Lobbyists

Wal-Mart Cans GOP Lobbyist After He's Charged in Abramoff Scheme

Zachary Roth | November 24, 2008, 3:10PM

Wal-Mart has fired James Hirni, the former Team Abramoff lobbyist who prosecutors on Friday charged with giving illegal gifts to two congressional staffers.

In a statement emailed to The Hill, a company spokesman wrote:

"Based on Mr. Hirni's [expected] guilty plea which relates to conduct occurring prior to and unrelated to his employment by the company, we terminated his employment."

Todd Boulanger, another former Abramoff team member implicated in the scheme resigned on Friday from the lobbying firm Cassidy and Associates. Boulanger has not been formally charged at this point.

Hirni had worked as Wal-Mart's "director of Republican outreach". He first represented the retail giant in 2004 while working with Abramoff at the law and lobbying firm Greenberg Traurig.

Jack Abramoff

Abramoff Lobbyists Wanted Measure Attached To Young's Transportation Bill

Zachary Roth | November 24, 2008, 12:29PM

So what did James Hirni and Todd Boulanger -- the former Team Abramoff lobbyists now in hot water for plying congressional staffers with undisclosed gifts -- want in return?

Both men were working for Abramoff at the law and lobbying firm Greenberg Traurig, on behalf of United Rentals, an equipment rental company. Court documents filed by prosecutors allege that in 2003, they wanted action on an amendment to a federal highway reauthorization bill that would have encouraged state public works agencies to rent, rather than buy, construction equipment. That would clearly have benefited United Rentals.

The documents further allege that immediately after they had paid for Blackann and another staffer (identified as Staffer D) to attend the World Series (and a "Gentleman's Club" in New York), Boulanger and Hinri sent drafts of the specific measure they wanted to Trevor Blackann, the staffer who just pleaded in connection with the scheme, and Staffer D.

Staffer D at the time worked for the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, which was then chaired by Rep. Don Young (R-AK). That committee was overseeing the larger highway reauthorization bill to which Boulanger and Hirni were seeking to attach their measure.

In November of that year, say the documents, Boulanger and Hirni prevailed on a Senate staffer to offer the amendment they wanted to the Senate version of the bill.

United Rentals hardly has a squeaky clean reputation. This September, it agreed to pay the SEC $14 million, ending a four-year probe into claims that the company fraudulently inflated its earnings and made fraudulent leasing transactions with suppliers, between 1997 and 2002. It did not admit or deny the charges.

Jack Abramoff

Another Ex-Member of Team Abramoff Charged -- And One More Could Be Next

Zachary Roth | November 24, 2008, 11:07AM

More developments in the ongoing Jack Abramoff probe...

Last week Trevor Blackann, a former staffer for Missouri Republicans Roy Blunt and Kit Bond, pleaded guilty to concealing thousands of dollars in illegal gifts he received from lobbyists who were part of Team Abramoff.

Those lobbyists were quickly identified as James Hirni, until recently a lobbyist for Wal-Mart, and Todd Boulanger, who until last week worked for Cassidy and Associates, a top DC lobby shop.

And late Friday, ABCNews.com reported that prosecutors had filed charges against Hirni, and that he's expected to plead guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Hirni's lawyer told the site that Hirni is cooperating with prosecutors, suggesting that DOJ is working to build cases against bigger fish.

As for Boulanger, he could be next to be charged: also Friday, Cassidy and Associates announced that it had "accepted the departure" of the lobbyist that afternoon.

Jack Abramoff

Trip To "Gentleman's Club" Leads To Guilty Plea For Married Abramoff Crony

Zachary Roth | November 20, 2008, 5:03PM

The wide-ranging probe into the activities of disgraced GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff has netted another conviction.

Trevor Blackann, a former aide to two Missouri Republicans, Rep. Roy Blunt and Sen. Kit Bond, pleaded guilty today to making false statements on his tax returns, concealing thousands of dollars in illegal gifts he received from Team Abramoff, reports The Hill.

What were those gifts? Only a free trip to Game 1 of the 2003 World Series in New York, a junket that included:

- airline travel to and from New York City.
- a ticket to the game.
- admission to, and entertainment at, a "gentleman's club" for the married aide.
- one-night accommodations in an "upscale" hotel.
- transportation in a chauffeured SUV.
- a souvenir baseball jersey.
- free meals and drinks.

All in all, not a bad haul.

In return, court filings allege, Blackann got Bond to write a letter of support for someone who wanted a political appointment to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

According to the Associated Press, Blackann said in court documents Blackann that he knew "the lobbyists gave these things of value for or because of official actions they were seeking from him or had obtained from him."

Abramoff has been cooperating with prosecutors as they build cases against others in his circle.

Lobbyists

WaPo Parrots Industry Line On New "Privacy" Group

Zachary Roth | November 17, 2008, 5:39PM

Looks like The Washington Post got spun just a bit on a story about a new group said to be advocating for increased online privacy.

Under the milquetoast headline, "A New Voice in Online Privacy: Group Wants Tighter Rules for Collecting, Using Consumer Data", the paper reports:

A group of privacy scholars, lawyers and corporate officials are launching an advocacy group today designed to help shape standards around how companies collect, store and use consumer data for business and advertising.

Privacy scholars pushing for more online privacy makes sense. And "lawyers" could mean a lot of things. But exactly which "corporate officials" have an interest in tighter rules governing online consumer privacy?

Read on and things become clearer: The group, says the Post, is sponsored by AT&T, and will be led in part by Jules Polonetsky, "who until this month was in charge of AOL's privacy policy."

The paper adds:

Internet companies have come under fire for tracking consumers' online habits in order to tailor ads relevant to their interests. Lawmakers have held several hearings this year to examine online privacy protections.

President-elect Barack Obama has cited privacy as one of the technology issues his administration would address, setting the stage for a debate over standards for online publishers and advertisers. Obama also said he would appoint the first chief technology officer, who may be charged with making government data more transparent while protecting citizens' privacy. The Future of Privacy Forum will seek to work with the government on these issues.

So, reading between the lines, it's not hard to figure out what's going on here. Corporations understand that stricter privacy regulations are coming, no matter what they do. So they're trying to get out in front, by funding an advocacy group that appears to put them on the right side of the issue, but will almost certainly work to ensure that whatever reforms are put in place won't be too onerous for internet companies.

Not that that's unusual in Washington. But why should Post readers have to read between the lines to understand what's really going on?

Since the Post appears not to have bothered to look into the Future of Privacy Forum (FPF) much beyond reading and transcribing its press release, we asked the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a leading advocacy organization for the public interest in the online sphere, what they knew about the group.

In response, we hardly received a ringing endorsement of FPF's bona fides as an advocate for stricter privacy standards. "This is the first we've heard of this group, so we'll have to wait and see," an EFF spokesperson told us.

We should note, by the way, the San Francisco Chronicle did better in giving its readers an accurate picture of what's going on, reporting in the lede of its story:

AT&T is funding a group run by some of the nation's top privacy experts that aims to influence policy in the Obama administration and develop best practices on privacy for businesses.

Barack Obama

Report: Top Obama Transition Staffer Led "Backdoor" Lobbying Campaign For Fannie Mae

Zachary Roth | November 17, 2008, 11:12AM

Change we can believe in?

Last week, the Obama transition team announced that it had tapped veteran Beltway Democrat Thomas Donilon to help lead its review of operations at the State Department. As multiple news outlets quickly pointed out, until 2005 Donilon helped oversee the aggressive lobbying operation of troubled mortgage giant Fannie Mae.

Now, ABCNews.com has fleshed out the picture a bit, reporting that Donilon oversaw what it describes as a "backdoor lobbying campaign ... to undermine the credibility of a probe into the firm's accounting irregularities."

The details, which center on a campaign to discredit an agency charged with overseeing the company:

The effort -- which reportedly included attacks on the funding for the oversight agency, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, and an attempt to launch a separate investigation into OFHEO itself -- was ultimately unsuccessful, and regulators eventually discovered top Fannie Mae executives had been manipulating the company's financial reporting to maximize their bonuses.

Donilon was not found to be involved in the financial manipulations, but he did help give Fannie's board the misimpression that the company was in good financial health, according to the OFHEO investigation.

Donilon did not comment to ABCNews.com.