The Center for Public Integrity

A politically connected solar company that pocketed a half billion dollar government loan, only to shutter its doors, fire workers and file for bankruptcy, secured an interest rate lower than other green energy projects, iWatch News and ABC News found -- one in a string of benefits the Obama administration doled out in bankrolling the project.

Now, the government’s agreement with the company compels taxpayers to take a back seat to a venture fund associated with a key Obama fundraiser in trying to collect on the debt. Investors who put in $75 million would be repaid first; some $150 million of the government's $535 million would be next in line, according to the Energy Department's agreement with the company.

The $535 million loan to Solyndra Inc., issued by the Treasury Department's Federal Financing Bank as part of the Obama administration’s stimulus to create jobs and spur development of green energy, included a quarterly interest rate of 1.025 percent, the government bank reported in July. Of 18 Energy Department stimulus loans cited in the bank’s report, Solyndra’s rate was lowest. Eight other Energy Department projects, each also backed by the Federal Financing Bank, came with rates three or four times higher, the report shows.

President Obama's alternative energy darlilng, Solyndra, goes bankrupt. Taxpayers could get stuck with a bill for $535 million in loan guarantees. See the segment below on Good Morning America.

House investigators say they have uncovered evidence that White House officials became personally involved in an energy department review of a hot-button $535 million loan guarantee to the now-failed California solar company Solyndra.

The revelation surfaced in a letter House Energy Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) sent to the White House Thursday night, saying he planned to accelerate efforts to understand an investment deal that may have left taxpayers out half a billion dollars.

"How did this company, without maybe the best economic plan, all of a sudden get to the head of the line?" Upton told ABC News in an interview this week. "We want to know who made this decision...and we're not going to stop until we get those answers."

Thursday's letter, which calls on the White House to turn over correspondence between administration officials, Solyndra and its investors, presents the most pointed suggestion that the White House had direct involvement in the financing.

"We have learned from our investigation that White House officials monitored Solyndra's application and communicated with [Energy Department] and Office of Management and Budget officials during the course of their review,"  the letter states.

White House officials have said in interviews that they did not intervene in the Solyndra deal or others benefiting companies backed by supporters of the president. Yet the administration, from Obama to his Energy Department, has very publicly praised the loan guarantee.

In 2009, the Obama administration hailed the Solyndra loan as the first in a series of federal infusions for "green energy" firms that held the potential to clean up the environment and create jobs. But earlier this week, Solyndra abruptly closed its doors, announced it would file for bankruptcy and laid off more than 1,100 workers.

Rick Perry’s GOP presidential campaign has rapidly assembled an impressive roster of bundlers who have each signed up to bring in sums ranging from $50,000 to $500,000.

Two veteran fundraisers for the Perry campaign, in interviews with iWatch News, put the number of recruited bundlers at more than 400 and as high as 1,000. A third said the number was “multiples” of President Obama’s bundlers.

The Obama campaign listed 271 bundlers who had raised $50,000 or more at the end of June, accounting for about 40 percent of the $86 million that the campaign collected jointly with the Democratic National Committee.

The Perry campaign appears to have made huge strides, considering it is less than a month old.

“The Perry campaign is off to a fast start on the finance side,” Mississippian Henry Barbour, who has pledged to raise $500,000, told iWatch News. At this early stage, Barbour added, it looks like the campaign “will be able to perform at a similar level, if not exceed, what Bush did in 2000 and McCain did in 2008. It’s impressive.”

Tuesday night in Dallas, at the chic Fairmont Hotel, Perry’s fundraising firepower will be out in force. An A-list of Texas donors and money rustlers have signed up as Dallas hosts including a few billionaires or near billionaires like: buyout mogul Harold Simmons, Ross Perot Jr. of the eponymous Perot Group and leveraged buyout executive Tom Hicks.

The Dallas event is one of several slated for this week in Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. On Monday, two fundraisers were held in Oklahoma including one in Oklahoma City where the legendary Sooner football coach Barry Switzer was a host.

This money marathon is part of the campaign’s drive to quickly raise $10 million, mostly out of the Lone Star state, say Perry fundraisers. To achieve that goal the bundlers will be crucial since individual donations are limited to $2,500 per election.

In ordering the Obama administration to disclose the names of all White House visitors, a federal judge has rejected claims that doing so could harm national security and be too time consuming.

U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell rejected the Secret Service claims that it would be “virtually impossible” to omit names of persons whose identities should be shielded for security reasons. The judge ruled that culling out those names was not “so unreasonable as to require a blanket rejection.”

White House spokesman Eric Schultz said on Friday that the administration is reviewing its options in response to the suit brought under the Freedom of Information Act by Judicial Watch, a public interest group.

“This is the most transparent administration in history and the president is very proud to be the first White House with a voluntary disclosure policy that provides visitor records to the American public. Administration lawyers are reviewing the decision and I’d refer you to the Department of Justice for any further questions about next steps," Schultz said in a statement.

Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said she expected the Justice Department to appeal the ruling. “I’d be shocked if that didn’t happen,” she said.

At issue are the names of all persons who entered the White House complex from January 20, 2009 through September 2009, a time of intense activity by the new Obama administration on a variety of controversial policy matters from the health care reform law to the economic stimulus package.

The White House budget office has agreed to turn over reams of records to a House committee investigating the first energy loan guarantee awarded by the Obama administration, a significant turn in an inquiry that had been bogged down by a no-show witness and subpoena for records.

That breakthrough means the House Committee on Energy and Commerce’s investigation can now explore some fundamental questions: Whether political connections factored into the $535 million loan guarantee, and whether the government fully vetted the deal before issuing the prized financial backing.

The guarantee benefited a California solar panel maker, Solyndra Inc., whose prime financial backers include a bundler for the president, Oklahoma oil billionaire George Kaiser. Yet not long after securing the $535 million loan guarantee from Obama’s Department of Energy in 2009, Solyndra hit financial hurdles, laying off workers and canceling a planned public offering.

When the House Committee on Energy and Commerce launched its investigation this year, it turned to the Office of Management and Budget for answers. OMB had vetted the loan guarantee’s financial risk shortly before DOE closed the deal in September 2009. Such vetting is required before the government puts taxpayer dollars on the line.

But for months, OMB resisted turning over all the records sought, saying it did not want to reveal internal analyses normally exempt from public scrutiny. The budget office said it made many records available for review, but the Committee said it failed to turn over key records – such as internal deliberations as it assessed the risk of the Solyndra loan guarantee. The Committee then called a hearing for OMB to testify, but the official, citing a scheduling conflict, didn’t show.

The White House budget office raised flags about the first energy loan guarantee awarded under the Obama administration, adding another layer of questions to the taxpayer backed financing now at the center of a House investigation.

In 2009, as the Department of Energy pushed to close the $535 million loan guarantee to California solar panel maker Solyndra Inc., the Office of Management and Budget concluded the financing was a greater risk to taxpayers than did DOE, iWatch News has learned. That higher risk rating, in turn, forced the government to set aside more money in case the company defaults on payments.

The Department of Energy pressed ahead, formally approving the deal in September 2009 while portraying the Solyndra loan guarantee as a symbol of President Obama’s quest to spread green energy projects with government backing.

Today, the Solyndra financing has evolved into something of a litmus test of how well the Energy Department has doled out billions of taxpayer dollars for clean energy initiatives. The loan guarantee is the subject of an ongoing House investigation, the center of a subpoena scuffle between House Republicans and the OMB and drawn questions from independent government auditors.

Yet even as the budget office has fought release of some of the records sought by Congress, its review at the dawn of the deal reveals questions about a guarantee that drew controversy as Solyndra hit financial hurdles after securing the prized government backing.

OMB scrutinized the loan guarantee’s financial strength shortly before DOE closed the agreement and, in the end, affixed a lower credit subsidy rating than the Energy Department had proposed.

The Obama administration’s budget office dodged a deadline Friday to hand over subpoenaed documents sought as part of a congressional investigation into a politically-connected solar panel manufacturer.

The Office of Management and Budget didn’t send over the requested documents—internal emails, memos and letters from OMB and anything in their possession from other offices—demanded in the subpoena from a House energy subcommittee on July 14. But OMB promised to make a “substantial” number of internal documents and emails available for committee staff to review, said OMB spokesman Kenneth Baer.

The House panel is looking into whether Solyndra, a California-based solar panel maker, improperly gained a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee have sought answers about the decision to award the guarantee, especially given the turn of events after Solyndra won the public support. Financial difficulties forced the company to shutter a plant, lay off workers and cancel a planned initial public offering.

iWatch News reported in May that Obama administration officials bypassed measures meant to protect taxpayers in awarding the large loan guarantee to Solyndra.