A “dark money” group that spent millions of dollars this year on ads supporting conservative Democrats, including Reps. Henry Cuellar and Kurt Schrader, was funded by oil and gas industry lobbying group the American Petroleum Institute, Sludge has discovered.
The American Petroleum Institute’s (API) 990 tax form for 2021 shows it paid more than $3.5 million to the Better Jobs Together Campaign, an opaque Virginia corporation that was formed in April 2021, for advocacy services it performed as an independent contractor. Better Jobs Together has spent more than $2.5 million according to AdImpact figures to run television ads that praise a handful of conservative congressional Democrats for policies that they say protect the climate and jobs. API did not respond to a request for comment.
