Former CEO Armand Hammer was a long time friend of former U.S. Senator Albert Gore, Sr. and Gore was a member of the board of directors of the company. In 1972, after he lost an election for the United States Senate, Gore became the head of Island Creek Coal Company, an Occidental subsidiary. Much of the company's coal and phosphate production was in Tennessee, the state Gore represented in the Senate, and Gore owned shares in the company. The company liquidated its coal assets in 1993 after Hammer died.