Legislative leader parrots oil company talking points

Anchorage Rep. Chuck Kopp, the House majority leader, could have been speaking for the oil companies Saturday when he argued for keeping the Hilcorp loophole intact and rejecting the Senate version of the gas line bill.

The Hilcorp loophole will become the Glenfarne loophole, exempting many companies from paying the graduated income tax that applies to oil and gas companies like ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips.

The House rejected the Senate version at the start of the new special session and a six-member conference committee will try to combine the competing versions by July 1.

Kopp, like the House minority Republicans and Gov. Mike Dunleavy, has long opposed updating the state’s oil tax system so that it applies to people like Texas billionaire Jeff Hildebrand, the owner of Hilcorp.

This was one of the big reasons they gave for opposing the Senate version of the bill.

“This provision Mr. Speaker is considered economically counterproductive at the moment the state is trying to attract final investment decision on phase one and phase two of the gas pipeline,” Kopp said Saturday.

Kopp was not speaking off the cuff. He read a prepared text that touched on why Hilcorp, Glenfarne and certain other oil and gas companies should continue to be exempt from income taxes.

Kopp’s words sounded like they could have been borrowed from oil industry lawyers and public relations people.

The oil companies would not have changed a syllable and had to be ecstatic that he repeated their vintage talking points.

Kopp used the passive voice and didn’t say who it is that considers ending the Hilcorp/Glenfarne loophole counterproductive.

In that regard it is productive to read what the oil companies and their business group allies claimed Friday night, just after the Senate voted 12-8 to pass its version of the gasline bill.

The oil companies said they consider the effort to end the Hilcorp/Glenfarne loophole as “entirely counterproductive.”

So when Kopp said the plan “is considered economically counterproductive,” he was lip-syncing the oil industry line.

The oil companies said Friday the Senate bill would increase uncertainty, discourage investment and make it harder to raise billions.

Kopp said Saturday the Senate bill would increase uncertainty, discourage investment and make it harder to raise billions.

The next time he stands up to defend the Hilcorp/Glenfarne loophole, Kopp needs to credit the oil companies as the source of his material.

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