Issa says oil royalties trail only taxes in generating revenue for the federal government

Royalties for oil and other energy sources are the "second-largest revenue source to the federal government after the IRS."
Darrell Issa on Tuesday, May 4th, 2010 in an interview with Dylan Ratigan on MSNBC

Condensed story from 2009 Pulitzer prize winner, Politifact.com Click here for Full Story.

Darrell Issa is a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from California.

In a May 4, 2010, interview with MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., suggested that there may be a conflict of interest between the government's reliance on revenue from oil leases and its need to be a tough regulator. He focused on the Minerals Management Service, an office within the Interior Department that handles royalties, rents and other revenues from oil, natural gas and coal on federal land or in federal waters.

First, let's look at how much money MMS brings in.

For the most recent year -- 2009 -- MMS says it received $7.6 billion in combined royalties for oil, natural gas and coal, plus roughly $2.3 billion more in other revenues, for a total of $9.9 billion.

Here are a number of revenue sources collected by agencies other than IRS that seemed to qualify:

• Deposit of earnings from the Federal Reserve System (deposited by the Fed): $34.3 billion

• Alcohol and tobacco taxes (collected by the Treasury Deptartment's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax Bureau): $22.7 billion

• Customs duties (collected by Customs and Border Protection): $21.3 billion

• Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. insurance premiums and recoveries (collected by the FDIC): $20.5 billion

• Digital Television Transition and Public Safety Fund (collected by the Commerce Department): $16.7 billion

• Energy sales by the Tennessee Valley Authority (collected by TVA): $11.1 billion

This would rank MMS no higher than eighth among entities generating revenue for the government.



So Darrell Issa --- Are you Kidding?