House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters today he sees the flap over Rep. Joe Barton’s apology to BP as giving voters the chance to decide this fall if they want a party which will serve as a check and balance system over corporate America.
Hoyer predicted that thanks to Barton a measure giving Congress subpoena power over BP to investigate the spill will pass the House. (It stalled in the Senate last week.)
Hoyer (D-MD) read Barton’s quote from last week’s Energy and Commerce hearing aloud at his weekly press briefing, along with quotes from Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich about government being part of the “problem.”
Barton’s apology and the majority of House Republicans calling a $20 billion escrow fund a “shakedown” in a Republican Study Committee statement “reflect a pattern” and an “underlying philosophy” of the GOP that government oversight is an impediment. He said the escrow fund is meant to help taxpayers and Gulf Coast residents and businesses.
“This was not an offhand comment,” Hoyer said. “I think that is a stark view of the comparison between the two parties.”
Hoyer said the Democrats aim to “protect the people” while Republicans are trying to “protect the corporations.”
