They already have a stake in it.
Maybe government should quit taking money on every gallon pumped at the station seeing how they had no actual expense in acquiring said product.
The govt owns the leases "on behalf of the American People". It is always more cost effective to sit back and let someone else take all the risk for msot of the reward. meanwhile, you get to criticize how they do it, even though you, yourself, have not a fucking clue how to do it, and you still get to collect a share of the per barrel revenue in exchange for the lease, plus a tax on the corporate entity's revenues, a tax on the capital gains of the shareholders, a per barrel tax on the refined product, and a tax on the consumer who buys the refined product.
Nice work if you can get it, eh?