Emails suggest DOE pressed Solyndra to delay layoff news until after election

Portions of emails released by House Republicans suggest that Obama administration officials pressed the now-bankrupt solar company Solyndra to delay announcing pending layoffs until after the 2010 midterm elections.

Solyndra CEO Brian Harrison emailed the Energy Department in October 2010 to alert officials that he planned to announce layoffs at the solar panel manufacturer on Oct. 28, 2010.

{mosads}“Solyndra has received some press inquiries about rumors of problems (one of them with quite accurate information) and we have received inbound calls from potential investors,” Harrison wrote in the email, noting that he would like to soon announce the layoffs. “Both of these data points indicate the story is starting to leak outside Solyndra.”

In an Oct. 30, 2010, email, advisers for Argonaut Private Equity, a major investor in Solyndra, said Energy Department officials asked the company to delay the announcement that Solyndra would shutter a manufacturing facility and lay off workers until Nov. 3, one day after the midterm elections.

“They did push very hard for us to hold our announcement of the consolidation to employees and vendors to Nov. 3rd — oddly they didn’t give a reason for that date,” the Argonaut advisers wrote in their email. The news was first reported Tuesday morning by The Washington Post.

The emails will fuel GOP claims that Obama administration officials made decisions about the solar company for political reasons.

“The plot thickens,” House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) wrote in a tweet that linked to the Post story about the emails.

But the GOP probe — which has uncovered about 185,000 pages of documents — has not uncovered evidence that the decision to issue the loan guarantee or the early 2011 decision to restructure its terms showed political favoritism.

Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, who have launched an investigation into the $535 million loan guarantee to the failed solar company, released portions of the emails Tuesday in a memo.

In the memo, the committee members state that “several emails produced by Argonaut to the Committee reference the fact that the layoff announcement was postponed because of the November 2 elections.”

The Energy Department dismissed the emails Tuesday.

“The Republican report cites internal email from Argonaut about the timing of a press release,” Energy Department spokesman Damien LaVera said in a statement. “But as the 180,000 pages of documents that the Department of Energy turned over to the Committee indicate, the Department’s decisions about this loan were made on the merits, based on extensive review by the experts in the loan program – and nothing in this Republican Committee memo changes that.”

Solyndra ultimately announced on Nov. 3, 2010, that it would close a manufacturing facility in Fremont, Calif., and lay off 40 workers. The announcement marked the beginning of a tumultuous period for the company, which ultimately filed for bankruptcy in September after laying off an additional 1,100 workers, setting off a firestorm in Washington.

Republicans have pounced on the bankruptcy, raising broad questions about President Obama’s green energy agenda.

The memo was released ahead of Energy and Commerce Committee testimony Thursday by Energy Secretary Steven Chu. The hearing marks the culmination of a months-long investigation of the Solyndra loan guarantee.

In the memo, Republicans said Thursday’s hearing with Chu will focus on three major questions:

• “How did the stimulus and Secretary Chu’s directive to accelerate the review of loan guarantee applications impact the review of the Solyndra application?”
• “Should DOE have better anticipated the financial problems that Solyndra experienced?”
• “Did the DOE take adequate steps to protect the taxpayer when it negotiated the terms and conditions of the Solyndra guarantee and its restructuring?”

— Updated at 12:18 p.m. and 1:46 p.m.

Ben Geman contributed.