Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Solyndra: I Forgot to Mention the Company was Also Backed by One of President Obama's Largest Campaign 'Bundlers' (GS; WMT)

 Following up on "Your Tax Dollars at Work: Goldman-backed "Solyndra shutters manufacturing, lays off workforce; plans to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy" (GS)".

Besides Goldman and the Estate of John Walton I forgot to mention Argonaut.
Digging deep into the link-vault we have this description from Barron's, July 10, 2010
...One of Solyndra's biggest stakeholders is Argonaut Ventures I. Its majority owner is Oklahoma oil billionaire George Kaiser, who was a "bundler"of campaign funds for the Obama-Biden campaign. This means he collected contributions and sent them en masse to the candidates....
ABC News said on May 24 of this year (page 3 of 3):

Did Obama Administration Cut Corners For a Green Energy Company?
...Obama Bundler George Kaiser
Kaiser's Argonaut Private Equity and its affiliates were the largest shareholder of Solyndra as it pushed for the IPO. Kaiser's firm remains a "significant financial backer of Solyndra," Solyndra spokesman David Miller confirmed. The Oklahoma oil magnate hosted a 2007 Tulsa fundraiser for Obama and regularly visits White House staff, visitor logs show.

Kaiser did not respond to interview requests made through Solyndra, and his Kaiser-Francis Oil Company in Tulsa said he declined comment. Solyndra's Miller said political ties had no bearing.

"We do not believe there was any connection at all," said Miller. "We have created a substantial number of jobs with Solyndra and we're very proud of that. I think people are missing a lot of the story getting into the politics."...MORE
The President did a photo op at the company in May of 2010. He said some things he'd probably like to take back.
Maybe some of the photos too.