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related: _Ted Cruz Master Profile · Koch Network - Charles Koch · Fossil Fuel Bloc
donors: Koch Network - Charles Koch · Fossil Fuel Bloc
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Oil, Gas, and the Texas Energy Donor Base
Money
$4.8 million career from oil and gas — Cruz’s largest donor sector and the defining financial relationship of his career. Texas produces more oil and gas than any other state. Cruz represents Texas. The alignment is structural: the state’s dominant industry funds the senator who protects it. Every Cruz vote on climate, regulation, and energy policy is pre-purchased.
The Numbers
| Source | Career Contributions |
|---|---|
| Oil & Gas sector total | $4,800,000+ |
| Koch Industries | $148,000+ (direct, plus network alignment) |
| Energy Transfer Partners | Significant |
| Pioneer Natural Resources | Significant |
| Valero Energy | Significant |
| Wilks brothers (fracking) | $15,000,000 (2012 Senate race) |
The Wilks brothers — Dan and Farris Wilks — are fracking billionaires from Cisco, Texas. They gave $15 million to a super PAC supporting Cruz’s 2012 Senate campaign — one of the largest single-donor contributions in Senate race history at the time. The Wilks fortune comes from Frac Tech Holdings, which provides hydraulic fracturing services. Their $15 million investment bought a senator who would fight every environmental regulation threatening the fracking industry.
What Oil and Gas Got
Climate obstruction: Cruz has called climate change “pseudoscience” and opposed every climate bill that reached the Senate floor. He led the opposition to the Paris Climate Agreement, called the Green New Deal a “socialist takeover,” and introduced legislation to block EPA regulations on methane emissions.
Keystone XL: Aggressively promoted Keystone XL pipeline approval, introduced multiple bills to force construction.
Deregulation: Supports eliminating the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Fought Obama-era Clean Power Plan. Supported Trump’s withdrawal from Paris Agreement.
Texas grid failure (February 2021): During the Texas winter storm that killed 246+ people and left millions without power, Cruz flew to Cancún. The grid failure was partly caused by the deregulated energy market Cruz champions — the same deregulation his oil and gas donors demand. Cruz’s response to the crisis: blame renewable energy (wind turbines), despite natural gas infrastructure failures causing the majority of lost generation capacity.
Contradiction
Cruz fled to Cancún while his constituents froze to death in homes without power — a grid failure caused by the deregulatory framework his donors fund him to maintain. The Cancún trip wasn’t the scandal. The scandal is the policy framework: Texas’s isolated, deregulated grid exists because energy companies profit from avoiding federal reliability standards. Cruz’s donors built the system that failed. Cruz protects the system. His constituents die in it.
Sources
- OpenSecrets: Ted Cruz oil and gas contributions (Tier 1)
- CNN Politics: Wilks brothers $15 million donation to Cruz super PAC (Tier 2)
- The Intercept: Ted Cruz pressure on EPA created Valero Energy windfall (Tier 2)
- Texas Tribune: Texas power grid failure and deregulation (Tier 2)
- Wikipedia: 2021 Texas power crisis (Tier 3)