by Nomad
Did a top-dollar campaign donation from a pair of evangelical brothers have anything to do with Ted Cruz attempt to sneak in a historic land-grab? What do Bundy's and the Oregon occupiers have to do with the corporate takeover of public lands?
Back in July 2015, Republican candidate Ted Cruz's run for the White House was given a boost with a contribution of $15 million, which was, at that point, the largest known donation to the 2016 presidential campaign. The donor of this campaign life-saver was a pair of billionaire brothers.
Surprisingly, the surname here is not Koch.
However, in many ways, the successful, blue-collar and religious Wilks brothers are a knockoff copy of the Koch brothers. The agenda is similar at the very least. Furthermore, both pairs of brothers have no problem working together if the prize is worth the taking.
According to Forbes, they are called "undercover billionaires." Farris and Dan Wilks made their sizable fortunes through the fracking industry with the sale of their company Frac Tech to a group of investors led by Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund for $3.5 billion in May 2011. The Wall Street Journal provides some more info on the company.
Frac Tech employs hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, to crack shale rocks for Exxon Mobil Corp., Chesapeake Energy Corp. and other big companies in their search for oil and natural gas.
At the time of the sale, Frac Tech reported 2010 profit of $368.7 million on $1.29 billion in revenue. The Wilks’ took in about $3.2 billion of the total $3.5 billion sale as reported by Forbes. The brothers reportedly owned 68% of the company so they are now wealthy -but not fabulously so, by Texas standards. Their estimated personal worth is $1.4 billion. Each.
Or to put it another way, they are the small fry of the 1%, but they have more than enough green stuff to build a Christian empire with.
