Top G.O.P. Donors in Energy Industry Met Cheney Panel
(Page 2 of 2)
March 1, 2002
"After we met with the vice
president that time, they just
waltzed us out on the White
House lawn and put us in front of
the TV cameras," Mr. Pope said.
There were no cameras waiting
when corporate chief executives
and senior vice presidents met
with the task force, he said.
In interviews this week, most of
the Republicans' top 25 corporate
contributors from the energy
sector confirmed their contacts
with the administration, and in
many cases, executives even
provided details of the issues they
discussed with task force
members or the vice president.
Many pointed out that
companies' opinions on most
regulatory and environmental
issues can be found on their Web
sites. Three of the companies
would not comment and four said
they did not meet with Mr.
Cheney or his staff.
The Exelon Corporation,one of
the nation's largest electric utility
companies, said its co-chief
executive officers, Corbin A.
McNeill Jr. and John W. Rowe,
were among a group of about 75
energy executives who met with Mr. Cheney in the Old
Executive Office Building in March. Along with other
Nuclear Energy Institute participants, Mr. McNeill also
met later in the month with Karl Rove, President Bush's
chief strategist, and Lawrence B. Lindsey, the president's
lead economic adviser, a company spokesman said.
The chairman of Ashland Petroleum, a major oil refining
company, met with Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham
last spring to argue the arcana of increasing pipeline
capacity. The chairman of BP, Lord John Browne, and
other executives from the company, the 10th largest
contributor to the Republican Party, met with Mr. Cheney
and other administration officials in late February of 2001
to discuss international issues.
As part of a series of meetings organized by oil industry
trade groups, the chairman of Anadarko Petroleum,
Robert Allison, along with a handful of other executives,
saw Mr. Cheney on Feb. 8, 2001. The 14th biggest donor
to the Republican Party, Anadarko called for opening
federal lands to greater oil and gas exploration and
production, a cause it has championed for years.
"It's our job to meet with people, and it's the job of the
administration to gather ideas," said Teresa Wong, a
spokeswoman for Anadarko. "Bob Allison has been
meeting with presidential administrations, with the
Clinton administration and others, for years."
The Marathon Oil Corporation, among other oil
companies, chose to have a trade group, the American
Petroleum Institute, speak for it. "Our interests were
represented by A.P.I. before the task force," a Marathon
spokesman, Paul Weeditz, said.
No energy company contributed more to the Republican
Party than Enron: $1.7 million in individuals'
contributions, soft money donations and contributions
from its political action committee. Enron appeared to
have the most access to the task force. David S.
Addington, counsel to Mr. Cheney, said in January that
Enron executives had six meetings with the task force in
2001. Five were with staff members, on Feb. 22, March 7,
April 9, Aug. 7 and Oct. 10. In the sixth meeting, on April
17, Kenneth L. Lay, the former Enron chairman, met with
Mr. Cheney to discuss energy policy and the California
energy crisis.
Discussions with the White House are nothing new to
many executives in the energy industry, and companies'
opinions on most regulatory and environmental issues are
widely known. All of which has left the energy industry
perplexed by the tug-of- war between Mr. Cheney and the
Congressional accounting office.
"When I talk to people in the industry or in Congress, the
sense is, What are we going to find out, that the energy
industry was in there talking to the task force?' " said an
executive from one large contributor to the Republican
Party. "I don't think there's a list out there that could be
far afield from any list of major companies. Within the
industry, there's this feeling like, `Don't we already know
who was there?' "
A handful of the most sizable energy industry donors to
the Republican Party said their officers did not meet with
the vice president or with task force staff members. Some
executives pointed out that with an administration led by
a former oilman that shares the priorities of the rest of the
energy industry, there is little need for dogged lobbying.
Lehman Brothers ranked as the sixth
largest energy industry contributor to the Republican
Party during the 1999-2000 election cycle. Lehman
owned Peabody Energy (news/quote), the world's largest
coal mining company, and its subsidiary, Black Beauty
Coal, until its initial public offering last year. Peabody
executives were among 30 or 40 industry officials briefed
by members of the energy task force in meetings set up
last spring by the Edison Electric Institute, the power
industry's primary lobbying group.
Frederick D. Palmer, the chief lobbyist for Peabody, said
the company met more often with the Clinton
administration than it does with the Bush White House
because it needed to argue its case more often.
"We're all on the supply side - the electric utilities, the
coal companies - and the energy plan is basically a
supply side plan, but that's not the result of back room
deals or lobbying the vice president of the United States,"
Mr. Palmer said. "People running the United States
government now are from the energy industry, and they
understand it and believe in increasing the energy
supply, and contribution money has nothing do with it."
The largest Republican donors maintain that their
contributions did not buy them access. But they did pave
the way for the rise of an administration that ultimately
supported much of the agenda of the energy industry.
"We give money to these people to have a business
environment we want to work in," Ms. Wong of Anadarko
said. "And the thing we're proposing is to have an increase
in the domestic energy supply."
nytimes.com |
