House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats forced President Joe Biden into finally banning oil exports from Russia on Monday, a new report indicates.
The move to ban oil imports from Russia is a bipartisan issue that enjoys the support of most congressional Republicans — and Congress is about to pass a unifying, bipartisan effort that could have embarrassed Biden.
Biden was reportedly forced to call Pelosi and other allies individually and convince them to delay the bill so that he could first pass the new sanctions by executive order.
Previously, Biden had been reluctant to curb Russian oil shipments to the U.S. or slap on energy sanctions in meaningful ways on Putin’s regime. A reduced supply as gas prices at the pump is already climbing for Americans ahead of the midterm elections that could hurt the Democratic Party’s already slim chances of retaining control of Congress.
But “a mini Hollywood drama” occurred over the last 48 hours in D.C. The White House “sought to get Democrats to shelve the vote so the president could look like he personally is leading on this issue instead of looking like he’s being led by his own party,” Politico reported Tuesday.
Fox News first reported on the behind-the-scenes battle.
… and also remove PNTR (permanent normalized trade relations) from Russia, meaning that they would lose ‘most favored nation status’ on tariffs – but the President himself intervened to stop it.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
…because this source tells me the White House called Ways & Means Dems and told them NOT to move forward on it.
Ways & Means Dems wanted to push ahead anyway – so at about 6:30 last night, someone from the White House called Pelosi’s office to intervene.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Pelosi, I’m told, still did want to move ahead. So the White House then targeted Sen Wyden via Schumer, to get him to pull out on the Senate side so it would all fall apart.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Members from both parties expressed frustration that they spent the whole weekend working in a bipartisan fashion only to get rolled by the WH.
**and as I type this, Reuters reports a WH announcement to ban Russian oil is imminent.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Democratic insiders say Biden still wants Pelosi to move forward with the bill — to give him “additional cover,” Politico reported.
“By putting Republicans on the record on this issue, Democrats on the other end of GOP attack ads can point to the GOP lawmakers to say: Look, they also supported the ban that increased your gas prices,” Politico wrote.
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