In light of President Obama’s announcement yesterday of further government control over the auto giants General Motors and Chrysler, our colleagues at the Center for Responsive Politics have pulled together an extremely helpful list of all their resources they’ve built over the years, making it possible to follow the powerful political influence automakers have amassed. “The connection between the automotive industry, the administration and Congress is more than just a shared interest in putting the economy on the track to recovery,” CRP writes. “Automakers and dealers have spent money on campaign contributions and lobbying to make sure they get the tune-up they need to survive.”

Here are a few resources on OpenSecrets.org, CRP’s site, that can help you follow the political influence of the industry:

• Overviews of federal campaign contributions and lobbying by the automotive industry.
• Auto manufacturers (contributions, lobbying).
• Here you can find how much congressional lawmakers have received from the automotive side  and the automakers. CRP suggests we play around with the dropdowns and slider menu to change the timeframe or see totals to specific members of the House and Senate.
• They have a full list of contributions and lobbying over time, which shows who the “heavy hitters” are. And here are links to General Motors, Chrysler and Ford.
• Here are links to the Big Three’s total lobbying expenditures: Chrysler, GM and Ford.
• CRP also tracks political giving of car dealers. Here are links to the industry’s campaign contributions (foreign and domestic) and lobbying expenditures (Japanese and domestic).
• And CRP has compiled a list of lawmakers supported the original proposal to use taxpayer funds to bail out the car companies and how much those legislators received from the industry. Here’s the list for the House vote and a list for the Senate vote.

This list of reports and breakdowns makes crystal clear how vital CRP’s work is. They are THE source for this invaluable information. Where would we be without them?

From October 1, 2008 through the end of the year, eighteen companies that had received, or would receive, bailout funds spent money lobbying the government. As the bailout is set to move onto round two, there have been concerns that recipients of funds are improperly lobbying the government after receiving the funds. In the past week there has been an effort by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to restrict lobbying of his department by bailout recipients and a bill introduced by Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Olympia Snowe to ban the use of bailout funds for political influence. Some good government groups are objecting to bailout recipient Bank of America's involvement in organizing opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act.

In total, the eighteen bailout recipients that continued to spend money on lobbying spent $14,810,259 over the three month period of October to December. Of course, many of these companies were lobbying on a variety of issues and did not necessarily spend the full amount listed on their disclosure to lobby on the bailout. All but two of the bailout contracts received by these companies came during the period of which this lobbying spending is the subject. Lobbying on the bailout was determined by whether the lobbyist disclosure forms listed one of the following in the Issue Area provided on the form: H.R. 1424, Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, TARP, and Troubled Asset Relief Program. One bailout recipient that continued to list lobbying expenses, American Internation Group (AIG), has publicly stated that they are no longer lobbying government. The report AIG filed indicates that the expenses were for:

In response to requests and to correct misinformation, AIG provided information about AIG to federal officials in connection with government efforts to address instability and liquidity in the financial markets and congressional oversight of federal programs including the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Topping the list is the General Motors Corporation with lobbying expenses totalling $3,550,000. The financial arm of the General Motors family, GMAC, a bailout recipient, also spent $,1540,000 on lobbying expenses. Both of these bailout recipients obtained funds at the end of the lobbying disclosure quarter, after Congress rejected a bill granting non-TARP funds for them, suggesting that the majority of the lobbying was done in pursuit of the funds themselves. Four more companies also obtained their bailout funds in the waning days of the year (the end of the disclosure quarter) or in the new year. Those companies are American Express, Chrysler, CIT Group, and PNC Financial Services Group.

Below is the full table of bailout recipients, their lobbying expenses for the 4th quarter, and the first date upon which they were issued bailout funds.

Oct.-Dec. 2008 Lobbying by Bailout Recipients

Bailout Recipient	Lobbying Expenses (Oct.-Dec. 2008)	First receipt of bailout funds
American Express Company	$1,080,000	1/9/09
American International Group	$1,080,000	10/28/08
Bank of America	$880,000	10/28/08
Chrysler LLC	$1,356,589	1/2/09
CIT Group, Inc.	$80,000	12/31/08
Citigroup	$1,480,000	10/28/08
General Motors Corporation	$3,550,000	12/29/08
GMAC LLC	$1,540,000	12/29/08
Goldman Sachs & Co.	$720,000	10/28/08
Huntington Bancshares, Inc.	$43,670	11/14/08
J.P. Morgan Chase Bank	$1,100,000	10/28/08
Morgan Stanley	$610,000	10/28/08
PNC Financial Services Group	$10,000	12/31/08
State Street Corporation	$210,000	10/28/08
The Bank of New York Mellon	$330,000	10/28/08
U.S. Bancorp	$160,000	11/14/08
Wells Fargo & Co.	$580,000	10/28/08

Executives for the Big Three auto makers are in Washington again asking for money. (Did you know they drove to Washington this time?!?!) While groveling for billions of dollars to aid the ailing industry, the Big Three are also spending heavily on lobbying and campaign contributions. CBS News (via Consumerist) reports on the influence spending:

The Big Three may be spending big on lobbying, but their campaign contributions aren't keeping pace with fellow bailout seeking banks and financial institutions. Open Secrets' Eliza Krigman wrote about this last month, suggesting that the auto industry's lesser contributions create a situation whereby lawmakers feel as though they owe the industry little:

Why, when Wall Street took the fast lane to grab its share of $700 billion in federal bailout funds, does the auto industry seem stuck in neutral? The carmakers' campaign contributions to Congress suggest one reason: Most lawmakers, especially those on the finance committees that heard this week from pleading GM, Ford and Chrysler executives, don't owe much payback to Detroit.

Meanwhile, the primary beneficiaries of the available bailout money -- securities and investment firms, commercial banks, mortgage companies and insurers -- are among the top 15 contributors to federal politics, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. By comparison, and perhaps as another sign of Detroit's hard times, the automotive industry ranks 34th among contributors to Congress, giving just $8.7 million this election cycle, far behind Wall Street and even below crop producers, retailers and accountants. The industry's ranking, which also accounts for contributions from car dealers, has been steadily slipping, from 16th in 2000 to 20th in '02 and 25th in '04 and '06.

In the past, the industry has gotten by with this level of contribution to lawmakers campaigns. Back in 2006, Sunlight's Larry Makinson on the Sunlight blog about the nexus between contributions and the inaction in Congress on reforms to CAFE standards that could have made the industry into less of a basket case. Makinson then left an ominous warning:

Members need [money] to fill the coffers of their reelection campaigns – in the last election the average House race cost just over $1 million; Senate seats were going for about $7.2 million. Industries respond well to that need, showing up at fundraisers, delivering checks on a regular basis, and thereby building relationships that last for years. Like Pavlov’s dogs, incumbents have come to expect the contributions to roll in year after year, as long as the industry remains relatively happy.

Of such logic are loopholes made. And also dilemmas. When an industry can stave off disaster either by retooling their factories and business plans or by living a few more years on an economically-illogical loophole from Congress, which do you think they’ll choose? And for how long? And at what price?

Washington is full of unpleasant choices to be made, and they’re tough enough without the logic of cold, hard cash getting in the way. And I don’t just mean the kind that’s stashed away in freezers.