we've already talked about lobbyists
giving gifts and sending
politicians on travel
let's talk now about politicians and
lobbyists getting new jobs what
information lobbyists have to disclose
and what the punishments are for
breaking the rules to make things just a
little more complicated
bear in mind during all of this that
certain kinds of tax-exempt nonprofits
fall under a different set of rules in
some ways based on tax law they can even
make gifts, some of which fund lobbying
activities, tax deductible for their donors
foist, jorbs. top federal agency
officials and politicians are not
allowed to take any lobbying jobs in the
same field for 2 years after they
leave new agency officials who used to
be lobbyists may not work on any matter
involving their old clients for 2
years senior members of a politician's
staff can't lobby after they leave for at
least a year and a politician can't
allow their staff to be lobbied by that
politician's spouse, if they are lobbyists,
politicians and their staffs must
disclose any employment negotiations
that take place before a successor is
elected and politicians can't use their
position to get lobbying firms
to hire people
this was in response to a long-running
practice of having lobbying firms hire
staffers when they left Congressional
offices after all if you know you're
going to go work for someone else's
lobbying firm are you going to say no to
them while you're still in Congress?
now we come to the information lobbyists
have to disclose this seems to be the
focus of a lot of the rules about
lobbying making sure that they tell
everyone what they're up to the law
defines "lobbyists" required to make
reports as anyone or any organization
that employs someone who spends more
than 20% of their time
lobbying or spends more than
$22,500 on lobbying costs
so you're good if you're
really cheap or lazy lobbyists must
disclose who they are lobbying for how
much they make how much they spend
in expenses and who they are lobbying
either in Congress or in the federal
agencies these reports are filed
quarterly they can use good faith
estimate to report how much they spend
and they also don't have to report every
single meeting they have with someone
they do have to report not just which
people they're trying to influence but
also what they are
trying to influence them about down to
the specific bills and sections (just
asking for information about something
is not lobbying) they also don't have to
report any client who pays them less
than $3,000 a quarter or
who they help for free, they do have to
report any foreign entity that hires
them directly or indirectly as long as
they're paid $5,000 of more, they must
disclose any event they pay for
like conferences or ceremonies to honor a
politician or federal official they must
also disclose any awards given out in
their honor like scholarships they must
disclose any contributions they make to
charities or foundations controlled by a
politician or federal official including
charitable donations unless the charity
was established before the person became
powerful and no longer has any
relationship with the politician or
federal official they also have to
disclose any donations to presidential
libraries or inaugural committees but
they don't have to report any funding
for multi candidate debates
churches and religious organizations don't have to
disclose any lobbying activity unless
they hire an outside firm lobbyists do
have to disclose if they were working
for a state or local government
that's right, your taxes might go towards the
lobbyists to get more of your taxes but
on the other hand industry associations
don't have to disclose who their
individual members are the Government
Accountability Office does audit
lobbyists' compliance and their reports
say that most lobbyists are basically
following the rules all the forms are
also posted to a publicly searchable
database to be annoying lobbyists will
print out all of their forms and give
them a hard copy so they have to be
entered manually the database isn't very
easy to search so it's hard to see how
much lobbying it was done on a specific
bill issue or to calculate trends over
time the database of lobbying forms is
at least easy to find the database of
waivers from the ethics committee is not
these are all the different rules
what kinds of punishments are in place
if you break them on the disclosure side
knowing that you filed incorrect
information or knowing that you're
breaking the rules can get you
up to $200,000 in fines
knowing you're breaking the rules
doing so for a corrupt purpose you get
you a prison sentence of up to 5
years using your political office to get
someone hired as lobbyists can mean
fines and prison for up to 15 years now
it's hard to say how consistent these
rules are enforced or how often fines and
prisoner given out it has been known to
happen though the ethics committees does
give out waivers to the rules for things
like charity fundraisers but it's also
hard to say whether they are being
abused or not so it's up to you how
suspicious you want to be
of politicians and lobbyists
and there you have it