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BP’s PAC sent its June checks to Indiana lawmakers
News Articles | Indy Star | Mary Beth Schneider | July 22, 2010
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When petroleum giant BP’s employee political action committee decided to hand out $23,700 in campaign contributions in June, the checks all had one destination: Indiana.
Seventy-nine state legislators and one state Senate candidate — 43 Democrats and 37 Republicans — have either received the money from the BP Corporation North American Political Action Committee or their check is in the mail.
BP’s business focus in this state is on Northern Indiana, including Whiting, where it is working on a $3.8 billion expansion of its refinery, and Fowler, where BP operates the largest wind farm east of the Mississippi.
But the PAC’s focus is all over the state map. The money went not only to lawmakers in Northwest Indiana, but also to lawmakers in Central Indiana and as far south as Vincennes and as far east as Fort Wayne.
With the taint of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill tarring more than just coastal beaches, however, some politicians don’t want the money. Many of the lawmakers contacted said they will not accept it — even though many have received and kept campaign contributions from BP in past years.
House Speaker B. Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, who has received $7,000 in campaign contributions from BP’s PAC since 2003, said he’ll be returning the $1,500 check BP’s PAC wrote to him in June. Bauer said he’ll recommend other House Democrats do the same.
Instead of sending money to lawmakers, Bauer said, “I think they ought to take that money and help some of those poor people that have become impoverished in the gulf.”
Senate President Pro Tempore David Long, R-Fort Wayne, said he hadn’t yet received the $1,500 check. Though he accepted $1,250 in the past, this time he expects to send it directly to a charity helping those affected by the gulf spill.
Still, Long said, BP’s Indiana operation needs to be distinguished from the deep-water drilling disaster. It employs thousands of Hoosiers, he said, and the expansion of the Whiting refinery will allow the use of Canadian tar sands to reduce the nation’s reliance on Middle Eastern oil.
“I support the expansion of the Whiting plant,” Long said. But this year, he thinks the BP PAC’s campaign contributions could be better spent elsewhere.
House Minority Leader Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, who has received $6,000 in past years, will return the $1,500 the PAC is giving him this year, a spokesman said.
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But Senate Minority Leader Vi Simpson, D-Bloomington, said she’ll keep the $1,000 the PAC is sending her, as she did the $750 she received in previous years. To turn it down, she said, “implies that a campaign contribution buys a vote, which it absolutely does not.”
Unlike direct contributions by corporations to lawmakers and candidates, there are no limits placed on donations made by political action committees that are composed of a corporation’s employees. In the case of BP’s employee PAC, the list of named donors is filled with managers and higher-ranking staffers.
Sherry Boldt, who is BP America’s government affairs director for Indiana and four other states, makes the recommendation on which lawmakers here receive money from the employees’ PAC.
Boldt said there was nothing unusual about the donations. In 2008, the last election year in Indiana, the PAC gave about $29,200 to Indiana legislative candidates, Boldt said, and in 2009, it gave about $13,000.
It was mere happenstance, she said, that the checks were all written in a single month. Indiana law bars campaign contributions during the legislative session, she noted, and most fundraising events take place in the summer.
“We issue the checks all at one time so that we can attend the fundraisers,” Boldt said. “This is pretty well business as usual.”
And, she said, one reason that only Indiana lawmakers were on this report is because so many of BP’s government affairs staff has been sent to the gulf. She said there was a chance she’d also be sent, “so I wanted to go ahead and get my checks issued and out before that happened.”
So far, she said, only about 20 of the checks have been delivered to the candidates. None had been returned yet that she knew of, but Boldt said she understood if some decided not to accept the money.
Boldt said she made her recommendations on which candidates to support in March, picking those in key leadership and committee posts, and those who are “pro-business and are supportive of pro-business and economic development activities in the state.”
That surprised Rep. John Day, a liberal Indianapolis Democrat who doesn’t often agree with business lobbyists but whom the PAC is giving $250. The Indiana Chamber of Commerce gives Day a 46 percent pro-business voting record — too low to qualify for its endorsement or PAC support.
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Day, though, said that when BP’s check comes, he’ll send it back — “You betcha!”
Dave Levinthal, communications director and OpenSecrets Blog editor for the Center for Responsive Politics, said that Washington-based watchdog group noticed the PAC’s FEC report Wednesday and did find it “pretty bizarre” that all the money went to state legislative candidates in a single state.
“For a political action committee to focus on one state and to donate so much money to so many candidates during one month’s time is not the norm,” he said.
The money is more than double the $8,250 the PAC gave in May, Levinthal said. That money went to 10 California state legislators and one Texas congressman, who also rejected it.
Julia Vaughn, policy director for the Indiana watchdog group Common Cause/Indiana, said that unlike some states, Indiana has no contribution limits, which might encourage a company like BP to focus here.
Besides, Vaughn said, “There’s not any business in the United States today that has a bigger PR problem than BP. They’ve learned over the years that campaign contributions can be a really good investment in terms of fending off hostile legislation.”
Those lawmakers who have decided to send back the money, she said, have made the right call.
“That’s a wise decision,” Vaughn said, “and makes a good statement to voters.”
Tagged with: bp, legislators, checks, indiana, whiting refinery
