Oil, gas industry spent $11.8 million on 2014 election in Colorado

The oil and natural-gas industry spent nearly $11.8 million on the 2014 election for Colorado state offices vs. $800,000 during the 2010 and 2012 elections, according to a report from Denver-based Colorado Ethics Watch.

The nonprofit watchdog group said this week that most of the oil industry’s spending came from an issue committee formed to oppose initiatives aimed at restricting hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The oil and gas well completion technique involves pumping millions of gallons of liquid into a drilled hole to extract oil and natural gas from dense shale formations deep underground.

Ethics Watch identified 28 companies and trade associations that contributed $10.8 million to issue committees. Nearly all of that money funded the issue committee Protecting Colorado’s Environment, Economy & Energy Independence, formed by, among other oil and gas producers, Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (NYSE: APC) and Noble Energy Inc. (NYSE: NBL), the two largest producers in Weld County.

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The oil companies created the issue committee to fight anti-fracking ballot measures, including 2,000-foot buffers between wells and buildings, and another initiative that called for an environmental bill of rights. A group backed by U.S. Rep. Jared Polis agreed to drop the initiatives when Gov. John Hickenlooper formed a task force to craft recommendations to reduce oil and gas land-use conflicts.

The issue committee spent $10.8 million, much of it on signature gathering, public opinion research and advertising.

About $800,000 of the total contributions went to a bipartisan mix of state political action committees and other political organizations, which contributed money to state candidates and funded advertisements.

Fourteen registered political action committees spent $130,800 in the 2014 state elections, most of which funded candidate committees. Oil and gas companies cannot contribute directly to state candidates, so the political action committees contributed a total of $70,200 to state candidate committees.

A bipartisan group of 86 state and county candidates received contributions. The 28 Democratic candidates who received contributions consisted mostly of incumbent legislators. Many of the 58 Republican candidates supported by oil and gas political action committees were challengers.

The political action committees contributed primarily to the governor and attorney general races in the 2014 election. Those positions influence energy policy and litigation concerning issues such as municipal fracking bans.

The political action committees mostly supported Gov. John Hickenlooper with a total of $9,200, while Republican challenger Bob Beauprez received just $1,100. Oil and gas political action committees contributed $4,850 to Republican attorney general candidate Cynthia Coffman.

Meanwhile, oil and gas industry employees contributed another nearly $190,000 to state candidates.