The largest U.S. energy companies increased lobbyist spending by 30% in 2008 to influence energy and climate change legislation. Some of those funds are now going towards the creation of the American Energy Alliance, a new off-shoot of Institute for Energy Research.
The American Energy Alliance is headed by an oil industry lobbyist named Thomas J. Pyle. Before joining AEA, Pyle was a policy adviser to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX). Pyle’s former employer was among the top recipients of oil industry campaign contributions from 1998 to 2004, raking in $498,375 according to the Center for Public Integrity. Pyle then went to work for the oil-giant, Koch Industries.
The American Energy Alliance is airing radio ads in the home districts of moderate Democrats in order to press legislators to vote against the Waxman-Markey clean energy bill. Here’s a list of the Democrats being targeted by the ads:
— John Barrow (D-GA) — G.K. Butterfield (D-NC) — Mike Doyle (D-PA) — Charlie Gonzalez (D-TX) — Baron Hill (D-IN) — Jim Matheson (D-UT) — Charlie Melancon (D-LA) — Tim Murphy (R-PA) — Mike Ross (D-AR) — Betty Sutton (D-OH)
The ad repeats the debunked $3,100 lie that energy companies and their conservative allies have been pushing for weeks. Listen to the AEA anti-clean energy ad: