah: Newsom and Co. have done a lot to drive up California’s gas prices.
Fortunately, Mr. USOGA’s criticism has a constructive bent:
“Here is our suggestion,” he writes. “Your proposed windfall profits tax will do nothing to bring relief to your overtaxed and underappreciated constituents.
“Instead — suspend those state-level taxes first and bring California prices in line with the national average.
“Put your state bureaucracy on a diet. They could stand to shed a few pounds.
“Encourage California domestic oil and gas production and expand your refinery capacity instead of shutting it down.
“Stand up to your [g]overnor. You know he is wrong and you can be on the right side of things.”
That about covers it.
Blaming Trump for state gas prices is an exercise in politics, not problem-solving.
Khanna and other California legislators would do better to focus on the actual sources of the price pain at the pump.
Newsom and the Democrats need to make gas less expensive, and the way to do that is to stop making gas so expensive.
They need to encourage oil production in the state, not thwart it under the banner of nebulous climate goals that will make little if any discernible difference in global temperatures, ever.
Mr. USOGA concludes:
“Energy abundance, not rhetoric, lowers prices and bolsters U.S. and allied security.
“Mrs. USOGA has instructed us to put the phone away so we will do that.
“Have a good weekend.”
Boom. Owned.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
