SENATOR ANWAR RELEASES STATEMENT AFTER FEDERAL LEADERS CALL OUT POTENTIAL ENERGY COLLUSION WORSENING INFLATION, HARMING FAMILIES

Today, State Senator Saud Anwar (D-South Windsor) released the following statement in response to a letter that U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and 22 additional Democratic U.S. Senators sent to the Department of Justice this week requesting that Attorney General Merrick Garland use every tool possible to prevent and prosecute potential collusion and price-fixing in the oil industry. The letter was spurred by a recent Federal Trade Commission investigation into a merger between Exxon Mobil and Pioneer discovered text messaging implying oil leaders and OPEC may have colluded to artificially keep oil prices higher. Such collusion may have cost the average American household as much as $500 in annual gas spending per vehicle, while major oil companies earned a collective $300 billion in profits in 2022 and 2023 – and energy prices are often pointed to as one of the most significant factors in inflation.

“It is disturbing to see oil companies potentially colluding to keep gas prices high in order to rake in profits while our communities suffered. Concerns over this issue only grow deeper when OPEC’s international ties with countries opposing the United States are involved – if these allegations are founded, they imply that American companies and foreign nations conspired to keep consumer prices high to harm American households. We have to stop corporate greed for the good of our economy.”