CAMDEN, NJ – New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy hasn’t been able to deliver any sort of plan to alleviate the rising cost of fuel at the gas pump.
Instead, the governor told New Jerseyeans to “Swallow hard and take it” as gas prices soared over $4 per gallon.
In response to a call to boycott Russian gasoline, Russian investments, and Russian products, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy today warned New Jersey residents of higher prices at the pump but said it’s a necessary measure.
Under President Joe Biden and Democrats, American gasoline prices rose 42% during his first year in office, long before Russia invaded Ukraine. Since the Ukraine invasion, prices have climbed an additional 8%.
“At this point with Russia given what Putin is doing in Ukraine, we’re all going to have to swallow hard and take it. This is completely unlawful,” Murphy said on the NBC Squak Box program. “This guy is a complete and utter thug. He’s a war criminal and if it means we all have to take a little bit of pain to break this guy then that’s what it’s going to take because that’s what we need to do.”
Now, a powerful South Jersey Democrat is challenging Murphy’s hands-off stance on the gas crisis, fueled over the first year of the Biden administration and made worse after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Congressman Donald Norcross (D-NJ-01) called for a temporary gas tax holiday to help protect American consumers from spikes in energy prices due to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
“That 80% of Americans say we should stop buying Russian oil in the name of defending democracy proves the depth of our support for the Ukrainian people,” Norcross said of the federal ban on Russian oil imports. “We support our friends in Ukraine in their fight for freedom. We must also act to protect the pocketbooks of working- and middle-class families here at home.”
On top of the federal ban on Russian imports, Norcross says now is the time to suspend both the state and federal gas taxes. The New Jersey gas tax is 42.4 cents per gallon. The federal gas tax is 18 cents per gallon. Combined, New Jersey drivers are paying an additional 60.8 cents per gallon for gas. Cutting both would provide significant savings.
Neither Joe Biden nor Phil Murphy has been receptive to the idea of cutting the taxes or temporarily suspending them.
“We should temporarily suspend the state and federal gas tax and continue full funding of the highway and transportation trust accounts to protect South Jersey families at the pump and preserve jobs, saving New Jersey taxpayers over 60 cents per gallon,” Norcross said. “As we exit two brutal years of the COVID pandemic and Ukrainian crisis continues to unfold, America must maintain our commitment to rebuilding our infrastructure and economy with good family-sustaining jobs, ever mindful that we need to have fuel prices that people can afford to get to their workplace.”
Norcross is the brother of powerful South Jersey Democrat powerbroker George Norcross.