• Claiming A $3.3 Million Tax Cut, They Paid Him Up To $140,000.

Craddick’s personal financial disclosures reveal that he received a 1999 income of between $44,500 and $140,000 from these companies, even as they claimed more than $3 million of his tax cut that year. Most of this income came from oil and gas royalties (the exact income amount is unknown because officials report it in ranges such as “$10,000-$24,999”).

While hundreds of producers claimed this special tax cut for marginal oil and gas wells, 17 companies—with tax breaks exceeding $200,000 apiece—accounted for 36 percent of the total tax cut. Craddick reported business dealings with seven of these mega-beneficiaries, including the $10,000-$24,999 in royalty payments he received from the only company to claim a $1 million tax cut: Pioneer Natural Resources.

As the Dallas Morning News reported in 2000, Pioneer had close ties to then-Governor George W. Bush, who fast-tracked the tax cut by declaring it an “emergency” bill. Pioneer was created in 1997 by a merger engineered by Fort Worth financier Richard Rainwater, whose business dealings with Bush included a major stake in the Texas Rangers baseball team, which made Bush a millionaire 15 times over.

During the late 1990s, the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission (IOGCC)—representing the governors of energy producing states—pushed such severance tax cuts nationwide. Texas’ tax cut may trace its roots to prolific appointments that then-Governor Bush made to the IOGCC in 1995. A number of these appointees came from companies that got the tax break four years later; they also included representatives of Pioneer’s precursor companies. Other Bush IOGCC appointees included: Craddick, who introduced the tax cut as House Bill 989; co-sponsor Rep. Tommy Merritt; and Sen. Buster Brown, the primary author of the Senate companion bill, SB 290.•

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