Even before he was elected last November to represent Chicago's southern exurbs in the House, Illinois Democrat Bill Foster decided to sell his stake in Electronic Theatre Controls, a company he founded with his brother. Foster jettisoned the shares -- worth at least $5 million -- "to minimize potential conflicts of interest when voting on legislation that might impact his personal finances," according to his press secretary.
Among this year's congressional freshmen, Foster stands out as a noteworthy exception.
Now that President Barack Obama's inaugural festivities are over and the 113th Congress is getting down to serious business, Sunlight ...
Continue readingShadow lobbyists, ex-lobbyists, give to Obama inaugural committee
Lucky for longtime lobbyist Mickey Ibarra, the president of his own lobbying and strategy shop, he could buy that champagne flute with the presidential inaugural seal.
That's only because, months before, Ibarra had technically deregistered as a federal lobbyist -- on the advice of counsel, he said, even though he continued doing some lobbying. Others in the influence business -- including one lobbyist who told Sunlight she was denied inaugural tickets she had already purchased because of her job -- had more difficulty being part of the inaugural festivities.
But an analysis by the Sunlight Foundation raises questions about just how meaningful ...
Continue readingBiden pitches gun control in NRA country
When Vice President Joe Biden travels to Richmond, Va. today to participate in a roundtable about gun violence, he'll be visiting a state where the legislature largely has beaten back proposals to regulate guns, and where politicians have gotten $2.2 million in support from gun rights groups over the past two decades.
Most of that money—$2 million—came from the National Rifle Association, according to Sunlight Foundation's Influence Explorer. By contrast, groups that support stronger restrictions on guns, such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, reported spending a mere $183,000 in Virginia over ...
Continue readingGabrielle Giffords: From gun victim to gun control lobbyist?
As the debate over President Barack Obama's proposed gun legislation heats up on Capitol Hill, gun control advocates have a potential ace in the hole: Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., the victim of a horrific incident of gun violence that interrupted a once-promising political career, is about to become eligible to lobby.
For Giffords, tomorrow marks the end of the official one-year "cooling off" period that former House members face when they leave office before they can lobby their former colleagues, according to Sunlight's post-employment lobbying tracker. Should she wish, she will be permitted to register as a ...
Continue readingNRA gives more than $2 million to support politicians in Texas, New Mexico
During the past two decades, the National Rifle Association has contributed more than $2 million to support politicians in New Mexico and Texas, where the nation's latest outbreaks of gun violence occurred this week.
Both are among the majority of states that provide broad protections for gunowners privacy, according to information compiled by the Sunlight Foundation.
MORE: For data on the gun debate, see the Sunlight Foundation's resource page.
Data pulled from Influence Explorer, a Sunlight Foundation database that tabulates federal campaign contributions from the Center for Responsive Politics and state contributions from the National Institute of Money ...
Continue readingRoe v. Wade at 40: Abortion debate fuels multi-million-dollar influence effort
Friday's annual March for Life will bring thousands of anti-abortion protesters to the Supreme Court, marking this week's 40th anniversary of the justices' Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. The event underscores the continuing intensity of a debate that has spawned well-financed lobbies on both sides at the federal and state level.
Although the 113th Congress has been in session less than a month, the issue of abortion already is on the docket. A search using Sunlight Foundation's Scout, which allows users to track issues in Congress, the 50 state legislatures and the Federal Register ...
Continue readingInside spending: super PACs, dark money groups dominated by political insiders
By suppressing the speech of manifold corporations, both for-profit and nonprofit, the Government prevents their voices and viewpoints from reaching the public and advising voters on which persons or entities are hostile to their interests.
-- from the majority opinion in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission
When the Supreme Court handed down its landmark decision in the Citizen United case three years ago this week, the majority's expressed intent was to allow corporations--both for-profits like Exxon-Mobil and nonprofits like the Sierra Club--to add their voices to the public debate. In practice, an analysis by Sunlight finds, it has created ...
Continue readingInaugural party surprise: VIP room off limits to congressional VIPs
Celebrities from John Leguizamo to Marlon Wayans were bused to Washington D.C.'s Shakespeare Theatre Monday night for a gala to celebrate with the second inauguration of President Barack Obama but in an odd reversal of their usual good fortune, members of Congress found themselves shut out of the Creative Coalition's VIP party-within-a-party.
Continue readingMajority of states prohibit access to gun records
(Updated 1/19 7:25 a.m.)
Following a New York newspaper's controversial decision to publish the names and address of local gun owners, state legislators are moving to make such information private, even as a Sunlight Foundation analysis shows that in a majority of states, the data are already off the public record.
Forty states plus the District of Columbia do not make data available about who owns a gun or has received a state permit to carry a gun, according to Sunlight's examination of state gun laws. There are ten states that do make data available ...
Continue readingCorporations pony up for inauguration bashes
President Obama may have downsized the number of official inaugural balls, but everybody knows that the real party goes on at the more than 100 unofficial galas and late-night parties, often sponsored by corporations, interest groups and state societies.
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