California Threatens Penalties for Oil Companies' Big Profits on Gas Prices

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

62% : Gov. Gavin Newsom and his allies in the state Legislature introduced the proposal Monday as lawmakers returned to the state Capitol in Sacramento for the start of a special legislative session focused solely on the oil industry.
57% : But that doesn't mean it will be easy to get it through the state Legislature, where the oil industry is one of the top spenders on both lobbyists and campaign contributions.
56% : We're heating up because of these folks," Newsom said, referring to the oil industry and its impact on the environment.
51% : Speaking to reporters, Newsom compared the actions of oil companies to price gougers charging more for hand sanitizer during the pandemic.
50% :"I don't think anybody objects to (oil companies) having a business model that makes a profit, but the extent to which they're taking advantage of people really does appear to be unfair," said state Sen. Ben Allen, a Democrat from Santa Monica, expressing general support for Newsom's concept.
48% : But the proposal was missing key details, including how much profit is too much for oil companies and what fine they would have to pay for exceeding it.
48% : She noted the oil industry spent the money as "independent expenditures," meaning she had no control over that spending during the campaign.
44% : The oil industry spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on radio and TV ads supporting Ashby's campaign, a trend noticed by critics who tried to use it against her.
41% : Gas prices are always higher in California because of taxes, fees and environmental regulations that other states don't have.
41% : That means only a simple majority would be needed for passage, instead of the two-thirds majority that is required to raise taxes.
36% : Ashby said she hasn't been approached by lobbyists or others from the oil industry asking how she would vote on a potential penalty.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.