BP Spent Millions on Lobbying, Campaign Donations

By: Brian Montopoli
Topics: Democrats ,; Domestic Issues ,; Congress

(Credit: NOAA)

During the 2008 campaign cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, individuals and political action committees (PACs) associated with oil-giant BP contributed about $500,000 to federal candidates. About 40 percent went to Democrats.

The top recipient overall? President Obama, who got $71,000 from the company tied to the environmental disaster in the Gulf, according to the group.

The organization says BP spent $16 million on lobbying last year and $3.53 million in the first quarter overall, putting it second among oil and gas industry interests. The oil and gas industry spent $169 million on lobbying in 2009.

Current law caps BP's liability for the spill at $75 million, though Congress and the White House are working to retroactively raise the cap, despite the possible unconstitutionality of such a move.

The White House stresses that the money that flowed to Mr. Obama during the campaign from BP came from individual employees, not PACs or federal lobbyists. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs today dismissed the notion that there is a correlation between contributions and insufficient regulation of BP as "silly and ridiculous."

Before the spill, Mr. Obama ended the moratorium on offshore drilling in certain areas and deemed the practice generally safe.

Spokesman Ben LaBolt told Politico in response to news of the contributions that Mr. Obama that "since he became president, he rolled back tax breaks and giveaways for the oil and gas industry, spearheaded a G20 agreement to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, and made the largest investment in American history in clean energy incentives."

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Brian Montopoli
Brian Montopoli is the senior political reporter at CBSNews.com.
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by kluzer12 May 5, 2010 9:19 PM EDT: The headline of the story should be the biggest recipient of cash in the last 20 years from BP was President Obama. You know if Bush were in office this would be the headline. Come on libs you know it.; Reply to this comment

by sjc_1 May 5, 2010 8:25 PM EDT

Public Money for Public Office. Corporate campaign and party contributions are NOT "free speech". We need to get the government accountable to the people.

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by pasmalltown May 6, 2010 8:28 AM EDT: What really needs to done is to hold BP completely responsible for their accident. Which appears to be what the government is trying to do:

"Current law caps BP's liability for the spill at $75 million, though Congress and the White House are working to retroactively raise the cap, despite the possible unconstitutionality of such a move."
How successful the gov't will be remains to be seen. It would seem that the "We need to get the government accountable to the people." is already taking place.........

The political system in place NOW does not allow the government to hold private industry responsible enough for their "mistakes", what the current system does do is allow private industry to "deflect" the blame onto the federal gov't i.e. lack of oversight. Big business has historically set themselves up into this "win-win" situation. You watch however as political conservatives dilute this attempt to "right this wrong" with their no more oversight rhetoric, "less gov't is best for the Nation" crap..............

by LIBERALS-are-HYPOCRITES-2 May 5, 2010 6:54 PM EDT

Support Obama and what do you get ?

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by pasmalltown May 6, 2010 8:30 AM EDT: We've already seen what we get from Cheney's buddies at Halliburton. Care to talk about that?


by jurado May 16, 2010 10:26 PM EDT: " . . . We've already seen what we get from Cheney's buddies at Halliburton . . "

Halliburton?? Didn't 0bama just give them another huge no-bid contract??

Oh,yeah, that's right.
From Bloomberg News: ?KBR Inc. (aka Halliburton) was selected for a no-bid contract worth as much as $568 million through 2011 for military support services in Iraq, the Army said.?

Face it, pasmalltown, your guy 0bama is a disaster for this country and he must be sitting in the basement of the White House right now thinking, "What do I have to do to get pasmalltown to obandon me??"


by hughjohnson May 5, 2010 5:15 PM EDT: What was Harry saying about republicans cozying up to wall street? The Dems dishonesty is so transparent.; Reply to this comment