US Administration Must Pay Federal Workers Instead Of Financing Oil Projects - Senators

US Administration Must Pay Federal Workers Instead of Financing Oil Projects - Senators

The US Department of Interior should reverse its decision to invest in a number of oil projects and instead pay the salaries of federal workers who are furloughed because of shutdown, US Senators Robert Menendez and Edward Markey said in a statement on Wednesday

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 23rd January, 2019) The US Department of Interior should reverse its decision to invest in a number of oil projects and instead pay the salaries of Federal workers who are furloughed because of shutdown, US Senators Robert Menendez and Edward Markey said in a statement on Wednesday.

"We urge you to reverse the decision to continue this work and to direct any funds available to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) toward critical bureau functions that have been hampered under the ongoing government shutdown, rather than toward actions that directly benefit the oil industry," the lawmakers wrote to Acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and Acting BOEM Director Walter Cruickshank.

Menendez and Markey also expressed their concerns on offshore drilling, saying such projects threaten the US economy and environment, they said.

The senators noted that about 90 percent of BOEM personnel are currently on an "on-call basis" because of the shutdown. Financing of offshore drilling projects is not essential and was excluded from the bureau's shutdown contingency plan, they said.

The US federal government has been partially shut down since December 22 as a result of a dispute over the wall between Trump and Congress. Trump has asked Congress to authorize $5.7 billion to build the wall, but Democrats have refused to meet the demand.