Congress votes to halt oil reserve shipments

WASHINGTON — Jittery about a political backlash over gasoline costs as prices set yet another record Tuesday, Congress voted to halt deliveries to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in defiance of President Bush.

The action was expected to have a modest effect on pump prices, saving motorists an estimated 2 to 5 cents a gallon, backers said. But its overwhelming support, including from Bush's usual GOP allies, underscored the potency of fuel costs as a campaign issue this year.

The measure is likely to be one of the few Congress approves this year in response to public angst at the pump as Democrats and Republicans agreed on little else Tuesday to bring down prices.

Senators approved the measure by a veto-proof majority of 97-1. The two Democratic presidential candidates, Sens. Barack Obama of Illinois and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, returned to the Capitol from the campaign trail to vote for the measure. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive GOP nominee, supported the measure but was absent for the vote.

The House later followed suit, approving it 385-25.

"Why on Earth should we be putting oil underground at a time of record-high prices?" Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., the measure's chief sponsor, argued. "When the American consumer is being burned at the stake of higher gas prices, the government should not be carrying the wood."

Bush has resisted calls to suspend the delivery of about 70,000 barrels a day to the emergency stockpile, contending it would have little influence on prices in a nation that uses about 21 million barrels a day, while weakening the nation's energy security. Instead, Bush has assailed Congress for not doing more to spur production.

"Stopping the fill of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve has been tried before, and there is no evidence that it will affect the price of oil or gasoline in a meaningful way," White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said Tuesday. But he said Bush would not veto the measure.

Although Bush now opposes suspending deliveries, he halted deposits in 2006, saying it would leave more oil on the market.

About 700 million barrels of oil are stored in the underground reserve on the Gulf Coast, established after the 1973 Arab oil embargo to protect against supply cutoffs.

The measure's approval came as the national average price for a gallon of regular gasoline hit a record of more than $3.73, up from $3.07 a year ago, according to AAA.

The House and Senate measures would suspend deliveries to the reserve for the remainder of the year, unless oil drops below $75 a barrel.

The two chambers still must agree on the form of the bill. The Senate measure was passed as an amendment to another bill, while the House passed it as stand-alone legislation.

Earlier Tuesday, Senate Democrats blocked a Republican-sponsored measure that called for more domestic production. Republicans proposed opening the Arctic refuge to energy exploration and relaxing a long-standing ban on new drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

"If Democrats believe that the 70,000 barrels, which will no longer be put into the strategic petroleum reserve, can save 2 to 5 cents at the gas pump, doesn't it make sense that the estimated 1 million barrels we could get from Arctic National Wildlife Refuge every day could do a lot more?" said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada responded: "Republicans must abandon their shortsighted strategy of 'drill, drill, drill.' ... We can't produce our way out of the problems that we have."

A Democratic proposal to impose a windfall profits tax on oil companies, roll back tax breaks for the industry and provide new protections against price-gouging is expected to face a GOP-led filibuster when it reaches the Senate floor as early as next week.