Congressional earmarking is in full swing as the 2010 appropriations bills make their way to conference, and ultimately, to President Obama's desk.
There's pork aplenty in the Agriculture-Rural Development-Food and Drug Administration appropriations bill - 481 congressional requests totaling $370.4 million, according to the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense. A "Swine and Other Animal Waste Management" project in North Carolina will receive $349,000. (Isn't that a by-product of pork?) Other, more cryptic earmarking includes a "wool research" project in Montana, Texas and Wyoming ($206,000) and $4.8 million for "wood utilization" - requested by 28 members. (See the group's earmarks database here)
West Virginia Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd has been busy delivering the bacon to his constituents in West Virginia. In the 2010 Homeland Security appropriations bill, he has earmarked $39.7 million for an "advanced training center" and another $3.6 million for an "operations systems center." And scores of small towns - undoubtedly the epicenter of possible future terrorist attacks - received handouts. They include Shelter Island, NY ($200,000), Winthrop, Mass. ($500,000) and Pelham, NY ($563,000).
While presidents invariably rail against unauthorized appropriations, they too get their finger in the pie. Obama alone earmarked four projects totaling $21 million in the Homeland Security bill. His requests in the Agriculture appropriations measure were more numerous - 14 earmarks totaling $101.4 million.
Members often join the president in requesting earmarks that land in their states or districts. The practice provides some political cover, as presidential requests tend to be less parochial than money steered by a lawmaker alone, said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense.
Advertising has long been a key part of the University of Phoenix's commercial success: according to AdWeek the school shells out more than $100 million a year--more than General Mills spends to market Cheerios--to lure students to its massive network of for-profit career schools.
The university, which serves more than 400,000 students at some ninety campuses and 150 learning centers worldwide has been a goldmine for its parent company, the Apollo Group, accounting for most of Apollo's $4 billion in revenues. But a spate of recent pricey ads the University has been running in The Washington Post are about damage control.
A recent joint investigation by New York -based ProPublica and American Public Media's "Marketplace" accused the school, which is the single largest recipient of federal education aid, of using high pressure recruitment tactics that leave students in deep debt--which the school denies-- while The Washington Monthly has an article outlining how federal laws and regulatory changes in the past decade have abetted aggressive recruitment and a spike in predatory private lending to students at these schools.
The charges come as the Apollo Group, is setting aside $80.5 million to settle a long running suit by two former admissions officers accusing the school of getting federal student-aid funds under false pretenses. It also comes as the Obama Administration contemplates tightening regulations meant to prevent such recruitment abuses. One University ad featured an open letter to students, alumni, calling the media reports the work of "ideologically driven critics" and asking to share success stories on the University's website.
Advocacy and lobbying stories in this week's National Journal: (subscription)
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "The insurance industry lobby is panning the Senate legislation. The lobbying group, America's Health Insurance Plans, said in a statement on Thursday that the bill would increase costs for individuals, families and employers; reduce benefits for older Americans; and threaten employer coverage," the New York Times reports. "In the statement, Karen Ignagni, the group's president and chief executive, said the association would work with the Senate to improve the bill."
Advocacy efforts over the prospect of credit card interchange regulation have led to a gridlocked debate between retailers and credit card companies. Interchange fees are the cost stores pay to banks when customers use credit cards.
A GAO study released Thursday, which sought to cut through the fray, was pretty much a wash. Stakeholders on both sides immediately adopted certain aspects of the report into their lobbying efforts, ignoring points that weren't so favorable.
Points supporting retailers:
- Total costs of accepting credit cards for merchants have risen over time as consumers use cards more.
- Part of these increased costs ...may be the result of how Visa and MasterCard competed to attract and retain bank issuers to offer cards by increasing the number of interchange fee categories and the level of these rates.
- Consumers who do not use credit cards may be paying higher prices for goods and services, as merchants pass on their increasing card-acceptance costs to all of their customers.
Continue reading GAO Study on Interchange Fees Inconclusive.
After striking a conciliatory note for most of 2009, the National Federation of Independent Business is now opposing both the House and Senate Democrats' health care reform legislation.
"Small business can't support a proposal that does not address their No. 1 problem: the unsustainable cost of health care," said Susan Eckerly, senior vice president of the NFIB in a statement about the legislation Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., unveiled last night.
Their opposition matters because the 350,000-member group has used its grassroots muscle in years past to oppose legislation, most memorably 15 years ago when it helped play a role in ending then President Clinton's plans for health care reform.
The NFIB joined with other business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, to create a coalition called Employers For A Healthy Economy, which has committed to spending as much as $10 million on advertising criticizing the House Democrats plans for health reform.
The NFIB had been working much of this year with Democratic staff, mostly in the Senate, to offer input into the developing health care legislation, and therefore remained conciliatory. We will be watching to see what they do next. I couldn't immediately reach an NFIB official for comment.
Meanwhile my colleague Marilyn Serafini and I have a story in tomorrow's National Journal looking at the NFIB and other groups that will have to be reckoned with for a health care bill to reach President Obama's desk.
Kristin Wells has just signed on as a partner with Patton Boggs. Wells was most recently deputy chief counsel at the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
According to a release, Wells will work with public policy and international law teams at the firm to "help corporate clients in their dealings with foreign governments and legal systems, as well as international markets."
Wells, who worked under current committee chairman Howard Berman, D-Calif. and the late Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., dealt with issues such as international refugee policy and immigration matters, international women's issues, and consular affairs. While working on Capitol Hill, she has had a hand in congressional resolutions declaring genocide in Darfur, the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004, and the Tuberculosis and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008.
She has also worked as counsel at the House Judiciary Committee under then-ranking member (now chairman) John Conyers, D-Mich. In addition to the departure of Wells, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chief Counsel David Abramowitz recently took a position as director of policy and government relations in Humanity United's Washington office.
More than 900 former federal employees, including 70 former members of Congress, have gone to work as lobbyists for the financial services sector in 2009, according to a Public Citizen report released today analyzing data provided by the Center for Responsive Politics
Nearly half of the 150 former members who have reported lobbying in 2009 are working in the financial services sector. These include former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, R-Ill; former Senate Majority Leader and Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole, R-Kan.; former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss.; former House Majority Leaders Dick Armey, R-Tex. and Dick Gephardt, D-Mo; former Appropriations Chairman Bob Livingston, R-La.; former Ways & Means Chairman Bill Thomas, R-Calif.; and former Rep.Vin Weber, R-Minn.
"It's a shame that so much taxpayer money has been spent to train people to lobby," said David Arkush, director of Public Citizen's Watch division.
Henry "Hank" White Jr., the American Bar Association's executive director, resigned from his position this week, reports the National Law Journal. (subscription)
White's departure follows the September exit of the ABA's chief financial officer, Kenneth Widelka, who was arguably the No. 2 staff official below White.
The Journal says that the executives left as part of a reorganization led by Carolyn Lamm, the president of ABA, who joined the organization in August.
The ABA has 1,000 employees and has a membership of about 400,000.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "The nation's mayors are pressing lawmakers to send more money directly to cities if Congress passes a second stimulus, arguing joblessness is often concentrated in metro areas. The lobbying push could reprise an earlier battle with state governors over control of federal dollars," The Hill reports. However, "several interest groups are reactivating and dusting off old policy proposals as Democratic leaders in Congress consider another jobs measure to ease unemployment levels."
Information technology lobbying group TechNet has hired Rey Ramsey as the organization's new president and chief executive officer.
Ramsey currently is chief executive officer of One Economy Corp., a global nonprofit that leverages the power of technology to improve the lives of low-income people, which he co-founded in 2000. One Economy brings unserved and underserved communities into the economic mainstream through facilitating affordable at-home broadband access, producing public-purpose media, and training and employing "Digital Connectors," youth aged 14-21, to enhance their communities' technology capacity.
At TechNet, Ramsey will be based in Washington, D.C. where he will oversee the Silicon Valley organization's day-to-day operations, strategic planning and implementation of its public policy and political agenda.
Separately, TechNet also announced that Paul Otellini, president and CEO of Intel, and Eric Schmidt, chairman and CEO of Google, will join the organization's executive committee.
(Photo of Ramsey from One Economy website)
Former Sen. Tom Daschle ,D-S.D.has joined law and lobbying firm DLA Piper as a senior policy advisor. He will not register to lobby, however.
Previously, Daschle was a senior advisor at Alston & Bird.
At DLA Piper, Daschle will counsel clients on a wide range of regulatory and government affairs issues, the firm said. He is also expected to play a significant role in management and client development globally. In addition to advising clients, Daschle will also serve on DLA Piper's Global Board.
(Photo of Daschle from Creative Commons)
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "House Republicans want the AARP to rescind its endorsement of comprehensive health reform legislation after a government report showed it could cause some providers to stop accepting Medicare patients," CongressDailyAM (subscription) reports. House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio "and other Republican leaders wrote to Barry Rand, AARP's chief executive officer, to 'strongly urge you to reconsider your endorsement' of the health reform bill the House passed Nov. 7."
• "National Catholic leaders this week ratified the church's official position in the ongoing health care debate, reiterating their tough stance against abortion rights and on other hot-button issues as the legislation makes its way through the Senate," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "At the annual fall meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, a group that has come under fire for lobbying heavily for anti-abortion measures in health care reform, church officials defended their positions and the pressure they have put on Capitol Hill leaders."
• "Native American advocates are vowing to keep up the fight after the Supreme Court this week opted against reviewing a nearly two-decade-long challenge to the Washington Redskins name. The court didn't comment on why it declined to reconsider a lower court's ruling that the plaintiffs took too long to file the case," Roll Call (subscription) reports.
RiskMetrics Group has advised its clients to call for the ouster of US Chamber of Commerce chief Tom Donohue from the board of Sunrise Senior Living Inc., due to accounting irregularities at the company, Bloomberg reports.
RiskMetrics advises mutual funds and pension funds on proxy votes. The group "believes that the chronic and serious nature of the accounting issues, potential stock option misdating, and potential insider trading is indicative of a significant lack of oversight on the part of the board," the New York-based firm said in a November 6 report.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Abortion-rights groups and other progressive lobbies are organizing a post-Thanksgiving assault on Capitol Hill to press lawmakers to keep restrictive language on abortion out of the final health care package," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The coalition has scheduled a 'National Day of Action' on Dec. 2 that will include a rally at the Capitol as well as visits by activists from around the country to lawmakers' offices."
• "Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S Conference of Catholic Bishops, defended the bishops' decision to play an active role in shaping national health care legislation, saying Monday that the church must be the 'leaven' in the country's political debate," the Washington Times reports.
• "Business foes of health care overhaul legislation are outspending supporters at a rate of 2-to-1 for TV ads as they grow increasingly nervous over a final bill," AP reports. "Led by the giant U.S. Chamber of Commerce, opponents of the Democratic health care drive have spent $24 million on TV commercials over the past month to $12 million spent by labor unions and other backers."
• "The Club for Growth's recent claim to fame -- or infamy, for some -- has been mixing it up in House Republican primaries by backing conservative candidates running against moderates," Politico reports. "But the anti-tax, anti-big-government group now is positioning itself to be a major 2010 player in Senate races, too, a development likely to cause headaches for both parties."
Four senior hands will be leaving the American Petroleum Institute by year's end, including Jim Ford, who until early this month was the group's top lobbyist.
After almost a year on the job, API President Jack Gerard has begun to move aggressively to put his stamp on the oil industry association by announcing internally early last week that Ford would be departing, as will Brenda Hargett, the chief financial officer, Jim Craig, vice president of communications and Doug Morris, API's head of exploration and production.
The moves were part of what Gerard in an interview called a "comprehensive reorganization" of API. Gerard indicated that the positions will be filled but that there will be "adjustments in the scope and portfolio" of the jobs. By year's end, Gerard added that "there will be more changes to API's internal organization. We'll reorganize API to run it as effectively and efficiently as we can."
The shakeup was not unexpected. Gerard, a former head of the American Mining Association and the American Chemistry Council, previously changed top staff after he assumed the helm of big trade groups. "He likes to have his own people around him," commented one industry lobbyist. "I think there will be more changes and more reorganizing," the source predicted.
Earlier this month, Gerard signaled his intentions by bringing on Martin Durbin from the chemistry group to be API's new top lobbyist with an expanded portfolio.
Former Virginia gubernatorial candidate Brian Moran will serve as executive vice president for government affairs at the Career College Association, the group announced Friday. With more than 1,600 member institutions, CCA represents the for-profit sector of private higher education.
Moran brings 13 years of experience in the Virginia House of Delegates and eight years as chairman of its House Democratic Caucus to CCA. "Utilizing his business acumen, interpersonal and communication skills as well as a thirteen-year legislative career, he will be a tremendous asset to the association and the career higher-education sector," said Harris Miller, president and CEO of CCA, in a statement.
CCA has spent north of $167,000 on federal lobbying so far this year.
UPDATE @ 2:28 PM to make clear that the Open Society Policy Center hired Bill Wasserman, not the Institute.
As the Obama administration's complicated tug of war with lobbyists continues, Washington's professional persuaders are fighting back the best way they know how: with a lobbying campaign, Eliza Newlin Carney reports in "Rules of the Game."
The leaders of more than a dozen advocacy groups, frustrated with the administration's multi-pronged restrictions on lobbyists, are meeting regularly at the Open Society Policy Center's Washington office to plot strategy. Possible actions include a push for congressional hearings, or even a demonstration on the Capitol steps.
The center, the advocacy arm of the George Soros-funded Open Society Institute, has underwritten the hiring of consultant Bill Wasserman, president of M+R Strategic Services, to help it respond to the administration's lobbying rules. Leaders of the groups spearheading the effort, which also include the Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest and OMB Watch, will reach out to trade associations and unions to fortify their ranks.
Constraints on lobbyists actually reduce transparency, some argue, by encouraging lobbyists to "deregister."
"What we want to do is try and shift the focus from federally registered lobbyists to money and influence in the administration," said Lee Mason, director of nonprofit speech rights for OMB Watch. "That's where the focus ought to be."
Continue reading Lobbyists: Obama's Rules Bring Pain, No Gain.
In a story that probably isn't great public relations for the business community, the Washington Post reports that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and others have been seeking to collect $50,000 to fund a study that would find the Senate health care reform legislation hurts the economy and will result in lost jobs.
In an e-mail obtained by the Post, a U.S. Chamber employee says the funds would first be used to hire a respected economist to study the legislation.
"Step two, according to the e-mail, appears to assume the outcome of the economic review: "The economist will then circulate a sign-on letter to hundreds of other economists saying that the bill will kill jobs and hurt the economy. We will then be able to use this open letter to produce advertisements, and as a powerful lobbying and grass-roots document."
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Apparent computer glitches and confusion over new reporting rules for political action committees have ensnared some of the nation's biggest lobbying organizations, which missed a campaign finance deadline by more than seven months," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "Under new rules enacted by the Federal Election Commission this year, PACs are required to report before the end of March whether they are controlled by an entity that is registered to lobby."
• "The House Financial Services Committee next week is set to debate the highly contentious issue of whether the government should have the power to break up large financial firms even if they're not about to fail," The Hill reports. "Lobbyists for big banks are anxious about language still being drafted by Reps. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.) and Ed Perlmutter (D-Colo.) that would give new powers to the government to break up big firms and separate their different types of commercial and investment banking business."
• "Supporters of the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba have made more than $10 million in campaign contributions since the 2004 election cycle," The Hill reports. "Pro-embargo donors are also continuing to funnel more and more funds to Democrats, according to a report released" today "by Public Campaign, a watchdog group that supports public financing of election campaigns."
• "Facing the possibility of a $27 billion pollution judgment against it in an Ecuadorean court, Chevron launched an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign to try to prevent the judgment as well as reverse a deeply damaging story line," Politico reports.
The lobbyists working for Genentech must be feeling pretty good.
The New York Times says that lobbyists working for Genentech put words into the mouths of lawmakers who made speeches on the House floor on the pending health care reform bill. (The bill passed the House on Nov. 7)
"In the official record of the historic House debate on overhauling health care, the speeches of many lawmakers echo with similarities. Often, that was no accident.Statements by more than a dozen lawmakers were ghostwritten, in whole or in part, by Washington lobbyists working for Genentech, one of the world's largest biotechnology companies."
Now there's a quick way to keep track of 17 lawmakers facing possible action by the Department of Justice, House ethics committee, Senate ethics committee and the Office of Congressional Ethics.
The group Citizens for Responsible Ethics in Washington has created a new site called Underinvestigation.org to profile the members in question. They include Rep. Jesse Jackson, D-Ill., Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev.
"The American people deserve to know which of their representatives may have engaged in misconduct," said CREW Executive Director Melanie Sloan, in a statement.
Advocacy, legal and lobbying stories from this week's National Journal: (subscription)
Trita Parsi, founder and president of the National Iranian American Council and an outspoken advocate of engagement with Iran, has never been popular with those that want the U.S. to take a hard line against that country.
But recently, the controversy swirling around his group has reached fever pitch. This month, Rep. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., called NIAC "regime sympathizers," and Parsi became the focal point of a heated online exchange between several prominent magazine columnists and bloggers.
Parsi is philosophical about the controversy, viewing it as a backhanded compliment. "The intensity of the attacks have tended to be tied to the group's level of success and prominence," he said in a phone interview. "The impression [critics] have given is that they're not happy to see another voice gaining prominence" in the debate over Iran.
The son of an Iranian academic who Parsi says was jailed by both the Shah and the ayatollah who overthrew the Shah, Parsi fled with his family to Sweden at the age of four. He came to the United States to attend the Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, where he received a Ph.D.
He founded NIAC in 2002, to give Iranian Americans a voice on their status in this country and on relations with Iran. One of the group's first successes, in 2003, was to reverse Monster.com's automatic excision of any mention of Iran on job seekers' resumes, in what Parsi calls a misguided post 9-11 security measure.
The group has tried to pursue a nuanced approach to Iran's internal affairs: condemning human rights abuses, while urging the U.S. government to engage with the Islamic regime with which the U.S. broke off relations after the 1979 hostage crisis, hard on the heels of the revolution.
Parsi sees the group's advocacy for Iranian Americans at home and dialog with the regime as interrelated. Many Iranian Americans "are concerned about risk of war between countries," he says, not merely because of concern for friends and relations in Iran, but because "discrimination issues would also deteriorate very quickly" in the United States. Parsi also argues that the group's foreign policy stance tracks the views of expressed in polls of Iranian Americans.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Federal prosecutors on Thursday moved to seize several U.S. assets allegedly controlled by entities linked to the government of Iran, including a mosque and Islamic school in Potomac, land in Prince William County and a Manhattan skyscraper," the Washington Post reports. "At the center of that web, they said, is a New-York based organization known as the Alavi Foundation, which U.S. authorities have for decades suspected of being a possible Iranian front."
• "A lawsuit has brought to light numerous documents that raise questions about whether the" National Iranian American Council "is using that influence to lobby for policies favorable to Iran in violation of federal law," the Washington Times reports. "If so, a number of prominent Washington figures could come to regret their ties to the group."
• "The nation's largest health insurance carrier is urging its employees to lobby the Senate against reform proposals that would hurt the firm's bottom line, according to copies of e-mails released Thursday by a liberal advocacy group," the Washington Post reports. "UnitedHealth Group, which is based in Minnesota, e-mailed its 75,000 employees Tuesday, asking them to write their senators and local newspapers in opposition to a public insurance option, alleging that 'government-run health care' will force 'millions of Americans' to drop their current coverage."
• "Organizing for America is dispatching volunteers to the local offices of 32 House Republicans whose districts supported President Barack Obama in the 2008 election to demand that they support Obama's health care reform initiative," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "OFA volunteers will begin to drop by the offices Friday and continue doing so through the middle of next week."
• "The Employment Policies Institute, founded by lobbyist and public relations man Richard Berman, has launched a $10 million television campaign warning about the high cost of proposed health care reform," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "Berman, long a lightning rod for consumer groups, has represented a long list of clients including restaurants, soda-makers and other business interests. ... In an interview, he said the health care advertising campaign is funded by a number of his clients, whom he declined to name."
• "The Senate Ethics Committee earlier this month dismissed a complaint alleging Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) traded campaign donations for earmarks, according to a letter released Thursday," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The ethics panel announced its decision in a letter to the Congressional watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which filed the complaint against Landrieu in January 2008."
Republican insiders are hosting a luncheon fundraiser on Capitol Hill for Colorado Senate candidate Jane Norton next Monday, Sunlight Foundation's Political Party Time reports.
Among those hosting include lobbyist Judy Black, wife of Charles Black (and Norton's brother in law), who was a top advisor to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. in his presidential bid; former Rep. Susan Molinari, R-N.Y.; and Maria Cino, who helped organize the 2008 Republican convention.
Norton, a former Colorado lieutenant governor, is running for the Senate seat currently held by Democrat Michael Bennet.
Read Political Party Time's full post.
Campaign contributions are skewing the amount of federal money spent to repair the nation's deteriorating bridges, according to a new report by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.
The group looked at earmarks in the final 2008 federal transportation appropriations bill and found that only 74 of 704 unauthorized expenditures went to repairing brides, tunnels or overpasses. It says one in ten of the projects, and about ten percent of the funding, focused on fixing the nation's crumbling infrastructure. The majority of the $570 million went for new highways and other new construction.
U.S. PIRG puts the blame squarely on campaign donations from special interests. "We believe that transportation spending is skewed toward road-widening and new highway projects favored by developers, road builders and the other interests who make those contributions," said the report's co-author, Lisa Gilbert, in a statement.
It's worth noting that Congress spent a total of $9.7 billion in the 2008 transportation bill. Lawmakers put $1.7 billion into the Capital Investment Program which uses a formula to grant money to states for road and bridge maintenance. Another $4.3 billion went to transportation grants to urbanized areas.
The Boston Globe takes a look at the $30 million in earmarks secured by members of the Massachusetts delegation and what that money is buying. The earmarks are included in the 2010 defense appropriations bill which is pending in Congress.
Here's a key graph:
The phenomenon carries clear rewards for local companies as well as lobbyists and politicians: In Massachusetts, nearly 40 percent of the defense earmarks are slated to go to companies whose top executives contributed to the sponsor's campaigns, hired former lawmakers or congressional aides to lobby on their behalf, or both.
Among the lobbyists involved in securing the earmarks were Bill McCann, a former aide to former Rep. Marty Meehan, D-Mass. and Steven A. Wolfe, a former aide to the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., David Urban, a former aide to Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa. and Michael Barbera, a former aide to Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., the story says.
A newly created coalition called Start Over has launched a multi-state grassroots effort aimed at derailing Senate health care legislation.
The coalition of nearly four dozen Washington business groups was organized by the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors and includes the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Retail Federation. The participants are pushing their members to contact or meet with senators considered key swing votes in such states as Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana and Nebraska over the Veterans Day recess.The grassroots drive is also expected to be active during the upcoming Thanksgiving recess.
"Our objective is straightforward: We want senators to hear from our members who are their constituents on the type of health care reform they want," says Dirk Van Dongen, the president of the Wholesaler-Distributors. The coalition includes several of the same business groups that recently teamed up with the chamber to start Employers for a Health Economy which last week ran a 19-state ad drive in an unsuccessful effort to block the House from passing its health care reform bill.
• "Abortion-rights advocates are calling in the cavalry to help fight off an anti-abortion provision House Democratic leaders swallowed in order to win passage of their health care reform bill," Politico reports. "On Tuesday, Planned Parenthood summoned 80 progressive groups to plot strategy for keeping the anti-abortion amendment -- named for sponsors Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and Joseph Pitts (R-Pa.) -- out of a final health care bill."
• "The 60 Plus Association, a conservative seniors' group, has pledged to spend $1.5 million targeting 15 House Democrats who voted for health care reform," Politico reports. "The group is launching robocalls against the 15 lawmakers and will run TV ads in eight of those districts."
• "Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), facing the prospect of a tough re-election bid next year, is under pressure from a liberal activist group to support a motion to proceed on health care reform legislation that is poised to hit the Senate floor next week," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The Blue America political action committee is hitting statewide Arkansas cable television with a 30-second spot demanding that Lincoln 'allow an up-or-down vote on the public option.'"
• "After trying to carefully balance their interests in health-care reform and immigration, the nation's Hispanic lawmakers and largest advocacy groups are scrambling to develop a strategy to counter what they see as efforts to shortchange immigrants in health bills on Capitol Hill," the Washington Post reports.
• "Lobbyists and corporate executives are targeting the newest members of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the high-stakes fight over regulating the Internet," The Hill reports. "Meredith Attwell Baker, the newest Republican commissioner, or her aides have held at least seven meetings with officials representing both sides of the debate since the FCC voted three weeks ago to move forward with a rulemaking effort on network neutrality, according to a review of close to 100 records at the FCC."
A liberal political group launched an aggressive campaign Wednesday to strip an anti-abortion amendment, championed by Rep. Bart Stupak, D-MI, from the health care reform bill.
The Progressive Change Campaign Committee sent an email asking its 250,000 members to sign the open letter from 40 Democratic congresswomen insisting the Stupak amendment be removed from the final bill. If it isn't axed from the bill, the signatories won't vote for it.
On top of the letter campaign, PCCC announced a $10,000 online ad buy targeting Stupak statewide in Michigan. According to the press release, the Michigan accountability campaign aims to stymie any chances Stupak has to become Governor.
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has been exercising its clout in Congress and played a key role in influencing the outcome of the House's vote on health care reform that included an anti-abortion provision, the Associated Press reported.
The AP notes that the Catholic bishops "don't spend a dime on what is legally defined as lobbying" but clearly they are lobbying the Hill.
... in recent days, the conference staff got elbow-deep in the legislative machinations on the health measure, even having bishops intervene with Republicans - who were loath to help Democrats pass their bill - to make sure they supported the abortion provisions.
Former Rep. Robert "Bud" Cramer, D-Ala., one of numerous former lawmakers who joined lobbying firms after leaving office, talks about his decision to join Wexler & Walker Public Policy Associates and why he thinks lobbyists play an important role in policy making in an editorial published in the Hill.
"All of us know the lobbying profession has received its share of criticism in recent years, and in some cases for good reason. There have been too many cases of individuals who abused the system and put personal gain ahead of not only the public good, but the law. This is why the rest of us have to work even harder to adhere to nothing less than the highest ethical standards, following all the rules and regulations to the letter and the spirit of the law."Cramer is now chair of Wexler & Walker Public Policy Associates, though he isn't currently a federally registered lobbyist, according to the Senate Office of Public Records.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Unions are pushing state lawmakers to pass legislation that would make organizing workers easier, as efforts to rewrite federal organizing laws remain stalled in Congress," the Wall Street Journal (subscription) reports. "Oregon passed the Worker Freedom Act, which prohibits companies from holding mandatory employee meetings to talk about organizing. Employers say mandatory meetings, known as 'captive audience meetings,' are necessary to counter misleading information disseminated by union organizers. Unions say employers use the meetings to gauge worker sympathies and pressure workers not to join the union."
• "President Obama's nominee for a top weapons-buying job at the Pentagon recently served as a paid adviser for a big defense contractor and is declining to disclose whom else he has worked for on a government ethics form designed to help the public guard against potential conflicts of interest," the Washington Times reports. "Frank Kendall III, Mr. Obama's pick for principal deputy undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, received $75,000 in consulting fees last year from defense contractor SAIC Inc., according to his recently filed disclosure form. He also reported fees totaling $8,500 from Centra Technology, another defense contractor."
Healthcare stakeholders have been keeping their powder dry in the digital world, but as a bill moves to the Senate, groups may open the spending spigot, ClickZ reports.
Andy Hunn, COO of Resonate Networks, a political ad network, tells ClickZ: "We've talked to about a dozen clients for whom we were already doing healthcare work...We know they want to spend related to healthcare reform, but they're deliberately holding back right now. A phrase you hear around here a lot is people are keeping their powder dry." He added: "When it breaks open, it's number one."
A concurring comment came from Mario Coluccio, managing director of the free market nonprofit Center for Medicine in the Public Interest, who said once a bill is submitted in the Senate "we may make a decision to increase our ad runs."
The article also examines the popularity of search ads during the healthcare debate.
In a continuation of a series cross posted from our energy topics page, here is a look at top spending groups involved in the climate change debate.
This analysis excludes individual corporations, such as Exxon Mobil, Chevon and General Electric, who have a hefty financial hand in the energy lobbying arena as well. Those three companies alone have spent between $10 and $20 million so far this year, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
By constraining the analysis to industry groups and not individual companies, the profiles are more emblematic of the divergent viewpoints lawmakers must grapple with when crafting climate change legislation since they themselves represent different companies. Individual corporations, on the other hand, typically have a more straightforward agenda they're putting forth to Congress.
The following groups ranked 5th through 10th in lobbying spending. Click on each for a profile of the organization and what they want:
5. Association of American Railroads $7.0 million
6. American Petroleum Institute $5.8 million
7. American Chemistry Council $4.9 million
8. Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers $4.4 million
9. American Wind Energy Association $3.8 million
10. National Rural Electric Cooperative Association $3.7 million
The Washington Times has weighed in on President Obama's policies to limit lobbyists' influence in Washington.
Here's an excerpt from the editorial:
Like his campaign promise to change the political tone in Washington, President Obama's stance against lobbying and corporate influence has proved to be a mirage. Instead of actually blocking lobbyists from serving in his administration, his "reform" has simply encouraged lobbyists to stop admitting they are lobbyists.
Fred Smith, president of the Competitive Enterprise Institute sent us a letter in response to this post last week.
To the Editor of the National Journal:I write in response to your recent article about CEI encountering "financial woes."
First it was the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's position on climate change legislation, now it's the group's stand on Democrats' health care reform measures that is causing headaches for the lobbying organization.
A group of faith-based institutional investors announced Tuesday they are pressuring 36 corporate members of the U.S. Chamber to publicly state whether the trade group's opposition to the health care bills wending their way through Congress is reflective of their company position on the issue. They are also asking the companies to push the chamber to play a more "helpful" role in the debate.
"Faith based investors already concerned about the 'disconnect' between the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and its leading members on climate legislation are now troubled to see the same dynamic at work on the health care reform bill," said Laura Berry, executive director of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility."
Berry's group said it has contacted 36 companies by letter or by phone asking them to clarify their position. All of the companies had previously "agreed at the urging of shareholders to embrace health care principles that are now inconsistent with the anti-reform stance" of the chamber.
The companies contacted include AT&T, General Electric, IBM, McDonald's, Merck, Starbucks, Verizon and Wal-Mart .
To see a copy of the letter, click here. The full list of the companies can be found here.
Among the investors sponsoring the letters are the AFL-CIO Office of Investment, Progressive Asset Management and Trillium Asset Management.
Howard Gantman, a former aide to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., has been named vice president of corporate communications at the Motion Picture Association of America.Gantman joined the MPAA in August as senior communications consultant and previously was Feinstein's staff director at the Senate Rules and Administration Committee. He also served as staff director of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies where he was responsible for overseeing President Obama's swearing in ceremony. Prior to work the committees, Gantman was Feinstein's communications director for nine years.
"The MPAA is at a critical time in its evolution as the voice and advocate of the American motion picture, home video and television industries around the world," Dan Glickman, chairman and CEO of the MPAA, said in a statement. "Howard's unique combination of expertise in public affairs and communications, will make him a critical player."
In his new position, Gantman will oversee MPAA's communications program in Washington. Elizabeth Kaltman, vice president of corporate communications will oversee MPAA communications in Los Angeles.
In 2007, National Journal profiled (subscription) Gantman as part of our Hill people series.
(Photo of Gantman provided by MPAA)
John Aravosis and Joe Sudbay, editors of the liberal outlet AMERICAblog, have launched a "Don't Ask, Don't Give" campaign urging a "pause" on donations to major Democratic groups until lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender issues are addressed at the federal level.
The campaign demands the enactment of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, the end of the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, and the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act. AMERICAblog reports co-sponsorship by Daily Kos along with several other liberal and gay media outlets.
The effort's supporters hope that by pausing donations to blue groups, including the Democratic National Committee, Organizing for America, and the Obama campaign, then Washington might quicken its pace on gay-rights priorities.
On some level, holding back donations is one of few avenues of recourse for LGBT rights advocates unsatisfied with the federal attention to their issues. And AMERICAblog is a hefty Democratic donor: It says it raised $50,000 for then presidential-candidate Barack Obama. But the effectiveness of donation pauses remains in question. For such a strategy to succeed, the campaign would need "a whole bunch of people committed to not donating," says Jason Snyder, an assistant professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Anderson School of Management.
Donation boycotts hinge on high support levels, especially when it comes to impacting large groups, like the Democrats, who have many donation sources, Snyder added. In politics, where you have "a large number of very diffuse people who are low-stakes donors," withholding cash to exert pressure is far less effective."
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Credit unions and associations representing military members are urging lawmakers to oppose a provision in a broad financial services bill that they argue amounts to a tax on troops and their families," The Hill reports. "The bill, currently being marked up in the House Financial Services Committee, would impose a fee on financial institutions with more than $10 billion in assets to pay for the costs if the government is forced to take over a failing financial firm."
• "Major union groups are spending $1 million this week to thank endangered Democratic Members whose yea health care votes over the weekend may complicate their 2010 re-election chances," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The labor-backed Health Care for America Now and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees on Monday announced a $650,000 television ad buy to thank 20 Members who voted for the Affordable Health Care for America Act."
• "The traditional pecking order of Washington's top trade and business groups has been thrown into disarray by the Obama administration's far-reaching domestic agenda and its tough tactics against opponents," Politico reports. "It's the Independent Community Bankers of America and the Consumer Federation of America that are seeing their ideas prevail in the current debate over rewriting the regulatory framework for the financial industry, not the once-invincible, big New York investment banks."
• "The House ethics committee has not approached Reps. Jim Moran (D-Va.) or Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) about the PMA Group, a now-defunct lobbying firm under FBI investigation," The Hill reports. "The two lawmakers, both of whom sit on the Appropriations Defense subcommittee that provided earmarks to the group's clients, said they are cooperating with the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE), a new quasi-independent board that initiates investigations and makes recommendations to the full panel."
If lobbyists set up a meeting to talk with Norm Eisen, White House special counsel on ethics and government reform, there should be no doubt that Eisen will then blog about it.
That's what happened Monday, when a group of lobbyists and others who chair Industry Trade Advisory Committees, met with Eisen and other administration officials to discuss the Obama administration's decision to ban federally registered lobbyists from serving on government advisory boards and committees like the ITACs.
Eisen blogged about it here.
The September decision was the latest administration move to restrict lobbyist activities which has caused an outcry in the K Street community who feel they are being unfairly targeted for following the law and registering as lobbyists.
Eisen explained the ban is part of an effort to reform the political system and ensure "a Washington that is more reflective of all of America." He added: "we do not intend to rescind the decision."
Former Rep. Larry LaRocco, D-Idaho, has joined Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck as a policy director in its government relations group. He will focus on financial services and natural resources projects.
LaRocco arrives from running his own firm, LaRocco and Associates. From 1991 to 1995, he served in the U.S. House of Representatives for Idaho's first district. During LaRocco's two terms, he was the deputy majority whip and a member of the Speaker's Working Group. He served on both the Financial Services and Natural Resources Committees.
After leaving Congress, LaRocco was vice chairman and president for Fleishman-Hillard Government Relations in Washington and later president of Neokinetics Corporation, a behavioral biometrics software security company.
From our Energy topics page:
Throughout the week, NationalJournal.com will be profiling the 10 energy coalitions that spent the most on lobbying in the first three quarters of 2009. This analysis excludes individual corporations, such as Exxon Mobil, Chevon and General Electric, who have a hefty financial hand in the energy lobbying arena as well. Those three companies alone have spent between $10 and $20 million so far this year, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
By constraining the analysis to industry groups and not individual companies, the profiles are more emblematic of the divergent viewpoints lawmakers must grapple with when crafting climate change legislation since they themselves represent different companies. Individual corporations, on the other hand, typically have a more straightforward agenda they're putting forth to Congress.
These are groups that ranked eighth, ninth and 10th in lobbying spending, according to the latest disclosure forms. Click on the group to see a profile of what they want.
8. Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers $4.4 million
9. American Wind Energy Association $3.8 million
10. National Rural Electric Cooperative Association $3.7 million
Nearly half of all trade associations ended 2008 in the red, according to an analysis of IRS documents by CEO Update.
The data, gleaned from IRS 990 forms, show 46.5 percent of organizations that ended their fiscal year on December 31, 2008 operating at a deficit - double the rate of the two previous years. The numbers clearly indicate the groups were struggling to deal with a slowing economy.
"Associations generally lag recessions by six to nine months," said Mark Graham, managing director of CEO Update. "They weren't prepared. Expenses were already set and revenues didn't come in to cover it."
After the economy plummeted in late 2007, many associations saw a drop off in membership dues, event revenues and advertising. To make matters worse, 89 percent of the groups saw a decline in revenue from investments - the money most often used to cover budget shortfalls.
Big trade associations tend to have large cash reserves to handle rainy days, but the deteriorating economy led several teetering groups to pursue mergers and acquisitions, said Graham.
Associations also lag behind an economic recovery. Groups are now watching the unemployment numbers and the hospitality industry for hopeful signs. Most don't expect to see an upturn until 2010.
Cross posted from NJ.com:
A simmering conflict between the House ethics committee and its fledgling investigative arm has escalated into open combat, prompting watchdogs to warn that lawmakers may be gearing up to kill the new Office of Congressional Ethics.
Following the accidental leak on Oct. 29 of a 22-page ethics panel activity report, most news stories have trumpeted the more than 30 House members identified as apparently under investigation. These include at least seven lawmakers caught up in the panel's ongoing probe of defense earmarks and the now-defunct lobbying firm the PMA Group.
But obscured in the hubbub over the leak, which was first reported in the Washington Post, was another explosive document released that very same day: A 525-page ethics committee report attacking the Office of Congressional Ethics. Established in March of last year, the OCE conducts preliminary inquiries and makes recommendations to the full ethics panel, officially the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct.
The ethics committee's real beef appears to boil down to two complaints: The OCE is being too transparent and too hard on members.
But the ethics committee has chafed under the new system, which has forced the panel to observe unaccustomed deadlines and disclosure rules. Its Oct. 29 report, ostensibly to dismiss a complaint involving Rep. Sam Graves, R-Mo., devotes more than 30 pages to blasting the OCE for its "fundamentally flawed" handling of the Graves matter.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Despite apparent tensions in the House's two-tiered ethics process -- notably, recent spats between the ethics committee and an outside review office -- House officials and ethics observers say a formal evaluation of the system is unlikely anytime soon," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "In recent weeks, both the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, as the ethics panel is officially known, and the Office of Congressional Ethics have feuded publicly over process issues -- from how to calculate deadlines to the interpretation of House rules -- suggesting friction in the reformed ethics process lawmakers approved less than two years ago."
• "After contentious Senate committee action on climate change legislation last week, industry and environmental interests are focusing on a select group of Senators who are trying to forge consensus on the heated issue," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "Much of the attention will be aimed at Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.), who are seeking common ground between those who want to curb greenhouse gas emissions and others who fret about the economic consequences."
• "Northrop Grumman, the third-largest U.S. defense contractor, agreed to sell a government-consulting unit to a group of investors led by General Atlantic and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts affiliates for $1.65 billion," the Washington Post reports. "The sale of TASC, to comply with new rules designed to prevent conflicts of interest, will generate about $1.1 billion in cash after taxes, Northrop said Sunday in a statement. The deal requires regulatory approval, and Northrop said it may be completed by the end of the year."
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Seven major American and foreign banks have hired a prominent financial lawyer to lobby on legislation that would restrict how banks do business in the multitrillion-dollar derivatives market," The Hill Reports. "Edward Rosen, a partner at Cleary Gottlieb, registered as a lobbyist for the banks at the end of October and received at least $200,000 in the third quarter, according to congressional lobbying records.... Rosen has been a central player on derivatives legislation throughout the financial regulatory overhaul debate this year. "
• "The American Petroleum Institute plans to announce Thursday that Martin J. Durbin has been named its new Executive Vice President of Government Affairs," Politico reports."Durbin will join API in December from the American Chemistry Council (ACC), He replaces Jim Ford, who has worked at API for the past 10 years."
• "The House ethics committee declared in a letter issued late Wednesday that Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) did not violate the chamber's rules through his involvement in a Tennessee land-swap deal in 2007," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The ethics committee's review focused on the Cove at Blackberry Ridge LLC, a real estate development company in Loudon, Tenn., in which Shuler is an investor."
Advocacy and lobbying stories from this week's National Journal: (subscription)
The jury in the trial of former Jack Abramoff lobbying associate Kevin Ring was split -- eight to convict and four to acquit -- according to a juror interviewed by Main Justice.
Ring was on trial on eight counts of conspiracy, illegal gratuities and honest services wire fraud, and the judge declared a mistrial after jurors announced they were deadlocked for three consecutive days. The jury originally arrived at a verdict on one of the honest services wire fraud charges, but later lost unanimity on that charge. Jurors had found Ring not guilty on that charge, but after further deliberations they split -- five to convict, six to acquit and one undecided, the juror revealed.
One sticking point for the juror, who voted to acquit, was that the government based a large part of its case on e-mails between Ring, Abramoff, other lobbyists and public officials.
Ring "could have had a lot of intentions, and those emails weren't enough to spell them out," the juror said. "If the prosecution could have discriminated between lobbying and corrupt lobbying better, then they would have made their case."
But another juror, Joy Stevenson, who voted to convict, said "the e-mail traffic" convinced her Ring was guilty. She said the e-mails showed her that Ring and the other lobbyists were "very shrewd... very careful... very strategic."
The case is set to be retried in June 2010, allowing time for the statute of limitations on potential charges against possible witnesses to expire and for the Supreme Court to hear three cases involving honest services wire fraud charges. Stevenson had some advice for the Department of Justice's next attempt at a conviction: "I think the government, I think those guys were great. I was very impressed with all of them.... But I was looking for them to pull it all together at the end. You know, bam! There was no clincher."
On Friday, the American Future Fund plans to run a week's worth of ads on CNN, Fox and the four Sunday talk shows to try and derail the House health care reform bill.
Nick Ryan, a spokesman for the little-known Iowa-based non-profit says that the initial cable buy will be $450,000 and that the ads might run longer depending on whether the vote is pushed back. The fund spent more than $200,000 over the last two weeks on a round of print and radio ads that have run inside the Beltway which are also aimed at killing the House bill. AFF does not disclose its funding sources.
The ads are the handiwork of GOP message man Larry McCarthy, who sparked controversy more than two decades ago as producer of the racially tinged "Willie Horton" commercials that damaged Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis. The AFF messages employ a newsy peg line: "If the government can't run a flu program, can we trust it to run America's entire health care system?"
Meanwhile, other conservative groups inside the Beltway have been running ads to influence key swing votes in the Senate. Americans for Tax Reform launched a TV blitz in Nebraska two weeks ago targeting moderate Democratic Senator Ben Nelson. The commercials are expected to run another two weeks says an ATR official. The group, he adds, is also "looking to educate voters on the tax issues" in the Senate bill in several other states where moderate Democrats worry about health care reforms in part because the final the measure is expected to include a version of the public insurance option.
As the House's version of health care reform legislation approaches a floor vote, the AARP and the American Medical Association, two groups that represent significant voices in the health care debate, endorsed the bill today.
At a press conference this afternoon, President Obama expressed the significance of the endorsements and thanked the groups for their support ahead of the House's scheduled Saturday vote on the bill.
"We are closer to passing this reform than ever before," Obama said, according to the AP. "Now that the doctors and medical professionals of America are standing with us, now that the organizations charged with looking out for the interests of seniors are standing with us, we are even closer."
The AARP officially endorsed the House's health care reform bill at a press conference this morning, after months of supporting the process but holding out on an endorsement.
American University's Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies and the School of Public Affairs periodically pay for advertisements to thank teachers and guest speakers as a way of highlighting the programs they offer.
But a new ad thanking Jack Bonner, CEO of grassroots lobbying firm Bonner & Associates, has gotten the university and center Director James Thurber into some hot water. The full-page print ad, for which American University paid Roll Call $1,523, ran on November 4 and said "Thank you Jack Bonner for over 15 years of teaching excellence." It then went on to note many of Bonner's guest lecturers, which included reporters, public relations specialists and D.C. lobbyists from associations, firms and unions.
The problem? Bonner admitted last summer that a former employee sent multiple fake grassroots letters to three House lawmakers regarding climate change legislation, which has made his firm a target for ethics questions. On Oct. 29, members of the House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming grilled Bonner about his ethics. Bonner testified that he had hired AU's Thurber as an independent ethics adviser to make sure his firm never produces fake letters again.
The timing of American University's ad, one week after the hearing, makes it appear the school ran the ad to prop up Bonner's reputation. That has raised eyebrows and questions around town about why a university would come to an aide of a lobbying firm under an ethics cloud.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "In a coup for House Democrats, AARP will endorse sweeping health care overhaul legislation headed for a history-making floor vote, officials told The Associated Press on Wednesday," the AP reports. "An endorsement from the seniors' lobby was critical when then-President George W. Bush pushed the Medicare prescription drug benefit through a closely divided Congress in 2003...An announcement from the 40-million member group is expected Thursday, said officials with knowledge of the group's decision."
• "The House ethics committee is likely to exonerate five members of the Congressional Black Caucus who were accused of taking an improper trip to the Caribbean, according to sources familiar with the case," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "The committee may also renew its complaint that the Office of Congressional Ethics is mishandling investigations."
• "With a White House decision on the direction of the war in Afghanistan still up in the air, and President Barack Obama considering whether to send as many as 40,000 additional U.S. troops, veterans groups on opposite sides of the debate are storming Capitol Hill this week to sway congressional opinion," Politico reports.
• "Business groups and unions are battling over a decision by a federal board that eases the rules for employees at airlines and railways to form unions," The Hill reports. "Though many airline and railroad employees covered by the Railway Labor Act are already unionized, the change could have a big impact on companies like Delta, JetBlue and Federal Express that have non-union workers."
Our colleagues at CongressDaily reported this morning on Senate Energy Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer's reaction to a a November 3 letter from the US Chamber of Commerce, praising the bipartisan blueprint for climate change legislation by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Lindsey Graham, R-SC. Although the letter was laced with caveats and excluded mention of a "cap-and-trade program," Boxer called it a "game changer."
The chamber has been under pressure from some of its members to relax its adamant opposition to climate change legislation. But outsiders' reactions to the letter ranged from cautious to hostile. On the Natural Resources Defense Counsel blog Switchboard, the group's Climate Campaign Director, Pete Altman, said the group "welcome[d] the US Chamber's desire to sound more constructive," but that "reading in between the lines - and reading the lines themselves - raises big questions about how much the Chamber's objectives have really changed - setting aside their obvious need to strike a more conciliatory tone."
And the free-market oriented Competitive Enterprise Institute put out a press release headlined "U.S. Chamber Caves to Special Interests on Energy-Rationing Legislation" which called on "small businesses to drop their Chamber membership and join CEI in fighting this catastrophic legislation."
Three years after losing the Montana Senate seat he held for nearly two decades, Republican Conrad Burns is still talking about how the Jack Abramoff scandal cost him the tight 2006 race against Democrat Jon Tester that came down to 3,562 votes.
In an interview this week with KTVQ in Billings, Burns (who is now a registered federal lobbyist at Gage LLC) said the Department of Justice's handling of investigations allowed his name to be tarnished during the campaign, when contributions he received from Abramoff and his office's relationship with the now imprisoned lobbyist were called into question.
"If you call [the Department of Justice] up today and say, 'Well, is Conrad Burns under investigation?', they'll say, 'Well we can't confirm it, we can't deny it,'" Burns said. "Well, that allows your opponents or the press, if they've formed a perception already, to just to run wild with it."
Burns also said he was never interviewed by Justice or the House Ethics Committee, and that the government "didn't interview anybody in the office with the exception of one person." He described implications that he was involved with the Abramoff scandal as "a hoax."
Two of Burns' former staffers were mentioned during the recent trial of former Abramoff lobbying associate Kevin Ring. A former associate of Ring and Abramoff testified about an all-expenses-paid 2001 Super Bowl trip that the lobbying team planned for lawmakers and staffers. No lawmakers attended, and only two Senate staffers, Ryan Thomas and Will Brooke, both of Burns' office, made the trip. Thomas was also listed as a co-conspirator in Ring's trial for evidentiary reasons.
(Thomas is also listed as a registered lobbyist for Gage, Senate lobbying documents show)
Times are tough at the free-enterprise-oriented non-profit Competitive Enterprise Institute.
CEI, which just celebrated its 25th anniversary, is still run by its bearded, Schumpeter-quoting founder, Fred Smith, and remains popular with conservative foundations and corporations. Its combination of free-market analysis with pro-industry advocacy on a broad range of environmental and consumer issues infuriates opponents, and has been a magnet for contributions in years past. The group's fudning rose nearly 70 per cent between 2004 and 2007, peaking at $5.2 million (the group's fiscal year ended September 30th 2008.)
But this year, amidst economic turmoil, contributions are down 15 per cent and the group is running a deficit of roughly 10 per cent, Smith told National Journal's Under The Influence. That comes to about $450,000 worth of red-ink--though some sources suggest the hole may be deeper. Smith says the group's reserves have cushioned the loss and that he has seen an uptick in fundraising recently.
But the Institute's financial woes may have precipitated another loss: its Center for Risk, Regulation and Markets has decided to leave the institute and affiliate with another conservative think tank, taking most of its five person staff and likely much of its roughly $500,000 budget with it.
The Center, run by Eli Lehrer, has been especially active in fighting state-sponsored natural disaster insurance pools that compete with private reinsurers, and had opened an office in Florida to wage a steady war of words with the state government on the issue; it is poised to open a second office in Texas.
Smith and Lehrer insist the split was amicable, and mutually agreed upon. Smith said he was uncomfortable with the Center's opening of branch offices, arguing that such arrangements haven't worked well for other think tanks; Lehrer said the split was because "our project had grown a good deal, where as the rest of CEI had not."
Lehrer said he plans to decide soon between a couple competing offers to house the Center, while the Institute says it plans to continue doing work on insurance issues as well.
(Photo of Fred Smith from CEI)
Reform group Change Congress launched a campaign yesterday to shame Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., for voting against legislation that would help ensure victims of rape have the right to bring their case to court. The government reform group hit cyberspace with an email asking people to sign a 'national expression of outrage.'
Citing $700,000 in campaign contributions from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the defense industry, Change Congress accused Burr of putting special interests before rape victims.
Introduced by Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., the legislation would stop federal funding for defense contractors who used mandatory arbitration clauses to deny victims of assault the right to bring their case to court. A protective measure inspired by the story of Jamie Leigh Jones, an American woman who was gang raped by her co-workers while working for a defense contractor in Iraq. Jones couldn't sue because her contract contained a clause which required her to arbitrate any disputes against her employer.
According to a poll commissioned by Change Congress, 73 percent of North Carolina voters disapprove of Burr's vote. Led by campaign guru Joe Trippi and Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig, the government reform group advocates for increased public money in campaign finance to keep big money out of politics.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "Two years after Congress toughened ethics laws that prevent lobbyists and corporations from paying for members' trips, lawmakers are still seeing the world courtesy of other outside groups," Politico reports. "Although the trips are permissible because the money doesn't come directly from lobbyists or corporations, the walls can be very thin. Some of the nonprofit groups that sponsor member travel are themselves funded by corporate sponsors, and the conferences that members attend on the groups' dime often put them in direct contact with representatives of the corporate sponsors."
• "When a confidential document leaked into the public sphere last week, it revealed the Justice Department is seeking to trump a House ethics investigation of Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.)," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "While the request offered no new insight into the Mollohan inquiry, it did shine light on the often murky relationship between House ethics officials and federal prosecutors."
• "The banking lobby is splitting with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over a key battle to revamp the nation's financial regulatory structure, with the two sides differing over whether a council to monitor systemic risk throughout the financial markets should also oversee accounting rules," CongressDailyAM (subscription) reports.
• "As the House prepares to vote on massive health care legislation as early as Friday, outside groups on the left and right with deep pockets are going into overdrive to make sure their opinions are heard," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "Some lawmakers, however, questioned the effectiveness of last-minute lobbying efforts, complaining they tie up office phones and are coming at a point when Members are already well-versed in the legislation and their constituents' views."
(UPDATE@1:44 pm on Nov. 4 to add a link to prominent economist Jeffrey Sachs' reaction to Jankowsky's editorial)
The Obama administration is talking out of both sides of its mouth regarding special interests, writes longtime D.C. lobbyist Joel Jankowsky in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece Tuesday.
He argues the White House has welcomed top campaign donors while ostracizing lobbyists as tainted:
"Campaign contributors, especially those who bundled large contributions from others, have been embraced by this administration. Because they aren't formally registered or regulated in the way lobbyists are, they enjoy the benefits and privileges of serving in the heart of the administration. These contributors serve in critical foreign and domestic policy positions, as well as department and agency boards and commissions. Dozens of Obama for America National Finance Committee members have joined the administration. Most of them raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the campaign, according to the watchdog group the Center for Responsive Politics."
Jankowsky adds:
"This inconsistent treatment does a disservice to federal policy making. Talented women and men who registered themselves as lobbyists under the Lobbying Disclosure Act are being excluded from contributing their expertise at a critical time in our nation's history."
Jeffrey Sachs, economist and director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University took issue with Jankowsky's argument, calling it "preposterous" on the Huffington Post.
He says: "Lobbyists may indeed be talented people of expertise, but they are part of a dysfunctional system that has turned policy over to the highest corporate bidder and that puts our economy and society in jeopardy."
A new business coalition that's led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and includes 10 other K Street powerhouses has launched a multimillion dollar national cable and local advertising drive in 19 states and 46 media markets that's aimed at blocking passage of the House health care reform bill which is slated to be voted on this weekend.
The coalition, Employers for a Healthy Economy which also includes such big groups as the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors and the National Retail Federation, intends to have the ads air through Sunday but might extend the buy if the vote on the House bill is delayed past this weekend.
National Journal is hearing that the initial ad buy will cost about $10 million but the exact numbers aren't public.
The ads argue that the House bill could lead to "millions of new lost jobs" and would mean tax increases and new mandates on business that would worsen the overall economy. The business community is especially worried about two parts of the House bill: its robust public option and a new "pay to play" mandate that would require companies to either provide insurance to employees or pay a penalty of 8 percent of their total payroll.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "The disclosure that seven House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee members are being scrutinized for their ties to PMA Group, a now-defunct lobbying firm that raised money for lawmakers and won earmarks for clients, is not expected to have a chilling effect on negotiations to reach agreement on a final FY10 Defense spending bill," CongressDaily AM (subscription) reports. "According to analysts for watchdog groups that monitor the appropriations process, House-Senate discussions are probably too far along for negotiators to start weeding out earmarks."
• "As the House Financial Services Committee begins its final push today in drafting legislation that will overhaul the banking system, lobbyists are scrambling to get Members of Congress to address specific provisions that would harm their clients' bottom lines," Roll Call (subscription) reports. "Republicans have been pushing the committee's chairman, Barney Frank (D-Mass.), to delay the hearing, citing the need to take more time to review the draft bill that was released late last week."
• "A liberal advocacy group is launching a new Web site" today "that aims to document the financial and political ties of conservative groups, many of which have emerged as major political forces this year in fomenting opposition to President Obama's policies," the Washington Post reports. "The Conservative Transparency Web site... which will be run by the Media Matters Action Network, uses Internal Revenue Service filings to track the major financial backers and beneficiaries of conservative activist groups."
If Democrats lose some seats in the House in 2010, it won't be because of Ben Barnes.
A look at the latest Federal Election Commission records tracking the "bundling" of campaign contributions -- to federal candidates, party committees and political action committees set up by congressional leaders -- shows that the Texas lobbyist pulled together the most political donations, by far. The data show Barnes getting credit for contributions worth a whopping $630,450 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee through October of this year.
That's more than twice as much as the next biggest bundler, former Rep. Bill Paxon, R-NY, now a senior adviser at Akin Gump, who packaged $244,000 in contributions to the Republican National Committee. And it dwarfs the sums put together by other well-known Democratic lobbyists-bundlers, such as Tony Podesta, who has bundled $101,200, but divided it between three incumbents' campaigns.
Barnes "biggest bundler" title comes at the same time the Center for Responsive Politics labeled Barnes and his wife Melanie the No. 1 individual political donors for the 2010 election cycle thus far, with contributions of $230,600 -- all of it to Democrats. That includes $52,000 to the DCCC, another $30,400 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, $30,000 to the DNC Services Corp and $10,000 apiece to the Connecticut and Indiana Democratic party committees.
The Ben Barnes Group has earned $2.8 million this year, with roughly two dozen clients -- the largest of which is global oil and gas exploration company Weatherford International. His reign as lobbyist-donor-bundler extraordinaire is just the latest chapter in a headline-grabbing career. He was elected Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives at 26, became lieutenant Gov. of Texas at the age of 31, was felled by political scandal and then endured bankruptcy in the 1980s. After rebuilding his fortune, Barnes made headlines during then-President George W. Bush's 2004 reelection campaign with a disputed account of having helped Bush avoid military service during the Vietnam War with an appointment to the Texas Air National Guard.
The association sector spent 14 percent more on lobbying in the third quarter compared to the previous quarter, led by big spending at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Beverage Association and the National Association of Manufacturers, CEO Update reported. (subscription)
Without those three associations however, lobbying at associations dropped 4.2 percent in the third quarter, CEO Update said.
The story was of interest because I report in this week's National Journal, (subscription) that activity was picking up on K Street for many hired guns during the third quarter. The trade association world doesn't seem to be sharing in that uptick in business yet.
How many lobbyists have actually deregistered is a topic of ongoing speculation in the K Street world because the lobbying records aren't clear on the matter. Based on the Senate Office of Public Records, we reported in this week's National Journal that the number of lobbyists is up from a year ago.
Today two non-profit groups report a different story which is sure to keep the speculation going.
The second quarter of 2009 saw 1,418 deregistrations by federal lobbyists, according to a joint analysis by OMB Watch and the Center for Responsive politics.
The groups said that number is a "marked increase for any reporting period during all of 2008 and 2009." The drop off also coincides with new White House rules on lobbyists that limit interactions with the administration. But a direct a correlation isn't ironclad, since there is no field for "deregistration" available to lobbyists filing with the House and Senate. Instead, the groups tracked lobby "terminations."
"You can't draw any conclusions about why they terminated," said OMB Watch's Lee Mason.
To arrive at the 1,418 number, the groups tracked terminations (which can apply to lobbying in general, or work for a specific client) and cross checked them against later lobby activity. If a lobbyist cropped up later as active, they were eliminated. The Center for Responsive Politics also crosschecked 90 percent the terminations for duplicates.
Determining the exact number of lobby terminations is far from a science. The House Office of the Clerk told us in early October that it had recorded 1,800 terminations since the beginning of 2008.
A district court judge revealed today that the jury in the trial of former Jack Abramoff lobbying associate Kevin Ring was overwhelmed by the number of e-mails the government used as evidence.
"The wisdom of the [Ring] jury was, 'You gave me way too many e-mails,'' Judge Ellen Huvelle said during a hearing for Horace Cooper, a former legislative and executive branch official who was indicted in August as part of the Abramoff scandal.
Huvelle revealed the information after an attorney for the Department of Justice, Matt Stennes, said that "the bulk of the evidence" in Cooper's case will be e-mails. In Ring's case, jurors were given four large binders filled with evidential documents, which mostly consisted of e-mails sent between Ring, Abramoff, other lobbyists and public officials in the executive and legislative branches.
Huvelle also said that the jurors in Ring's trial "thought the best witness the government had was [Neil] Volz" because he was "the most persuasive."
Continue reading Too Many E-mails Used In Ring Trial, Jury Said.
If you think the health care reform fight has been aggressive, hear this: The lobbying war over climate change could be even nastier.
The climate bill battle has fractured partisan, geographic and industry allegiances; thrown erstwhile enemies into strange-bedfellow partnerships; and sparked allegations of dirty tricks on both sides of the debate. And this is just the beginning.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has filed a 36-page civil complaint demanding a jury trial of the Yes Men, activist hoaxers who staged a fake press conference announcing a fictitious Chamber about-face on climate change two weeks ago. The Chamber is already reeling from member defections over its climate bill opposition.
On the flip side, Washington lobbyist Jack Bonner and coal industry organizer Steve Miller were excoriated on Capitol Hill last week by lawmakers who accused them of deceptive practices. At a hearing before the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, lawmakers grilled Bonner and Miller about more than half a dozen faked anti-climate bill letters sent to Capitol Hill purportedly from civil rights and civic leaders.
Both controversies signal a rough-and-tumble climate bill fight ahead, with the full range of pressure tactics thrown into the mix. By nature, environmental policy disputes tend to break down along unpredictable partisan and geographic lines, and that has been especially true for the cap-and-trade climate bill now wending its way through Congress.
The Yes Men stunt raises questions about misrepresentation in lobbying and when it strays over the line.
Democrats have squabbled among themselves; Republicans such as Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina have declared themselves willing to work with Democrats, angering some in their own party; and environmental groups have forged new partnerships with industry players promoting green energy.
Continue reading Climate Change Advocacy Is Off To Ugly Start.
From this morning's Earlybird:
• "A recent leak that an ethics panel is investigating seven defense appropriators is expected to shut down Members' fundraising prospects from the industry, which is typically a reliable source of campaign cash for their re-election campaigns," Roll Call (subscription) reports.
• "Two former high-level managers at IBM and Microsoft are playing key roles in the Obama administration's patent reform efforts, leading critics to question whether their involvement constitutes a breach of the administration's ethics policy," Politico reports.
• "House lawmakers this week will attempt to alter legislation creating a new federal insurance office after lobbying interests clashed over its proposed powers," The Hill reports. "The insurance industry is divided over whether the new office under the Treasury Department should negotiate international insurance agreements on prudential matters."
