Six figure campaign will run in DC, Iowa, North Carolina, Utah, Maine, Kansas
Watch campaign’s launch ad — “Follow the Money”
Campaign will highlight Senate budget’s $18 billion in new oil and gas giveaways– and how families will pay the price
Washington, DC — As the Senate takes up the reconciliation bill, a new campaign called Families Over Big Oil is launching to expose how Republican leaders are slashing programs that support working families to bankroll billions in tax breaks for Big Oil. The coalition is launching an initial six-figure campaign that will run in DC, Iowa, North Carolina, Utah, Maine, and Kansas and will include digital and print advertisements, billboards, grassroots activations, op-eds, and more.
“Trump and the GOP want another tax cut for Big Oil billionaires,” said Erich Pica, President of Friends of the Earth Action. “Paying for another polluter handout with cuts to Medicaid and food stamps is simply unconscionable.”
“Congressional Republicans and President Trump are choosing to put wealthy fossil fuel corporations and billionaires over working families with their dangerous tax scam. The deadly tax and budget bill would authorize fossil fuel drilling on public lands at discount rates — saving Big Oil billions at taxpayer expense; gift Big Oil an arcane tax break worth another billion; and provide billions more to incentivize even more dangerous drilling — all while slashing support for domestic clean energy technologies, throwing away good-paying U.S. manufacturing jobs and driving up consumers’ energy bills,” said Robert Weisman, co-president of Public Citizen. “This is all a piece of the unconscionable bill that represents the greatest transfer of wealth from regular people to the super rich in American history. If Republicans have their way, this bill would make permanent the tax cuts for the richest 0.1%, while low-income Americans would see their health care and food assistance disappear. Amazingly, Republican fealty to Big Oil is so great that they are supporting legislation that would make energy bills even more expensive, even as many families already pay a quarter of their income on their electricity bills. The One Big Bountiful Oil Bonanza is an extremely dangerous step backwards that would harm millions of Americans. It’s time congressional Republicans put working families over corporate interests. That means abandoning this legislative debacle.”
“The reconciliation bill is a gospel of greed and cruelty. It slashes healthcare and nutrition. It decimates government support for renewable energy. It giftwraps billions in subsidies for the fossil fuel industry,” said Rev. Fletcher Harper, Executive Director at GreenFaith. “No faith on the planet supports such a heartless abomination.”
“Trump’s tax bill is a slap in the face to our generation, a disaster for our planet, and a gift to the billionaires destroying our future. Republicans are gutting good-paying clean energy jobs and letting Big Oil poison our air and water, all to give handouts to the fossil fuel industry and massive tax cuts to billionaires,” said Aru Shiney-Ajay, Executive Director of the Sunrise Movement. “Any member of Congress who votes for this bill is siding with billionaires and Big Oil over millions of Americans.”
“The science could not be clearer — time is running out. Every day policymakers choose to delay bold climate action, we edge closer to irreversible climate chaos,” said Jamie Minden, Executive Director of Zero Hour. “As young people, we are watching our futures be sold out so fossil fuel companies can make record profits. The reconciliation bill’s subsidies for oil and gas are a direct threat to our lives and the children who will inherit this planet.”
The campaign will focus on how while families across the country are struggling to afford groceries, child care, rent, and healthcare – fossil fuel CEOs are raking in massive profits propped up by nearly $170 billion in taxpayer-funded subsidies over the next decade . And now, Senate Republicans are taking it even further: slipping a $1.1 billion tax loophole for oil and gas producers into Trump’s budget plan – on top of the billions in oil and gas giveaways in the House bill, while proposing cuts to food assistance, clean energy rebates, and affordable healthcare. The total in new oil and gas tax giveaways across the entire Senate bill stands at $18 billion.
Families Over Big Oil is a campaign launched by United to End Polluter Handouts, a coalition of dozens of economic justice, environmental, faith-based, youth, and anti-corruption organizations including Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen, Greenfaith USA, Sunrise Movement, Sierra Club, Hip Hop Caucus, Zero Hour, FACT Coalition, Oil Change International, and more — representing millions of Americans. Their goal is to educate people about the fossil fuel scam in the reconciliation bill and put pressure on Congress to stop it. The campaign will be taking action online and in the streets to demand an end to polluter handouts and for a budget that puts working people first — not fossil fuel executives.