The ever-enterprising Matt Stiles took last week’s list of Houston billionaires and gave it a local politics-angle:
Business reporter Purva Patel has a story today about the Houstonians who made Forbes magazine’s annual list of the 400 richest Americans.
The list includes John Arnold, a 33-year-old former energy trader at Enron who now heads the energy-market hedge fund Centaurus Energy.
Arnold, the youngest billionaire noted by the magazine, is among several on the Forbes list who donated campaign money to city politicians.
The Houston billionaires and their spouses gave at least 44 donations, totaling more than $100,000, in the 2005 and 2007 election cycles, according to campaign finance records.
Mayor White, of course, received the most money, collecting at least 17 donations totaling $80,000, the data show.
I compiled a list of all the donations, and then the totals by elected official. Check out both files on Google Docs.
