AP is reporting: “Exxon Mobil Corp. reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion Thursday, the biggest quarterly profit ever by any U.S. corporation, but the results were well short of Wall Street expectations and its shares fell.”

TYSON SLOCUM
Slocum is director of Public Citizen‘s Energy Program. He said today: “Contrary to what Bush is claiming, the Department of Energy determined that an increase of offshore drilling would have an insignificant impact on oil supply and prices. These profits at Exxon Mobil and other big oil companies are not being re-invested into things that would end our oil addiction; they are being used to finance things like stock buy-backs. We need to stop subsidizing big oil so we can invest in clean energy.”

Public Citizen has just released a statement “Loophole Spared Oil Companies Billions in Royalty Payments to American Taxpayers,” which begins: “A bureaucratic oversight has allowed 24 oil companies to skip out on more than $1.3 billion in royalties (55% by foreign oil companies) for the privilege of extracting oil and natural gas from U.S. territory in the Gulf of Mexico. But this $1.3 billion in forgone royalties pales in comparison to the $60 billion that Americans stand to lose in royalty revenue over the life of these leases. If Congress repeals the moratorium on offshore drilling, these freeloading oil companies will gain more record profits while American families are left holding the bag.”

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167