Gardner Calls Obama's Keystone XL Decision A 'Misguided Choice'
DENVER (CBS4) - Colorado Republican Sen. Cory Garner says President Barack Obama's rejection of the proposal to build the Keystone XL pipeline Friday puts "the demands of radical political groups over American jobs" and is a "misguided choice."
Senator Michael Bennet, a Democrat, also said he disagreed with the president's action.
"Construction of the Keystone pipeline would have created jobs, reduced America's dependence on overseas oil, and helped further the North American energy revolution that has created so much prosperity in our country," Gardner said Friday morning in a prepared statement.
The proposal would have contructed an oil pipeline system that would transport oil from Canada and the North Dakota Bakken Shale region to Midwest and Gulf Coast refineries.
Bennet, one of few Democrats who supported the project, said he disagreed with the president.
"For years, the Keystone XL pipeline has been over-hyped on both sides of the debate," Bennet said in a statement to The Durango Herald. "The number of jobs it would create and the amount of carbon emissions it would facilitate have both been exaggerated.
Obama said Friday morning he does not believe the Keystone XL pipeline serves the national interest.
In announcing the decision, he said the pipeline played an over-inflated role in politics on both sides. Gardner, however, said the measure had bipartisan support.
"The President's decision today has nothing to do with the environment, and everything to do with politics," he said.
The president says the United States has cut pollution even as the population grew, and that it's important that Americans hold ourselves to the same standards we hold the rest of the world.
"Frankly, approving this project would have undercut that global leadership. And that's the biggest risk we face -- not acting," Obama said. "Today we're continuing to lead by example."
The announcement brings an end to a seven year saga. It comes just days after TransCanada asked the U.S. State Department to pause their review.
