Updated 4:22 p.m. The Treasury Department has now fixed the link to March meetings with outside groups concerning implementation of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. A spokesman also just called to thank us for alerting the agency to the missed deadline.
Something curious happened after we contacted the Treasury Department press office Tuesday to inquire why it had missed the April deadline for releasing information about meetings with outside groups around implementation of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law--meetings that often include financial heavyweights such as JPMorgan Chase & Company.
We did not get a response -- neither to our initial ...
Continue readingJPMorgan better at hedging political bets than financial investments?
JPMorgan Chase & Co. may have lost a $2 billion dollar bet on the markets, but the investment giant's campaign contributions show a much more conservative approach, featuring mega contributions to both political parties -- and both of this year's leading presidential candidates.
The company and its employees have been generous donors to political campaigns. JPMorgan's political largesse has totaled more than $21 million since 1991, according to Influence Explorer. The Center for Responsive Politics lists the storied bank as one of President Obama's top 2008 donors; his haul that year made him the top recipient of JPMorgan ...
Continue readingJPMorgan not alone
With the news focused on JPMorgan Chase & Company's $2 billion "mistake" and company's lobbying campaign at financial agencies to permit the sort of trades that led to the loss, it's worth reviewing some other examples where industry have pushed hard to limit the reach of the Dodd-Frank financial law, arguing as JPMorgan did against a heavy hand because they could handle the risk.
The emphasis is on "some:" the list really is much longer. The law famously set in motion more than 220 rulemakings of which just under a third have been completed. Dominating the dockets of ...
Continue readingStealthy Wealthy: Jerry Perenchio speaks softly, carries a big checkbook
It may be easier to get the famously closemouthed mega-donor Jerry Perenchio to open his checkbook than to get him to talk to a reporter. The octogenerian former chairman of Univision and his wife Margaret are major players in this year's election, having underwritten American Crossroads to the tune of $2 million so far. Perenchio also gave half a million dollars to Restore America, the Super PAC that supports Mitt Romney, and $100,000 to the super PAC that supported Jon Huntsman's now-defunct presidential campaign.
That's just the latest in the more than $50 million Perenchio and ...
Continue readingHappy Mothers Day! Policymakers stalled on breastfeeding in the workplace guidance
Many a working mother who nurses her baby faces a major challenge upon returning to her job: exactly where will she find the space and how will she find the time to pump milk so she can continue to breastfeed?
As the nation prepares to celebrate Mother's Day, policy makers are stalled about issuing final guidance for employers on how to comply with a new law that requires them to supply hourly workers with "reasonable break time" to express milk for one year after a child's birth, as well as provide a place, other than a bathroom, that ...
Continue readingAnti-incumbent super PAC backs former incumbent turned lobbyist
The Campaign for Primary Accountability, a super PAC that's raised $2.5 million and has been active in about a dozen races across the country, maintains that long serving incumbents should be ousted because their campaigns are accountable to lobbyists, not district voters. Yet in one district, the challenger it's backing in Tuesday's Indiana primary is a former House member who went on to work as a registered lobbyist.
Recently, the super PAC helped oust Rep. Tim Holden, D-Pa., by calling him a friend to K Street. Part of the problem with incumbents, according the group's ...
Continue readingKentucky Derby: Owners put money on politicians, not ponies
The real money in the Kentucky Derby isn't in the purse or the pari-mutuel, but in the politics. Horse-focused PACs like the American Horse Council, the National Thoroughbred Racing Association and horse breeders and owners have contributed more than $8.7 million to political candidates and parties since 1989 and spent $2.2 million more lobbying. And some of the top donors to these organizations are mega-donors in their own right, having contributed millions more to politicians, parties, PACs and super PACs.
Far from the finish line, the industry jockeys for tax breaks and other special treatment for big ...
Continue readingSuper PAC profile: Group focused on healthcare repeal has shadowy sister
This week, Restore America's Voice PAC has disclosed its first political spending of the 2012 election cycle--more than $50,000 worth of phone call fundraising pitches that mention President Barack Obama--but a shadowy nonprofit tied to the group has spent millions more attacking Obama and congressional Democrats for the healthcare reform act.
Restore America's Voice Foundation, a social welfare organization that does not have to disclose its donors, ran ads around the country in 2011 featuring former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. On one of its websites, Repealitnow.org, the group claims that the ads were "the only televised ...
Continue readingSuper PACs first quarter haul: More than $100 million in political contributions
Super PACs raised more in the first three months of 2012 than they did in all of 2011, and after just two years of existence have emerged as a financial force that rivals the political parties and candidates' campaign committees.
An unusual conjunction of Federal Election Committee filing deadlines -- reports from campaign committees that file quarterly were due at midnight Sunday while those that file monthly were due Friday -- has given us the first comprehensive look at the impact of super PACs in the first presidential campaign year where they've been a factor.
An analysis of data gathered by ...
Continue readingWith merger, expect airline lobbying to take off
American Airlines and US Airways, the fourth and fifth biggest domestic airlines that took another step towards merger Friday, are also high fliers when it comes to political influence.
Any marriage of the two carriers would require government approval, and both airlines have been active lobbying Congress -- which controls the budgets of the federal agencies that would review the merger's impact on the market, the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission.
American Airlines has spent $3.8 million on lobbying in the first three quarters of 2011 and has hired 10 lobbying firms during that period.
Although US ...
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