WASHINGTON (news agencies) — As he campaigned for the presidency, Joe Biden promised to spend billions of dollars to “save the world” from climate change. One of the largest players in the solar industry was ready.
Executives, officials and major investors in First Solar, the largest domestic maker of solar panels, donated at least $2 million to Democrats in 2020, including $1.5 million to Biden’s successful bid for the White House. After he won, the company spent $2.8 million more lobbying his administration and Congress, records show — an effort that included high-level meetings with top administration officials.
The strategy was a dramatic departure from the Arizona-based company’s posture under then-President Donald Trump, whom corporate officials publicly called out as hostile toward renewable energy. It has also paid massive dividends as First Solar became perhaps the biggest beneficiary of an estimated $1 trillion in environmental spending enacted under the Inflation Reduction Act, a major piece of legislation Biden signed into law in 2022 after it cleared Congress solely with Democratic votes.
Since then, First Solar’s stock price has doubled and its profits have soared thanks to new federal subsidies that could be worth as much as $10 billion over a decade. The success has also delivered a massive windfall to a small group of Democratic donors who invested heavily in the company.
Ahead of what is shaping up to be a tight race for the White House this year, Biden and his fellow Democrats point to the sprawling legislation as an example of investing in alternative energy in ways that will help the environment and lift the economy. But First Solar offers an example of how the same piece of legislation, shaped by a team of lobbyists and potentially influenced by a flood of campaign cash, can yield mammoth returns for the well-connected.
First Solar’s top lobbyist, Samantha Sloan, offered a revealing glimpse of the company’s reach after a bill signing celebration.
“Those of us who’ve worked on this know that none of this would have been possible without the dedication and collaboration of a group of Congressional staffers who worked long hours” to ensure that the law would “deliver as intended,” she posted on LinkedIn alongside a photo of herself beaming on the White House South Lawn.
Angelo Fernández Hernández, a White House spokesperson, did not directly address First Solar’s efforts to curry favor with the Biden administration.
“President Biden has led and delivered on the most ambitious climate agenda in history, restoring America’s climate leadership at home and abroad,” Fernández Hernández said in a statement. “The White House regularly engages with industry leaders across all sectors, including clean energy manufacturers and gas and oil producers.”
In a statement, First Solar CEO Mark Widmar said the new subsidies have helped build the company’s domestic footprint. He also took a swipe at some of First Solar’s rivals with ties to China, which dominates the industry.
“Unlike others who routinely spend substantially more lobbying on behalf of Chinese companies that circumvent US laws and deepen strategic vulnerabilities, our interests lie in a diverse, competitive domestic solar manufacturing base supporting American jobs, economic value, and energy security,” Widmar said.
Founded in 1999 by a private equity group that included a Walmart fortune heir, First Solar went public in 2006, the same year former Vice President Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth” helped raise consciousness about the threat of climate change. Company officials cultivated a constituency with Democrats during Barack Obama’s administration, which in turn subsidized their industry — and First Solar — through billions of dollars in government-backed loans.
When the Biden administration started writing rules to implement the Democrats’ new law, First Solar executives and lobbyists met at least four times in late 2022 and 2023 with administration officials, including John Podesta, who oversaw the measure’s environmental provisions. One of the more intimate gatherings was attended by Podesta, Widmar and Sloan, as well as First Solar’s contract lobbyist, Claudia James, an old friend of Podesta’s who worked for decades at a lobbying firm run by Podesta’s brother, Tony, records show.
Widmar and Sloan also attended a September 2022 celebration at the White House, according to records and social media posts, with Sloan praising the new law as “one of the most consequential pieces of legislation of our lifetimes.”
The law has been consequential for First Solar.
The company will benefit from billions of dollars in lucrative tax credits for domestic clean energy manufacturers — a policy aimed at putting the U.S. on a more competitive footing with green energy giant China. Though intended to reward clean energy businesses, the credits can also be sold on the open market to companies that have little to do with fighting climate change.
Last December, First Solar agreed to sell roughly $650 million of these credits to a tech company — providing a massive influx of cash, courtesy of the U.S. government.
Investors in the company, including a handful of major Democratic donors, have also benefited as First Solar’s share price soars.
Farhad “Fred” Ebrahimi, co-founder of the software company Quark, was added to Forbes billionaires list in 2023 thanks to the skyrocketing value of his roughly 5% stake in First Solar, financial disclosures show. Ebrahimi, along with his wife and family, contributed at least $1 million to Biden’s 2020 election effort, according to campaign finance disclosures.
Lukas T. Walton, an heir to the Walmart fortune, held a 4.9% interest in the company, according to financial disclosures from 2020. Walton donated $360,000 to Biden’s 2020 campaign, as well as $100,000 to his 2021 inauguration, campaign finance records show.
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