A self-described nonpartisan watchdog group on Thursday urged the Senate Ethics Committee to investigate possible connections between donations from the payday lending industry to Sen. Richard Shelby's campaign account and congressional votes that benefitted the industry.

Sen. Richard Shelby (Lawrence Specker / LSpecker@AL.com)

"It's no coincidence that Sen. Shelby fought for the payday lending industry's priorities while raising money from the industry at the same time," said Campaign for Accountability Executive Director Daniel E. Stevens in a statement. "This appears to be a textbook example of pay-to-play behavior."

Shelby's office dismissed the complaint from the Campaign for Accountability, whose actions have largely targeted Republicans, GOP donors and Trump administration officials, accusing the group of cherry picking facts and distorting the record.

The senator's office said his 2015 vote to give the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau less power over rulemaking regarding payday loans was made according his view on the CFPB's structure, not how the vote would have affected payday lenders. The vote also went along party lines, and only one other Republican senator besides Shelby received money from the payday loan industry.

Since the creation of the CFPB in 2011, Shelby has called for the bureau to have a board of directors, saying that such a structure would give the CFPB more accountability than a director with sole authority. The bureau oversees consumer financial products and makes sure that the public understands the fine print on such products.

"Sen. Shelby has long-standing concerns with the structure of the CFPB and has openly stated that he believes the agency has functioned in an irresponsible and unaccountable manner," a Shelby spokeswoman said in a statement. "The senator's vote against providing more autonomy to the CFPB stemmed from his public belief that the agency needs more accountability on all rulemaking."

But in a complaint filed with the Senate Ethics Committee, Campaign for Accountability argued that the timing was "suspicious" between Shelby receiving more than $46,000 in campaign donations and the 2015 vote, which occurred within a month of each other.

The donations were by far the largest among the more than a dozen lawmakers cited in a report titled "Payday Puppets" and released last week by Allied Progress, which Campaign for Accountability is using as the basis for its complaint. Pat Toomey, a Republican senator from Pennsylvania whom Allie Progress said received $15,000 from the payday loan industry, was the only other senator mentioned in the report.

"Well there's a larger question about why he has been so vehemently opposed to the CFPB. Is it because he received the contributions from the payday lending industry? "Also, I don't buy the argument that he only acted on this issue out of ideological motivation. The payday lending industry didn't give this money to him for charitable purposes. The payday lending industry contributed to Sen. Shelby's campaign because they wanted him to support their issues. In this case, it appears to have worked."

In Mobile on Tuesday, Shelby said the amount mentioned in Allied Progress' report was a drop in the bucket compared to the $20 million in his campaign account. He also accused the group's claim of being politically motivated.

"I saw that. Out of $20 million, that has nothing to do with anything. I don't even know who gives me money, as a matter of fact I've quit raising money, 'cause I don't need any," the senator said. "And secondly, out of $20 million ... that group that wrote that report liked the Democratic liberal position of the consumer agency, which I have fought from the beginning."

Lawrence Specker contributed reporting