A new ad from the conservative group Americans for Prosperity portrays Michael Whatley as a political outsider despite his two-decade career as a corporate lobbyist.

A voiceover claims that “while others chased power, Whatley worked to make a difference,” but his résumé is a virtual case study in revolving-door politics, with him constantly ping-ponging between the public and private sectors.

Federal law requires most lobbyists to publicly disclose their clients and earnings. A review of Whatley’s disclosures dating back to 2005 suggests that much of his work was done on behalf of oil and gas companies, an industry in which he continues to have deep financial investments.

Whatley’s public sector experience includes four roles: deputy assistant secretary at the Energy Department from 2001 to 2003, Sen. Elizabeth Dole’s chief of staff from January to December 2004, chair of the North Carolina Republican Party from 2019 to 2024, and chair of the Republican National Committee from 2024 to 2025.

In 2005, Whatley founded his first lobbying firm, The Patriot Group, which dissolved less than a year later. Despite its short tenure, the firm represented several large utility providers, including Cinergy, which later became Duke Energy.

Today, Duke Energy is the largest utility company in North Carolina and a financial supporter of Whatley’s Senate campaign. Duke Energy is expected to seek permission to raise rates for North Carolinians in the next year.

From 2005 to 2008, Whatley was employed by O’Connor & Hannon (now Nossaman LLP), a California-based firm that specializes in energy and health care policy.

Whatley’s disclosures from O’Connor & Hannon indicate that he personally generated at least $1.3 million for the firm, managing the accounts of several big-name clients, most notably Exxon Mobil, General Electric, and the weapons manufacturer Lockheed Martin.

Whatley founded another lobbying firm, HBW Resources, in 2007. The firm still exists today and specializes in the “energy, environment, conservation, transportation, and infrastructure sectors,” according to its website. Between 2007 and 2022, the firm took in more than $8 million from corporate clients, including the American Petroleum Institute, the largest trade association for the U.S. oil and gas industry.

Between 2022 and 2025, when Whatley ran the North Carolina GOP and the Republican National Committee, he was also employed as a consultant by Capital City Ventures, another D.C. lobbying firm.

Whatley’s personal finance disclosures show Capital City Ventures paying him $755,555 over a two-year period. His main clients appear to have been Centrus Energy, a nuclear power provider, and GE Vernova, formerly General Electric.

Whatley’s net worth is estimated between $3.5 and $12 million.

Americans for Prosperity, the group pushing Whatley as a political outsider, has ties to the energy sector as well. The group is closely affiliated with Koch Industries, a manufacturer of petroleum and polymers.

Whatley’s campaign website makes no mention of high utility or gas costs. His Democratic opponent, former Gov. Roy Cooper, has made lowering those costs a core plank of his campaign platform.

Cooper’s plan calls for making the energy grid more efficient and cracking down on data centers that use large amounts of power and drive up costs.

Reprinted with permission from American Journal News