[dragonwriter]

> To be clear, we are talking about donations from employees of the fossil fuel industry, who are just as much citizens and constituents as anyone else.

The usual approach to reporting political donations by firm/industry uses only PAC funds from corporate PACs controlled by firms in the industry, but OpenSecrets aggregates PAC and individual employee donations, which it justifies on the basis that “[o]ur research over more than 20 years shows a correlation between individuals' contributions and their employers' political interests and we have also observed that the donors we know about, and especially those who contribute at the maximum levels, are more commonly top executives in their companies, not lower-level employees.” [0]

In any case, I've been commenting on the political impact, not the merits, of the donations wet his candidacy.

[0] https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/methodology.php