Sen: DeWine (R) Helps His Own Investments With Oil & Gas Votes

It's not just about the campaign contributions, although goodness knows that Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Cedarville) has received enough of those from Big Oil (more than $380,000 over his career). A new report from Friends of the Earth Action analyzes the investments held by each federal legislator and how each has voted on critical oil and gas issues, and it finds that DeWine has the biggest personal investment in oil and gas companies of any U.S. Senator and that he votes accordingly:

Senator Mike DeWine (R-OH) owns more oil and gas company stock than any other senator, holding as much as $1.47 million. On ten significant energy votes, DeWine sided with the oil industry 70 percent of the time. While environmentalists have applauded DeWine’s opposition to drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, he voted against taxing the excess profits of oil companies, in favor of opening new areas off Florida’s Gulf Coast to drilling and against a proposal to reduce foreign oil imports by 40 percent.

An accompanying press release indicates that DeWine's oil and gas holdings include Occidental Petroleum (up to $350,000), Halliburton (up to $15,000), Dynegy (up to $15,000), and BP (up to $250,000). “Senator DeWine should get his assets out of oil and gas,” said Erich Pica, spokesman for Friends of the Earth Action. “The potential conflict of interest is undeniable and Mike DeWine’s voting has clearly sided with big oil. We demand that Senators like Mike DeWine either recuse, divest or place their oil and gas stocks in blind trusts in the future."