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Thursday, January 04, 2007

House and Senate Begin Ethics and Lobbying Reform

The House and Senate have recently convened, and as promised, the next two days will involve the adoption of new House rules that address ethics, lobbying, budget enforcement, and the disclosure of earmark sponsors. The text of the House rule changes can be read here. These new House rules include:

• prohibiting members and staff from accepting gifts or meals from lobbyists or private organizations that have lobbyists.
• Starting March 1, members would have to be approved by the Ethics Committee for privately funded travel, eliminating access to corporate jets, and requiring that those financing the trip confirm that lobbyists are not involved. This pre-approval could allow for the exception of legitimate nonprofits and foundations to provide educational trips.
• The ethics committee would also write guidelines allowing for lawmakers to attend forums, one-day trips to visit specific sites, or participate in panel discussions and to give speeches.
• House members could not use their influence persuade a private institution to make employment decisions based on political affiliation (responding to the K Street Project.)
• And all House employees would have to participate in ethics training.

Meanwhile in the Senate, Senators Reid and McConnell plan to introduce a lobbying and ethics bill on Monday based on S. 2349 passed last March. In March Senators Lieberman and Levin introduced an amendment to change requirements under the Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) to include grassroots lobbying disclosure, which will most likely appear in legislation this year as well. The Free Speech Coalition is fighting against the provision, and directly targeting Public Citizen for its support. They are asserting that the provision will create a loophole for corporations that confine their grassroots communications to their employees and shareholders. Here is Public Citizen's response. OMB Watch is in support of the grassroots lobbying disclosure provisions and will come out with an analysis of the changes to the LDA. The issue of grassroots lobbying disclosure will probably come up later on in the House.

The New York Times and Washington Post both have articles on ethics and lobbying reform.

Posted by Amanda Adams