The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) was reportedly amended on Thursday by the Senate to prohibit the sale of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to China, North Korea, Iran, and Russia.
Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) were the main proponents of the initiative, which was approved by the Senate 85-12. SPR levels are at 40-year lows under President Joe Biden.
The House approved a related bill in January. A
fter Republicans voiced their worries about the Biden administration selling about a million barrels from the reserve to a Chinese state-controlled petroleum company last year, more than 100 Democrats joined them at the time.
The Biden administration announced a series of contracts for the purchase of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in July 2022 as part of a 180 million barrel drawdown through which the government tried to stabilize the world’s oil markets and counteract increasing gasoline prices.
One of the 14 firms that received one of the contracts included Unipec America, a division of Sinopec Corp., which is owned by the Communist Party, and was for around 950,000 barrels.
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