As Democratic US Senate candidate John Fetterman slammed oil companies for price gouging to pad their profits, his opponent Mehmet Oz called the criticism of those same companies “reprehensible.”
While Pennsylvanians filled up their tanks Thursday, paying an average of $4.84 a gallon for gas, ExxonMobile announced they’re on track to hit $18 billion in quarterly profits.
Lt. Governor and US Senate candidate John Fetterman called the number “mind boggling” and said it doesn’t take a genius to see that oil companies are price gouging hard-working consumers.
“These oil and gas companies are keeping prices high for consumers just so they can make literally billions of dollars in profits,” Fetterman said in a statement. “And they are bragging about it to their investors while hard-working Americans pay more and more at the pump. This price gouging bullshit needs to end.”
One person who hasn’t noticed the sky-high prices, Fetterman said, is his Republican opponent, celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz.
“My opponent, multi-millionaire celebrity doctor Dr. Oz, surely doesn’t notice these sky high prices,” Fetterman said. “He might not even notice if one of his nine homes went missing. He simply doesn’t get it.”
With gas prices surging nationally, Oz called President Joe Biden’s criticism of profiteering oil and gas companies “reprehensible” during a recent appearance on the right-leaning Rose Unplugged podcast.
“The oil industry, natural gas folks who provide base energy for our nation and its growth are being vilified and they’re being hurt in ways that are invisible to the voter, which is wrong,” Oz told host Rose Tennent.
According to AAA, the current average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gas nationally is $4.75.
At this time last year, the average gas price in Pennsylvania was $3.21 per gallon.
Gas prices in Pennsylvania have exceeded the national average — hitting a record high average of $5.07 per gallon last month — since March, when President Joe Biden ordered a ban on Russian oil imports in retaliation for Vladimir Putin’s onslaught in Ukraine.
Pennsylvania’s highest prices are currently in the western part of the state, where a gallon of regular gas is averaging around $4.93 in Armstrong, Beaver, and Greene counties.
Ashley Adams In her 16 years in the communications industry, Ashley Adams has worn many hats, including news reporter, public relations writer, marketing specialist, copy editor and technical writer. Ashley grew up in Berks County and has since returned to her roots to raise her three children.
