As leaders in Congress announced a series of hearings this June to tackle huge telecommunications issues with a focus on the Internet, the top phone and cable organizations that control the majority of the access to the Internet have hired 276 former government officials to lobby both the Congress and the executive branch.

According to data obtained from lobbyist disclosure forms and the Center for Responsive Politics, seventy-two percent of the lobbyists hired by AT&T, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Verizon, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association and the US Telecom Association have previous government experience. These organizations combined to spend $20.6 million lobbying the federal government in the first quarter of 2010.

Eighteen of the 276 revolving door lobbyists are former members of Congress. These include the powerful former senators John Breaux and Trent Lott. The Breaux Lott Leadership Group reported spending $150,000 lobbying on behalf of AT&T in the first quarter of 2010.

Both Breaux and Lott served in the leadership of their respective parties while in the Senate with Lott serving as Majority Leader. Lott also served on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, the committee with jurisdiction over the telecommunications industry.

The eighteen former lawmakers include a heavy representation from the House Committee on Energy & Commerce, the House committee with telecommunications jurisdication. In 2010, the organizations hired former Energy & Commerce Committee members Jim Davis (AT&T), Jack Fields (Verizon), Ron Klink (Comcast), Chip Pickering (Comcast and National Cable and Television Association) and Al  Wynn (US Telecom Association).

The organizations are also hiring former lawmakers with previous clout in both the House and the Senate. Former Sen. Don Nickles, hired to lobby for Comcast, was the Republican Majority Whip from 1996 to 2001. Comcast also hired the former House Majority Whip William H. Gray.

Aside from Breaux and Lott, AT&T has hired two other lawmakers with strong resumes, former House Republican Conference Chair J.C. Watts and longtime California Democrat Vic Fazio.

The top telecom organizations are also hiring a number of lobbyists who previously worked on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation or the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. Fourteen lobbyists used to work on the House committee and thirteen previously worked at the Senate committee. In addition, the six organizations employ 26 former staffers of current members of the House committee and 22 former staffers of current members of the Senate committee.

These staffers include the former chief of staff, Lane Bailey, and deputy chief of staff, Patrick Robertson, to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation. Robertson lobbies for Comcast and Bailey lobbies for the National Cable and Television Association.

The former counsel to Sen. John Kerry, the number two Democrat on the committee, Barry LaSala, is registered to lobby for Verizon.

Comcast and Time Warner Cable lead the way in hiring former government officials as lobbyists. Ninety percent of lobbyists hired by Time Warner Cable previously worked in government. Two Time Warner lobbyists served as congressmen and two others served as staffers to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation.

In first quarter lobbyists disclosure filings for 2010, eighty-eight percent of all lobbyists hired by Comcast had previous experience in government. While this percentage is slightly lower than Time Warner's, Comcast hired more than twice as many lobbyists with former government experience as Time Warner did—82 to 38. This includes five former members of Congress and four Energy & Commerce Committee staffers. Comcast, as it seeks government approval of its purchase of NBC Universal, has also hired six former officials from the Department of Justice.

Broadband regulation has been a major issue over the past few years as many Democrats, including President Obama, have called for the institution of net neutrality rules to govern broadband transmission. Net neutrality regulations would prevent broadband service providers from blocking or slowing transmission to certain sites, services and users.

In April, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was rebuffed by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit after trying to stop Comcast from slowing broadband access to users using the BitTorrent file-sharing service. The court ruled that the FCC did not have sufficient regulatory authority to require Comcast to provide equal access to all sites and services online.

In the wake of the court's decision, four committee and subcommittee chairmen announced a series of meetings with industry players to discuss a rewrite of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The meetings will focus on the changes in telecommunications brought on by the revolution in Internet technologies over the past fifteen years. Much of that time is expected to be spent on the regulation of broadband routes.

A group of 74 Democratic lawmakers recently sent a letter to FCC Commissioner Julius Genachowski asking that the FCC not institute net neutrality rules without specific instruction from Congress. The 74 Democrats were comprised of a mix of Blue Dog Democrats, New Dems and members of both the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC).

At least, six of the letter signatorees—Reps. Joe Baca, Allen Boyd, Corrine Brown, Baron Hill, Eddie Bernice Johnson and Ciro Rodriquez—have former staffers lobbying for the top telecom organizations.

Philadelphia congressman Robert Brady recently joined 71 other lawmakers in signing a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) questioning the commission's newly stated policy of network neutrality, which would prohibit Internet providers from favoring or discriminating against types of traffic coming across their lines. Of the 72 letter signatories, Brady is the leading recipient of campaign contributions from the combination of telecom companies and their lobbyists. Since 2007, Brady has received a total of $91,650, all from one company and their lobbyists, the Philadelphia-based Comcast Corporation.

Brady has a long standing history of supporting the policies of Comcast Corporation. In 2006, Brady, along with 38 of the other letter signatories, voted against an amendment to the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006 that would have established a federal net neutrality policy.

The Democratic letter signatories have stated that the letter is not a letter of opposition, but instead simply a voice for concern. The previous voting behavior of a large number of signatories is one sign that this is not the case. The similarity that the letter bares to public statements by Comcast executives is another sign that the agenda of the signatories is closely linked to that of the companies opposing the policy shift.

The letter signed by Brady and 71 other Democrats mimics the language released by Comcast after the FCC's announcement of a net neutrality proposal. The Democratic letter reads as follows, "...we believe in a transparent, data-driven process and stand ready to work with you on measures that will spur adoption and expand the use of broadband networks. But we remain suspicious of conclusions based on slogans rather than substance and of policies that restrict and inhibit the very innovation and growth that we all seek to achieve." Comcast's executive vice president issued a statement with almost identical language, "We appreciate and support Chairman Genachowski's commitment to have a fair, fact-based, and data driven process to explore these issues. We continue to hope that any rules adopted by the Commission will not harm the investment and innovation that has made the Internet what it is today and that will make it even greater tomorrow."

Comcast has been at the center of net neutrality debate since the company was a subject of an FCC ruling that led to censure for slowing the lines for certain customers engaged in peer-to-peer downloads. Comcast claimed that some users were slowing the lines with excessive downloads of BitTorrent files. The FCC, however, ruled that Comcast had "arbitrarily picked an application and blocked their subscribers' access to it."

So far this year Comcast has contributed over $1 million to lawmakers and candidates for Congress. In the previous election cycle, Comcast contributed nearly $3 million.