In July 2015, John Catsimatidis made it clear that for him, friendship mattered more than politics when he donated $2,700 to both Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican candidate Jeb Bush. He told Time magazine, “When friends are running for office you do whatever you have to do. If Hillary Clinton was the nominee in the Democratic Party and Jeb Bush was the nominee in the Republican Party, I would go to sleep early on election night because regardless of who got elected our country would be in good shape.”

Catsimatidis is not the only big businessperson to double dip and give large donations to both Clinton and Bush. Jackie Kucinich and Matan Gilat from Daily Beast reported another seventeen people who have done the same. These people all share the fact that they are highly-ranked businessmen and women, but their specific businesses vary. Donors include John Tyson, the chairman of Tyson foods, and David Stevens, CEO of Mortgage Bankers Association.

When examined and questioned about their reasoning behind funding both Clinton and Bush, these men had very different responses and reasoning. For Tyson, it seems that the donation to Clinton comes from a sense of obligation after her husband pardoned Tyson and other employees after the company was punished for offering bribes to Mike Epsy, who, at the time, was Agriculture Secretary.

In the case of David Stevens, who has given $2,700 to Clinton and $1,000 to Bush, it seems his MO is everything in moderation. He told The Daily Beast:

‘I want to focus on candidates who best represent issues of housing and issues important to me and are not extreme, especially on the social issues that are important to me…I want to make sure my views are presented to them, because they are considered more center-left or center-right.’

The image below, courtesy of Vocativ/ The Daily Beast, lists all seventeen of the big-name men and women who have donated to both Clinton and Bush.

Big-name donors don’t just support Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush exclusively, though. It seems, as far as large donations go, Clinton is the Democratic candidate who is the big business favorite — no surprises there, seeing as how Bernie Sanders has made it no secret how he feels about businesses buying their way into politics. However, it seems these businessmen and women are bit more divided on their Republican candidate of choice.

Patricia Lizarraga, managing partner of Hypatia Capital Group, has been focused first and foremost on getting a woman in the White House. She donated $500 to both Clinton and Carly Fiorina. Of her decision to double donate, she said, “I’m a firm believer that the more women that participate as senior executives in the United States and around the globe, the better the outcomes will be for everybody. If there were a third [woman] in the fray, I would support her as well.”

We’ve known for a while that there was plenty of flip-flopping by businesses for their preferred Presidential candidate, but we didn’t know that things were this bad. This type of campaign donating, where businesses are giving money out of personal obligation, a desire to be covered on both sides, or to have a female nominee regardless of personal politics, is embarrassing at best.

Featured image via KAZ Vorpal/ Flickr, available under a Creative Commons license.