Oil Industry Likes Obama -- But They Love McCain

Open Secrets:

Much has been made of Barack Obama's TV ad this week that accuses John McCain of being "in the pocket" of the oil industry, and yesterday the Democratic Party launched a website pairing McCain and Exxon Mobil as running-mates. While McCain has raised considerably more money from this unpopular industry, CRP was surprised to notice that it's actually Obama who has received more from the pockets of employees at several of Big Oil's biggest and most recognizable companies. Tallying contributions by employees in the industry and their families, we found that Exxon, Chevron and BP have all contributed more money to Obama than to McCain.

Through June, Exxon employees have given Obama $42,100 to McCain's $35,166. Chevron favors Obama $35,157 to $28,500, and Obama edges out McCain with BP $16,046 vs. $11,500. McCain leads the money race with nearly every other top giver in the oil and gas industry, though -- Koch Industries, Valero, Marathon Oil, Occidental Petroleum, ConocoPhillips, the list goes on. (You can see detail on all these companies in the spreadsheet linked below.) McCain also has a big edge with Hess Corp. -- $91,000 to Obama's $8,000 -- which has gotten some attention. And, overall, McCain's campaign has gotten three times more money from the industry than Obama's has -- $1.3 million compared to about $394,000.

Read the whole story: Open Secrets

Comments

[whiteboyblues]

HuffPo you are getting as bad as Faux News... your headline is misleading, the composition is flat and lame. Try again... "FROM THE POCKETS OF EMPLOYEES!"

[genseric13]

This is a common practice among corporations. They have employees give the money in order to hide their tracks. Happens every election. Barry is like gumby, they can work with him. McCain? They are afraid of him.

[KQuarksSuperKollider]

The real graft comes from the donations to the RNC where they have a 10X+ higher limit than an individual candidate. That's where Rethughlicans really rake it in from big oil. This is chump change.

[GuyFawkes]

Which is why they gave him 1.3 million? Do you even let facts get in the way? Or are you just proud to be ignorant?

[HadEnoughCrap]

So you're suggesting that Exxon has demanded their employees to donate huge amounts to Obama (the guy who wants to eliminate oil dependencey)? Do you really think they can do that? Or are you saying they give their employees monetary gifts to use as donations to a candidate? And somehow this has remained a secret and no one has leaked this coercion to the press?

Or isn't it more likely that these employees have donated $25 to $100 to the candidate of their own choice despite what their employers would want them to do?

[Justsaynodeal]

"So you're suggesting that Exxon has demanded their employees to donate huge amounts to Obama"

It is my understanding that the money actually comes from Exxon and is donated under the name of the employee..........called bundling. All the employee gives is the use of his name............a method used so the company can circumvent the finance laws and give more than the max allowed.

[realistxxx]

This is stupid. I work for a major pharmaceutical company and I have given O.bama the pre-convention max. Does that mean that my company or my industry supports O.bama? I donated as a citizen who has been energized by O's campaign.

Jesus, is this the best HP can do?

[poco767b]

Yes Obama is now in the pocket of big pharma and it is ll your fault.

Obama 08 :: in the pocket of the people.

[KQuarksSuperKollider]

Yup it's about what big oil gives to the RNC anyway because they will be funding most of McBush's general campaign anyway.

[StevieRae]

Ridiculous assertion. Obama has obviously collected donations from individuals who happen to work in the industry. What's more important, and supports the notion of future influence, is what are the Oil PAC's contributing? The real numbers suggests a 3 to 1 ratio benefiting McCain.

[poco767b]

Urmmm.... I don't see how this is anything. Employees of oil companies give to Obama more than McCain in spite of Obama's policies.

[loax]

These were individual donations from INDIVIDUAL PEOPLE. You are trying to make something that is nothing. This was already hashed out months ago. Get a grip and report real news!

[demfriend]

Funny though the article points out the families and people associated with big oil gave to Obama but ig oil put the money into the campaign of Mccain just as he started the "drill offshore" chorus for the oil companies. Obama has not done anything for them although it does look a bit off that now Obama has mentioned that Offshore drilling is not completely off the table if part of the deal of new energies

[AdamND]

too bad McCain has gotten over 2 million while Obama has gotten 400k

[hoopesaz]

GASP! The OUTRAGE!

[personalpolitical]

Its the employees, and CLEARLY Obama's positions haven't changed as a result of the donations, whereas McCain CLEARLY flip-flopped on got rewarded handsomely:

http://www.thepersonalispolitical.com/2008/08/mccains-oil-money-surge-his-vote-bought.html

[PoliticoJonze]

This article seemed to go out of it's way to cherrypick and twist facts so they can paint the conclusion they did. It didn't say how much the average donation was or how many donations there was and only point out in passing that McCain has the 3:1 donation advantage from Big Oil. Why only choose the top three companies? Maybe because it would fit nicely into the conclusion they wanted to push.

I think this site and their 25 years just proved they are bought and paid for with this one article. McCain is getting hammered on the fact that he'd in deep with Big Oil and low and behold this site gives him an out he can run with in ads OpenSecrets.comm says Obama gets more money from Big Oil than John McCain". This article is scandalous..

[clearthinker2008]

This is crap, the employees donated more, not the company. How freakin' misleading.

[Pquilson]

If the figures were reversed, what would you be saying? Would you be defending McCain for accepting donations from "oil company employees"?

[InnocentBystander]

If the situation was reversed and Obama called his wife a c**t would you still vote against him? Don't you love hypotheticals?

[Truye]

So what I don't like about this article is that it says that "employees" to more name brand oil companies have given more to Obama. Then it implies that all of these employees are oil execs. Which makes no sense. Is it regular employees giving to the Obama campaign, or is it all execs? I would wager a guess that it is regular employees. It seems a lot like Microsoft. A majority of their employees give to Democrats, but the higher ups give more to Republicans (though as a company I believe they give to both). So I think this is a very misleading article.

[thegreatgiginthesky]

The headline is misleading to the max.

[zull2]

Just because you happen to work for a company doesn't mean you buy the company line, hook, line, and sinker. Just because you work for an oil company does not mean you're a Republican. And just because you work for an oil company doesn't mean you're so stupid that you can't see that there's a finite supply and fossil fuels are not the answer. In fact, you'd probably be more in touch with that fact if you worked on the inside than you would be as just a simple customer of the oil industry...as almost all Americans are in some capacity.

[Coinyer101]

big oil cant have obama he's ours!

[Justsaynodeal]

That is what his people's financed campaign has wanted you to think, but this is the second story in the last two days about 0bama's big-bucks-donors.