Since President Obama’s decision to delay construction of the $7 billion Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, congressional Republicans have been looking for a way to both attack him as dithering on a potential job creator, and simultaneously wanting to wrestle away the President’s authority to approve the pipeline, and do it themselves. Most recently, John Hoeven (R-ND) is attempting to write new legislation that uses congress’ powers to regulate international commerce to bypass President Obama’s power to veto the pipeline’s construction.

This most recent move by congressional Republicans is made more urgent by language included in December’s payroll tax holiday bill that forced Obama to come to a decision on the pipeline within 60 days. That deadline is fast approaching and some republicans fear that in forcing Obama’s hand, he may veto the pipeline’s construction. Obama is caught in a political tug-of-war between his party’s two large constituencies, environmentalists who want the pipeline eliminated and labor unions who want the pipeline’s construction jobs. Hoeven and House Senate Republicans claim that the pipeline will increase oil security in the western hemisphere by making the U.S. less dependent on foreign oil (even though Canada is, technically, a foreign country), and will create as many as 20,000 jobs in the U.S. Environmentalists, on the other hand, believe that it will make no significant different to oil prices within the U.S. and will only create about 5,000 jobs at the expense of putting thousands of miles of ecosystem and agricultural farmland in danger.

Nebraska is the only state government that is impeding construction of the pipeline, mostly to find an alternate route around the state’s fragile sand hills and the Ogalalla Aquifer, the largest natural source of fresh water  on the continent and directly in the path of TransCanada’s original pipeline plan. Should Nebraska locate that alternate route and OK the pipeline’s construction in their unicameral, the only hurdle will be the President’s approval. Ahead of that, Republicans are hoping that they can create a legislative work-around that allows them to bypass the Presidential veto power on any infrastructure that straddles national borders.

Obama’s only other option, and one that is just as likely to enrage environmentalists but may be a bit more politically expedient, is to say that the pipeline is in the national interest but it’s construction will be contingent on an environmentally sound path through the state of Nebraska. In that way he’ll essentially be passing the buck to a conservative state where a majority of voters have already been found to support the pipeline’s construction. Of course, taking this alternative isn’t really going to save the President many political points with environmentalists, who are already lamenting the President’s record on the environment.