Sanders Calls For Hearings On Oil Co. Price Gouging

This one goes out to Newshog's pet conservative and oil company apologist, Allan@Aberdeen. Friend of the people and shoo-in for the Senate, Rep.Bernie Sanders (I-Vt), is fighting the good fight yet again.

Today Exxon Mobil announced a 3rd quarter profit of nearly $10 billion, the largest corporate quarterly profit ever, and more than $4 billion dollars more than the company brought in during the 3rd quarter of last year. All of the other major oil companies experienced record-breaking profits as well. These staggering profits come at a time when consumers are faced with skyrocketing prices for gas and home heating oil.

In response to these announcements, Congressman Sanders is calling for the Government Reform Committee on which he sits to hold a hearing immediately with the CEOs of the major oil companies to investigate their price gouging practices. Sanders requested this hearing today in a letter to Government Reform Committee Chairman Tom Davis.

Sanders said, “It is absolutely outrageous for oil companies like Exxon Mobil to be raking in obscene profits while millions of Americans are struggling to pay skyrocketing gas and home heating oil prices. Let’s be clear. Senior citizens will go cold this winter, and workers will lose a significant part of their pay checks if we do not stop this price gouging.”

The record-breaking profits posted by the big oil companies come at a time when the price of heating oil is already 56 cents a gallon higher than a year ago and the price of gasoline is over $1 higher than just two years ago. The nearly $10 billion profit reported by Exxon Mobil today represents only the profits earned in the last three months of the year. This means that Exxon Mobil’s 3rd quarter profits would be more than Coca-Cola Co., Intel Corp. and Time Warner Inc. earn in an entire year. Similarly BP reported a $6.53 billion third-quarter profit, up from $4.87 billion in the same period last year; ConocoPhillips Co. 3rd quarter profits increased by 89% from last year’s level, going from $2 billion last year to $3.8 billion this year; Royal Dutch Shell’s profits increased by 68%; and Marathon Oil’s profits more than tripled.

Sanders said, “At a time when millions of Americans are hurting financially, they should not be forced to pay outrageously high prices for gas and home heating oil. We owe it to the American people to do everything we can to stop big oil companies from ripping-off American consumers."

Go Bernie, Go!