Monitoring Desk
WASHINGTON: The US House of Representatives adopted a bill on Thursday to ban releases of oil from the United States Strategic Petroleum Reserve from being exported to China, though the step faces an uncertain future in the upper house of the Congress.
US House of Representatives and exports of oil
The bill passed 331-97 in the House of Representatives, which Republican party took thin control of this month. The matter of United States oil exports to China became a rallying call for members of Republican party last year when Joe Biden announced the sale of 180 million barrels from the States Strategic Petroleum Reserve to domestic oil prices that rose due to war in Ukraine.
Last year United States oil companies exported almost 67 million barrels of oil to China. But in all of 2020, when Donald Trump was president of the United States, Washington exported 176 million barrels to Beijing.
Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican from Washington said that the Biden administration is wasting their strategic reserves.
Experts say to get legislation into law will need tough compromises with the upper house of the Congress, which is controlled by Democrats.
