| Location | Lobbying and PR totals 2010 | Recent events | U.S. lobbying summary |
| Algeria | $205,000 | President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has remained in power since, 1999. In March, the government boosted wages of government employees to soothe protesters. Spring protests were dispersed by riot police. Small-scale protests against housing shortages and unemployment continue. | Algeria has hired Foley and Hoag since 2007. Lobbying efforts focused on reducing Morocco's influence in Western Sahara. |
| Bahrain | $63,000 | Bahrain began to crackdown on protests mid March. Protests left 30 dead, the state of emergency was lifted June 1. Negations were set up between the government ... |
Arab Spring: One Year Later
International lobbying is the hidden story to come out of the Arab Spring, which hits a major landmark Saturday, the first anniversary of ex-Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's resignation. Lobbying represents a vital puzzle piece in an international structure of power that propped up dictators and oppressed millions of people. The Sunlight Foundation has been tracking these developments using the Foreign Lobbying Influence Tracker, a searchable database of international lobbying records gleaned from the Department of Justice that we've just updated.
The project started in partnership with ProPublica, aiming to make this treasure trove of information accessible to the ...
New nuclear plant builder a major Washington player
The company benefiting from today’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission decision to approve the construction of the first new nuclear plant in the U.S. in over three decades is an influential powerhouse in Washington.
Southern Company, a power company based in Atlanta, has spent $130 million lobbying the federal government since 1998, ranking 17th among all organizations, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Last year, the company spent nearly $13 million on lobbying, including in-house efforts and hiring 14 outside firms.
The company’s political action committee, its employees and their family members also donate generously to federal candidates ...
Continue readingDark money in the twilight of 2011
Dark money has haunted the psyche of good government reformers. Recent changes in campaign law raise the prospect of unlimited donations, routed to political action committees through 501(c)4 "social welfare" organizations that don't have to disclose contributors' names. That could allow innocuously named groups to shelter powerful individuals and corporations and the influence they're exercising to determine who wins a federal office.
So far, that scenario has been the dog that didn't bark, but that doesn't mean it has been defanged.
Sunlight looked at the super PAC filings in search of 501(c)4 ...
Continue readingCrossroads, Planned Parenthood advertise in presidential battlegrounds
As if independent expenditures by super PACs weren't enough, two major political players have notified the Federal Elections Commission of recent electioneering communications in states likely to be battlegrounds this fall.
Crossroads GPS reported spending $500,000 on ads against President Obama in Arizona, Michigan, Minnesota and Missouri, while Planned Parenthood Action Fund Inc., spent $36,000 on ads in Florida and Michigan. Electioneering communication are TV or radio ads that refer to a candidate for office within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election but stop short of calling for a vote for ...
Continue readingRevolving door from CFTC to lobbying firm
A former Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) commissioner has gone through the revolving door to the law and lobbying firm firm Patton Boggs, where he'll work as a senior policy advisor, the firm announced Tuesday.
"Regulatory agencies should be accessible to the businesses and industries they regulate," said Michael Dunn, the former commissioner, in a statement today. "I am excited to join the firm, and I look forward to helping clients navigate complex regulatory processes and agencies."
Appointed to the CFTC by former President George W. Bush, Dunn specialized in agricultural issues at the agency. His new employer is ...
Continue readingSuper PAC floodgates open
Whether you consider it a case of raging hypocrisy or a common sense decision not to unilaterally disarm -- and there will be plenty of predictably partisan views on both sides -- President Obama's decision to greenlight donations to a super PAC that former staffers formed last year is confirmation that the influence of big money on politics is about to get exponentially bigger.
In a prescient piece of eye-opening analysis, our colleagues Lee Drutman and Jacob Fenton today take a look at how donations to super PACs took off at the presidential campaign intensified in the week's leading up ...
Continue readingSuper PAC profile: Democratic governors play in presidential primary
DGA Action is a super PAC created by the Democratic Governors Association, but so far in this election cycle, all of its ads have been against Republican presidential candidates.
During January, the group placed a series of ads on Facebook and Google targeted to users in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida. Like bigger presidential super PACs, such as the pro-Mitt Romney Restore Our Future and the pro-Newt Gingrich Winning Our Future, DGA Action focused on the negative.
Its ads opposed Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney and Ron Paul. No ads were placed opposing Newt Gingrich, but that could change according ...
Continue readingSuper PAC filings show who big donors of 2011 were
The deadline for presidential super PACs like Restore Our Future and Winning Our Future--supporting, respectively, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich--and other committees to file their disclosures with the Federal Election Commission fell at 11:59 p.m. Sunlight's Reporting Group combed through the filings, looking to see who's writing six- and seven-figure checks to the super PACs that are trying to influence voters in the Republican primaries--and beyond. We're also providing a chart tracking super PACs playing in the presidential race where you can download .csv files of their latest FEC filings. If you do, be sure ...
Continue readingNot so super PACs
For every high-spending, politically-connected PAC, there are even more PACs that fail to accomplish much of anything. As of January 30, some 300 organizations have written letters to the FEC with their intention of raising unlimited money as a super PAC.
Any citizen, union or company (assuming the company is U.S. or has a U.S. subsidiary) may start a PAC -- or 60 PACs, in the case of serial super PAC creator, Josue Larose.
While some PACs have causes without money, other PACs have money but no cause: The candidate they set out to assist, has dropped out of ...
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