WASHINGTON, DC— Today, Chair of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Peter DeFazio (D-OR) issued the following statement regarding reports that a “gas tax holiday” may be under consideration in Congress.
“Suspending the 18.4 cents per gallon federal gas tax is not going to give consumers significant relief—if any at all—at the pump because the oil companies will just add the forgone federal tax to their coffers in whole or part. These are the same oil companies who made record profits last year and are on target to use $22 billion of excess profits this year to benefit investors and executives.
What suspending the tax will do is blow a $26 billion hole in the highway trust fund this year and create uncertainty surrounding the funding of our nation’s infrastructure in the future. Passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law late last year will improve our nation’s crumbling infrastructure, our global competitiveness, and create jobs—repealing the gas tax will not.
That’s why we need to focus on overcoming Republican obstruction and enact a full year funding bill that will fully unlock the benefits of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the high wage jobs that will be created by these critical investments.
We should deliver relief directly to American families struggling to make ends meet by passing the rest of President Biden’s agenda, not by pushing a well-intentioned but ill-conceived policy that counts on the good will of oil companies to succeed and undermines the long-term positive impacts of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.”
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