Despite Vote – Tester says Keystone XL Pipeline Should be Built

Senator Jon Tester released his weekly Facebook Live program called ‘Flat Top Headlines’ on Monday in which he answered several selected questions from viewers.

Tester started by saying that he met personally recently with President Biden and Vice President Harris.

“Earlier today I had the opportunity and honor to sit down with President Biden and Vice President Harris and other leaders from the Senate to continue work on providing additional resources to combat the virus and get Montanans back to work and help students get back to the classroom across our state,” said Tester.

Tester said he also spoke with President Biden personally about the Keystone XL Pipeline.

“President Biden took the permit away from the Keystone pipeline and stopped it, and I disagree with President Biden. I think that was the wrong decision,” he said. “And when I disagree with my party, I hold him accountable and I talked to him today about it. By the way, I was at the White House earlier today. In the end, I think, the Keystone Pipeline, and I know we at least have hundreds of pipelines going across the border. I'm not sure that we shouldn't build this one. In fact, I don't understand why we're not.”

When the Senate held votes on the pipeline recently, Tester originally voted to keep the pipeline, but early the next morning voted to drop the issue from the bill, drawing harsh criticism from his fellow Montana Senator Steve Daines.

However, the article stated that Tester withdrew his support because the pipeline issue ‘was not germane’. Other news sources also criticized Tester for his vote.

In addition, Tester responded to a question asking him if he could help get small concert venues in Montana back up and running.

“I'm going to tell you what the upshot of this is; if we lose these mom and pop concert venues, they'll be turned over to the big guys, and then it’s Katie bar the door,” he said. “There's a number of venues, one of them in Missoula, another one in Billings that comes to mind, who do just a marvelous job of putting on a great show and allowing folks across Montana exposure to some incredibly talented musicians and so that's also important.”

Tester holds a Facebook live session from his office in Washington, D.C. on a regular basis and solicits questions from his Facebook audience.