Exclusive: West Coast emergency oil reserve sparks pushback from Senate Democrats | CNN Business

A pair of Senate Democrats is calling for the Trump administration to abandon efforts to build a West Coast emergency oil reserve. In a letter dated Wednesday to Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Sens. Alex Padilla and Patty Murray warn that establishing a West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve this fiscal year would flout the law and usurp congressional authority. “We also request that the Department cease all work to establish any new West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve until it has followed the process Congress has laid out,” Padilla and Murray wrote in the letter, which was shared first with CNN. The plan for a West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve came this month from Sable Offshore Corp. The proposed reserve would be an extension of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), a federal emergency stockpile that has been depleted by back-to-back wars involving Russia and now Iran. According to Politico, Sable said the proposal was made “in response to the inquiries made by the Trump administration and… ongoing discussions with the Department of War for the supply of oil and gas to California.” Details about the proposal are unclear, and Sable did not respond to a request