Bill Bush | 202.682.8114 | bushw@api.org

WASHINGTON, December 16, 2011 – Jack Gerard, President and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute, and General Jim Jones, former U.S. National Security Advisor in the Obama administration, presented remarks to reporters this morning about the Keystone XL pipeline.They said the pipeline was of utmost importance to America's national security and to creating new jobs.They urged the administration to approve the project as soon as possible:

Gerard:

"The administration delayed a decision to go forward with the Keystone XL project until after the election…. Based on the facts it is hard not to conclude the President's decision was driven by politics.He relented to the demands of those who essentially oppose all development and consumption of oil and natural gas.

"However, the President's apparent deference to political expediency means he has also put on hold thousands of near-term, shovel-ready construction and manufacturing jobs at a time when millions of America's workers are desperately seeking them.These are jobs that could put food on the table and help pay the rent of many Americans now without the ability to do either."

Gen. Jones:

"One of our key challenges is maintaining our ability to make rapid decisions to be more competitive in the world…. If we get to the point where we cannot bring ourselves to do what is in our national interest, then we are clearly in a period of decline in terms of our global leadership and our ability to compete.

"A nation that fails to secure the energy its citizens and its economic engine need to keep functioning leaves itself vulnerable to external contingencies in a dangerous and uncertain world and to the whims of foreign leaders and other actors who may not always have its interests at heart.

"The delay, and possible rejection of this pipeline, could have significant and long-range national security implications for our nation. Our economy will recover and, as it does, it will need more and more energy. While we have made tremendous progress developing wind, solar and other alternative energy forms, and while the country's vast natural gas supplies are playing a greater role in meeting our energy needs, the fact remains – as the president has noted – that we will continue to need oil, and plenty of it."

API represents more than 490 oil and natural gas companies, leaders of a technology-driven industry that supplies most of America's energy, supports 9.2 million U.S. jobs and 7.7 percent of the U.S. economy, delivers more than $85 million a day in revenue to our government, and, since 2000, has invested more than $2 trillion in U.S. capital projects to advance all forms of energy, including alternatives.