Senator John McCain the Oil and Gas Presidential Pick

onJul 29, 2008 @ 11:19 PDT

The Washington Post has a story out today on the dramatic spike in campaign contributions to John McCain right after the Senator reversed his opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling.

The Post reports:

“Oil and gas industry executives and employees donated $1.1 million to McCain last month – three-quarters of which came after his June 16 speech calling for an end to the ban – compared with $116,000 in March, $283,000 in April and $208,000 in May.”

Overall McCain has received close to three times more in campaign donations from the oil and gas sector than Barack Obama. Here’s a graph of oil and gas donations made to the presidential hopefuls from the Center for Responsive Politics:

David Donnelly has a further breakdown of the oil and gas donation gush to McCain on the Huffington Post.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.