Senate, North Carolina
Before chairing the Republican National Committee, Michael Whatley spent nearly two decades as a paid energy lobbyist — co-founding the firm HBW Resources in 2009 and serving as executive vice president of the Consumer Energy Alliance, an oil-and-gas-industry group backed by BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Shell. Lobbying-disclosure records show Whatley and colleagues reported $3.5 million in lobbying income over 12 years, roughly $1.2 million of it tied to energy clients including Duke Energy, and his family still holds stock in Duke Energy and ExxonMobil — companies he lobbied for. As RNC chair, Whatley pressured Senate Republicans to pass what became the Big Ugly Bill — which repealed the bulk of the Inflation Reduction Act’s clean energy tax credits — saying on a radio interview, “We’ve seen the House deliver on the ‘big, beautiful bill.’ We need the Senate to do the same”. After it passed, he called the law “our agenda” and said it would be the “cornerstone” of the RNC’s 2026 midterm messaging. That record sits alongside a proposed 18% Duke Energy rate hike hitting North Carolina customers through 2028, driven in part by surging data-center electricity demand. Appointed by Trump in January 2025 as Western North Carolina’s Hurricane Helene recovery coordinator, Whatley has drawn complaints from Black Mountain and Swannanoa residents, who told a local TV station that FEMA appeals were taking up to 180 days and tens of millions of dollars in aid remained bottlenecked nearly a year later.
