Today, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) introduced a bill to levy a carbon tax. But, back on Nov. 15 of last year, Pres. Obama's press secretary promised the administration would "never" do so.
According to Reuters, the new tax law "would set a $20 tax for each ton of carbon dioxide equivalent a polluter would emit beyond a set limit, which would rise 5.6 percent annually over a 10-year period."
Last November, however, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters that would never happen:
"We would never propose a carbon tax, and have no intention of proposing one. The point the President was making is that our focus right now is the same as the American people's focus, which is on the need to extend economic growth, expand job creation. And task number one is dealing with these deadlines that pose real challenges to our economy, as he talked about yesterday."
"A carbon tax will skyrocket [the] price of everything," a statement from Sen. David Vitter (R-LA), a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, warned today:
"It's not just energy prices that would skyrocket from a carbon tax, the cost of nearly everything built in America would go up."