Yesterday, the U.S. Senate passed after extensive debate a bill greenlighting the construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. The final vote was 62-32 in favor, two votes more than the 60 vote threshold required to avoid a filibuster. The Senate version of the bill will either go back to the House where they can pass it as is, or the House can request a conference committee to hash out the differences. If the House goes the conference route, the committee will produce a report subject to a straight up-down vote in both chambers. In either case, everyone anticipates that some form of Keystone legislation will be sent to the president within the next week.
But, it really doesn’t matter. Because President Obama has
indicated he will veto any Keystone XL bill, as he believes that Congress is
intruding on his presidential powers by authorizing an infrastructure project
crossing an international boundary. And, as there are not enough votes in either
chamber to override his veto, Keystone XL will be again delayed and remain
unbuilt unless and until Obama gives the project his assent.
The political realities of Keystone did not prevent political
gamesmanship in the wake of the vote here in Montana though. Republicans have
been chomping at the bit to get this legislation passed, giving it the
designation of Senate Bill 1 to signal the importance of the issue. But the legislation
has been debated for weeks now and subject to scores of amendments. To expedite
the bill’s passage earlier this week, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
filed a cloture motion to end debate on the bill and prevent additional
amendments from being considered. As you all know, a cloture motion is used
either to prevent or stop an ongoing filibuster, and if it passes, places
strict limits on further discussion before moving to a vote on final passage.
This cloture motion failed 53 to 39 (again, the motion
needed 60 votes), with Montana Senator Jon Tester voting against cloture. Montana’s
freshman senator, Steve Daines, supported McConnell and voted to end debate.
(Caption: Montana's congressional delegation, presumably before the vote on Keystone XL)
Freshman Congressman Ryan Zinke immediately took the
opportunity to blast Tester. “To me, a vote against the Keystone is a vote
against Montana,” he said. “I’m a proud co-sponsor of the House bill to build
the Keystone XL Pipeline because it is proven to be safe and in the best interest
of Montana. I will always put Montana before raising money from special
interests in Washington, D.C.” (Full story here).
Zinke implied, of course, that Tester’s a flip-flopper
and in the pocket of special interests—special interests that are opposed to
the construction of Keystone and the production of good paying Montana jobs.
Yesterday’s press release from Montana’s State Republican Party
was much more hyperbolic than Zinke’s statement. Here is what they sent via
e-mail to those subscribing to their list:
“Last November,
Tester voted to build the
Keystone XL pipeline.
On Monday, Tester joined Senator Democrats’ delay tactics and voted against the Keystone XL pipeline.
On Monday, Tester joined Senator Democrats’ delay tactics and voted against the Keystone XL pipeline.
- Tester claimed he wanted more amendments and debate but last November- when Tester voted for the Keystone XL pipeline- there were no amendments allowed and just 6 hours of debate.
- Under the Republican-led Senate, there have already been “more amendment votes than in all of 2014 under Democratic control” on the Keystone bill alone. And, the Senate has spent 3 weeks debating the bill.
On Wednesday, Tester voted to support President Obama’s latest land power grab, allowing Obama to
declare land in Phillips County a national monument and immediately halt
construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.”
Both Congressman Zinke and the Montana Republican Party, in
their eagerness to score political points, are pushing a narrative spun of
cynicism and obfuscation instead of an honest consideration of the facts. And
this, I find as a political scientist, quite disturbing.
Let’s consider reality for a moment.
Tester supports construction of Keystone XL, but with some
qualifications, and as he has since the project was proposed. I spoke with him
about Keystone XL and energy development in the Bakken on Veteran’s Day in 2011
as we flew between Billings and Helena—an interview I conducted as part of the
research for my book, Battle
for the Big Sky. Here is the transcript verbatim:
David: Do you have any problems
with more development in the Balkan?
Sen. Tester: No.
David: No?
Sen. Tester: No.
As long as it's done right. It's
kind of like the Keystone pipeline, as long as it’s done right, you can do
it. Now, I'm going to tell you
what. There's a lot of times that this
stuff isn't done right and taxpayers for generations and generations to come
have to fix the problem. Take a look at
a lot of the abandoned mines around.
Yeah, they create a bunch of jobs and then when they left, it becomes a
Superfund site the taxpayers have to pick up.
That isn't a false choice. That
should have been -- the rules should have been dictated early and that's what
I'm saying is make sure we get the playing field established so that it is done
right so that it isn't a false choice.
David: Are you confident with the
rules and regulations in place now that the Bakken can be drilled safely?
Sen. Tester: Yeah.
David: Well then let me ask the
follow-up question to that. If we sit
and put our eggs in the Bakken basket, don't we risk basically having Butte
part 2 over again? All this development
happens, big towns happen, oil's gone, it collapses. How do we, as a state, look beyond that?
Sen. Tester: I don't know that I say we put all our
eggs in the Bakken basket. I think we've
got incredible opportunities in wind and solar and renewable energies across
the board, but we also need to do right because they can be done wrong, but do
those right and expand upon those. I
think the Bakken [play], if that's all we're going to look at for energy
future, big mistake, big mistake. I
think if we developed the Balkan right, there are going to jobs there for many,
many years and there can be a level of energy security there for many, many years.
David: But what about the environmentalist
movement? There's a number of folks that
are really opposed to the pipeline, opposed to drilling the Bakken and
ostensibly those people are going to be people who are probably going to want
to vote for you and not Denny Rehberg [Tester’s opponent in 2012], isn't there
a risk that they're not going to show up and turn out to help you?
Sen. Tester: I always think common sense is going
to be the deciding factor when it comes to elections and I think, if you
develop in a common sense way, everybody can win. That’s the basis of my Forest Jobs bill. And there's going to be people on the hard
right and the hard left that want it all their way, but that's not practical
and it’s not common sense. So you've got
to be thoughtful about it. You've got to
make sure you do it right. You've got to
make sure that folks follow the rules.
And if agency
folks don't follow the rules, by the way, I don't care if you're talking about
benefits for veterans or you're talking about drilling in the Bakken or
whatever, that's an important part of the equation. So but no, I think enviros in the end can
take a look at what I stand for. You
know, it is a good choice, it is a clear choice for them because you've got, on
the one hand, the guy [Rehberg] who built the Keystone pipeline, come hell or
high water and I'm saying let’s use our heads about this. Let's do it right if we're going to do
it. And the same thing with drilling in
the Balkan, let’s do it right.
I searched Tester’s Senate press releases, available on his
Senate website, for the term “Keystone XL” to further understand his position
on Keystone XL. The first mention of the
project came in 2010, when Tester questioned TransCanada’s request to operate
the proposed pipeline at a higher than standard pressure—a request which TransCanada
withdrew at Tester’s urging. The press release aptly portrays Tester’s position
on Keystone XL: He wants it built, but with certain restrictions. Completely in
step, mind you, with what he told me in fall of 2011 more than a year later.
That’s the same pattern you see when reviewing Tester’s
votes on amendments to Senate Bill 1. Tester supported some amendments mandating
that the pipeline to be built with American material and labor. He voted for an
amendment clarifying that products produced from tar sands would be subject to
federal petroleum excise taxes. He supported an amendment requiring a renewable
standard for electricity production. He opposed an amendment requiring the
federal home heating assistance program to be funded at a minimum level, and
another restricting the transportation of petroleum coke.
Most of these amendments, including those Tester favored,
failed. And despite the fact Tester has long supported amendments requiring the
use of American labor and material in the construction of Keystone XL, he
supported the bill on final passage. To be clear, Tester did not get his ideal
Keystone XL bill. But he voted for it anyway—figuring, I suspect, that half a
loaf was better than none.
You can see all the roll call votes on the Senate website here.
So, where’s the alleged flip flop? As far as I can tell, in
my review of previous pieces of legislation and Senate amendments concerning
Keystone XL going back to 2011, Tester has always supported the construction of
Keystone XL.
The “flip flop” is because Tester did not vote in favor of
cutting off debate on Senate Bill 1 says the Montana Republican Party. He’s not
a Keystone XL “purist” because he favored more debate and more amendments.
Well, a funny thing happens when a party moves from the
minority to the majority. Because all of the sudden, positions the party once
took become, shall we say, inconvenient.
When Republicans served in the Senate minority in the last
Congress, they expressed indignity when Senator Reid did not allow them the
courtesy of considering Republican amendments to Democratic-crafted bills. Democrats
did not allow the amendment process to run its full course, they said, and they
felt debate was rushed and did not consider the minority party’s point of view.
Here’s Republican Senator Orrin Hatch in a National Journal piece on Harry Reid’s
ironclad control over the Senate floor agenda, achieved by filling the
amendment tree (thereby shutting out the minority party in the amending of
legislation): "When the Senate Democratic leadership decides to bring a
bill to the floor, far more often than not we are blocked from offering any
amendments," Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said on the floor last week.” You
can access the article here.
Republicans, of course, vowed to allow more amendments and greater debate if
only voters gave them a majority in the Senate.
Majority status means majority control, and it often means
that in order to get things done, you have to shut down debate and control what
can and cannot be discussed. It also means limiting the amending process. I’ll
bet you good money that we’ll see far less amend-a-thons on future bills in the Republican-led
Senate. The Republicans, while in the minority, doth protest too much.
On this point, the Republican Party’s press release was disingenuous.
But what followed next was either disturbing or laughable. Take your pick.
One of the amendments voted upon by the Senate AFTER cloture
failed was Senator Steve Daines’ Senate Amendment 132, which expressed the
“sense of Congress” that restrictions should be placed on the president’s
ability to create National Monuments. You can read the text of the amendment here.
Tester voted no on that amendment—a vote which he never
would have taken had the cloture petition succeeded—the same cloture petition
that Tester was criticized for voting against in the same press release!
So Tester’s faulted for voting against cloture, and then he
is criticized for endorsing “President Obama’s latest land power grab, allowing Obama
to declare land in Phillips County a national monument and immediately halt
construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.” At least, that’s what is
spun in the press release. Don’t believe it.
Facts are stubborn things. Had Daines’ amendment passed, it
would have done nothing to change existing statute.
There is no land grab in Phillips County—and even if there
was or is, Senator Tester’s vote on Senate Amendment 132 certainly didn’t
express his views on it. At best, Tester voting no suggests that he believes
that the executive branch has and should have the power to protect land by
declaring it a national monument under the Antiquities Act. Every president
since has created at least one National Monument—including Gerald Ford and
Ronald Reagan. It does not mean he wants President Obama to drop a national
monument in Phillips County and stop Keystone XL because HE WANTS KEYSTONE XL
BUILT.
The process of legislating is messy, tortuous, and
complicated. To truly understand it requires taking each and every vote and
placing it into its proper context. To do otherwise represents a gross
distortion of the how the Senate and House operate, and at its core, represents
elevating a politically-driven narrative at the expense of what Stephen Colbert
termed as “truthiness.”
Perhaps more importantly, no piece of legislation is
perfect. To expect our legislators to vote for the perfect bill asks the
impossible. No legislator can or should be held to that standard. But the way
in which political operatives abuse roll call records, they aim to make us think
there is only one way—the true way—to represent a political position and the
interests of a place or a people. Everything else is craven and suspect. I
fundamentally object to this standard, and to this particular misrepresentation
of legislating. We ought to expect better of civic discussion and discourse.
One final point. Using the logic of the Montana Republican
Party as expressed in their press release, I guess Senator Mitch McConnell
hates Keystone, too, because he voted against his own cloture motion! He
flip-flopped!
Don’t believe me? Go look it up here.
No, of course not. He voted against it as a procedural
matter so that he could later introduce a possible motion to reconsider on the
bill. But hey, context doesn’t matter, right?
