Main News; National Desk
CAMPAIGN '08: A WARNING FROM BUSINESS; GLOBAL INTEREST; Chamber vows to
spend big on campaign; It indicates it will exceed the more than $60 million it put into
defeating anti-business candidates 4 years ago.
Tom Hamburger
Times Staff Writer
1092 words
8 January 2008
Los Angeles Times
Home Edition
A-13
English
Copyright 2008 The Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON
Alarmed at the increasingly populist tone of the 2008 political campaign, the president of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce is set to issue a fiery promise to spend millions of dollars to defeat
candidates deemed to be anti-business.
"We plan to build a grass-roots business organization so strong that when it bites you in the butt,
you bleed," chamber President Tom Donohue said.
The warning from the nation's largest trade association came against a background of mounting
popular concern over the condition of the economy. A weak record of job creation, the sub-prime
mortgage crisis, declining home values and other problems have all helped make the economy a
major campaign issue.
Presidential candidates in particular have responded to the public concern. Former Sen. John
Edwards of North Carolina has been the bluntest populist voice, but other front-running Democrats,
including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, have also
called for change on behalf of middle-class voters.
On the Republican side, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee -- emerging as an unexpected frontrunner after winning the Iowa caucuses -- has used populist themes in his effort to woo
independent voters, blasting bonus pay for corporate chief executives and the effect of unfettered
globalization on workers.
Reacting to what it sees as a potentially hostile political climate, Donohue said, the chamber will
seek to punish candidates who target business interests with their rhetoric or policy proposals,
including congressional and state-level candidates.
Although Donohue shied away from precise figures, he indicated that his organization would spend
in excess of the approximately $60 million it spent in the last presidential cycle. That approaches
the spending levels planned by the largest labor unions.
The chamber president is scheduled to announce the broad outlines of the organization's plans for
the 2008 election and beyond at a news conference here today. Donohue also plans to fire a
rhetorical warning shot across the bow of candidates considered unfriendly to business.
"I'm concerned about anti-corporate and populist rhetoric from candidates for the presidency,
members of Congress and the media," he said. "It suggests to us that we have to demonstrate who
it is in this society that creates jobs, wealth and benefits -- and who it is that eats them."
In advance of today's news conference, Donohue told The Times of his plans to be active in 140
congressional districts this year, as well as the presidential contest.
At the state level, Donohue said his organization would be active in nearly four dozen contests for
attorney general and state supreme courts. Both state courts and attorneys general are involved in
decisions affecting business, including consumer protection and a wide range of litigation.
The chamber has become a significant force in state and national politics under Donohue's decade
of leadership. Once a notably bipartisan trade association with a limited budget and limited
influence, it has hugely increased its political fundraising and developed new ways to spend money
on behalf of pro-business candidates.
Under Donohue, the organization has also frequently aligned itself with GOP priorities.
Since he took over the chamber, contributions by businesses have soared, often to pay for political
advertising known as "issue ads," which are exempt from many of the Federal Election Commission
limits.
Under a system Donohue pioneered, corporations contribute money to the chamber, which then
finances attack ads targeting individual candidates without revealing the name of the businesses
involved in the ads.
In 2000, drug companies paid the chamber to run advertisements in Michigan to help elect thenRepublican Sen. Spencer Abraham. Pharmaceutical companies that year gave the chamber
additional millions to run issue ads attacking mostly Democratic House candidates. And large
corporations paid $1 million or more to support advertising campaigns against judges deemed too
friendly to plaintiffs.
There has been pressure from lawsuits and government activist groups to require the chamber to
reveal the source of its political funds and more details on its spending.
Donohue is not inclined to do so.
"I will disclose any funds I am legally required to disclose -- and not disclose any others," Donohue
said. "We are exercising our constitutional right to petition the government and we will continue to
do so."
In 2004, the chamber also helped defeat Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle, flooding his home
state of South Dakota with money, ads and more than 50 on-the-ground organizers.
This year that kind of ground tactic is going to be more prevalent, Donohue said, noting that the
chamber plans to make use of its ability to communicate freely with its 3 million member companies
located in every congressional district.
In the interview Monday, Donohue said he was unhappy with anti-corporate rhetoric coming from
candidates in both parties and he wanted candidates to know about the chamber's ambitious plans.
Donohue is not likely to name names at his news conference, but there is no doubt he is unhappy
about Huckabee.
The concerns Donohue expresses reveal apprehension that Republican pro-business candidates may
lose favor with voters and that the GOP's important but fragile alliance between economic and social
conservatives is showing signs of strain.
Even more than Republicans, Democratic candidates have boosted the volume of populist messages
as the economy softens. Edwards, whose trial lawyer past has been openly criticized by Donohue for
years, launched new advertisements that warn against the danger of replacing "corporate
Republicans with corporate Democrats."
The middle class, Edwards says in the new ad, is "losing ground while CEOs pocket million-dollar
bonuses and corporate lobbyists get their way in Washington."
Donohue, in effect the nation's leading business advocate, kicked back hard at some of the leading
Democratic proposals on taxes, labor law and the courts.
If that agenda succeeds, he said, Democrats "will be gone from power for at least 40 years," though
he acknowledged that the political rhetoric might moderate after the primary season.
"People on the other side have been very strong in the way they play in legislation and elections.
We intend to do the same," he said.
tom.hamburger@latimes.com
Main News; National Desk
VACANCY ON THE SUPREME COURT; Process Won't Be Business as Usual; The U.S.
Chamber of Commerce and National Assn. of Manufacturers prepare to lobby for the
nomination of a Supreme Court justice.
Tom Hamburger
Times Staff Writer
1284 words
2 July 2005
Los Angeles Times
Home Edition
A-29
English
Copyright 2005 The Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON
The nation's leading business lobbies are poised for the first time to campaign for the confirmation
of a Supreme Court nominee, marking a historic change for the confirmation process, the perception
of courts and business activism.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Assn. of Manufacturers say they have put
structures in place to review and consider endorsement of President Bush's nominee and, if
necessary, to launch a campaign on the candidate's behalf.
"If the nominee is controversial, then we can make a judgment that we want to activate our vast
grass-roots network, engage our lobbying power and there could be paid media as well," said Stan
Anderson, executive vice president of the Chamber of Commerce.
In the current climate in Washington, he said, the nomination is likely to be controversial, meaning
business would be immersed in a nomination battle.
Historically, judicial nomination fights have been the province of social activists and the American
Bar Assn., and have not drawn active participation from business. There have been partisan fights
over nominees, most famously the Reagan-era rejection of Robert H. Bork by Democratic senators
and the organized left.
But never before have interest groups prepared to spend millions of dollars on television and directmail campaigns for or against a particular nominee.
The addition of big business to the mix coincides with a shift in the way the judiciary is viewed by
the public and leading interest groups. Federal courts once were largely exempt from the hurlyburly of political invective, and judges were considered above the fray for the most part. Now,
judges and their decisions are routinely attacked from the right amid cries for "judicial reform" from
talk radio, church pulpits and corporate board rooms.
In response, left-leaning organizations have become unusually unified, urging the president to
consult with Democrats and offer a "consensus nominee." But their request -- a plea for
consultation and compromise -- contrasts with more combative vows of the past to fight
objectionable nominees. Despite a compromise last month that preserved the right to judicial
filibusters, liberals had felt steamrolled by the president's judicial nominations to date and had stood
by as some nominees once viewed as among the most objectionable were confirmed.
"There is now a completely unified right and a completely unified left," said conservative activist
Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform. "Both teams will be at full strength, and
the court nominations will be an incredible test of that strength."
Within hours after Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's decision to retire from the bench was announced
Friday morning, liberal and conservative groups vowed to spend millions to communicate their views
to voters and lawmakers.
The Republican-oriented Progress for America pledged to spend $18 million on the Supreme Court
vacancy campaign. A spokeswoman for the organization, Jessica Boulanger, said the group had
"operatives in 21 states across the country who are working aggressively at the grass-roots level."
Within 45 minutes of O'Connor's resignation, "we had our Web ads sent to 8.7 million Americans,"
Boulanger said.
Meanwhile, the liberal People for the American Way will "definitely be spending millions of dollars" if
necessary to fight an objectionable nominee, vice president Elliot Mincberg said. The National
Abortion Rights Action League transformed its website Friday so that visitors could donate time and
money to a Supreme Court vacancy campaign.
Business may well be countering liberal messages with positive comments on a White House
nominee. Business lobbyists said it was likely that business and social conservatives would find
themselves on the same side of a nomination battle but noted they are not always allies. Justices
who are heroes to social conservatives, such as Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, also have
taken stands opposed by business, as in a 2003 case on punitive damages in which the two
dissented from a court majority in favor of limiting awards.
"The point is that 'conservative' doesn't necessarily mean 'pro-business,' " Anderson said. Despite
some decisions that rile business, Norquist is urging executives and owners to recognize that
socially conservative judges are likely to be pro-business overall.
"We are trying to make sure that every part of the center-right coalition is correctly focused on why
this [judicial confirmation battle] is important," he said. "The same judge who will make Pastor
Jones happy will make the Chamber of Commerce happy."
Even though business leaders may take an active part in an upcoming nomination fight, the
prospect of a protracted battle is disconcerting to them.
"The concern we have is that a drawn-out fight ties down the Senate for months on end and our
agenda doesn't get acted on," the Chamber's Anderson said.
There are other concerns for business, including the sense from shareholders or customers that
business should not engage in political fights over polarizing social issues.
But the head of the National Assn. of Manufacturers, former Michigan Gov. John Engler, a
Republican, has long argued that business should pay more attention to the courts.
"We can't sit on the sidelines with the third branch of government" making so many decisions
affecting business, he has said.
Patrick Cleary, a vice president of the manufacturers' association, calculated that 80% of a federal
judge's civil cases "concerns issues that we care about" -- liability, contract and employment law.
"All the hard-fought gains business has made in the executive and legislative branches could be
lost" by the decision of a single judge, Cleary said.
Engler has said he would like to see the Business Industry Political Action Committee, an
organization created decades ago by the manufacturers' association and other groups to mobilize
the grass-roots, engaged in federal judicial confirmations.
The head of that organization, Greg Casey, said there had been no formal request to engage the
group, which encouraged companies to provide specially prepared information to their employees
about political candidates and their stand on issues that affected business. In the last campaign,
BIPAC took credit for registering and providing educational material to millions of pro-business
voters.
Casey said that BIPAC could quickly gear up to launch an educational campaign on a Bush nominee,
provided that member companies agreed to the idea and were willing to fund the effort. He said a
national campaign could be launched for less than $1 million.
The Chamber has forwarded to the White House its review of federal judges from each circuit, with
ratings of each judge based on rulings that concern business. But Anderson said the review was not
intended as a complete manual for picking a future justice because it did not include a review of
people who were not currently on the bench, such as Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales.
Since 1998, the Chamber has had a process for reviewing the records of Supreme Court nominees.
It endorsed Thomas, Scalia, Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen G. Breyer but did not see the need
to campaign for those nominees.
This year, however, the organization is likely to be in campaign mode. At both the Chamber and
National Assn. of Manufacturers offices, officials said the decision would be based on a candidate's
overall fitness for the job. However, a candidate's past position on issues such as labor law, punitive
damages, tort reform and regulation also would be reviewed.
Times staff writer Cynthia Cho and researcher Benjamin Weyl contributed to this report.
Main News; National Desk
THE NATION; Business Groups Invested in Races, Now Wait for Returns; After a hefty
push for Republican candidates, industry organizations form their wish lists.
Tom Hamburger
Times Staff Writer
1498 words
8 November 2004
Los Angeles Times
Home Edition
A-1
English
Copyright 2004 The Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON
Lobbyists for the nation's leading business groups have been toasting the success of what they
describe as an unprecedented effort this year to help elect President Bush and Republican
congressional candidates. Now they plan to collect on that investment.
"With his victory and better numbers in the Senate and the House, we hope we would get to some
things we believe are long overdue," said Dirk Van Dongen, president of the National Assn. of
Wholesaler-Distributors and a leader of this year's effort to mobilize the business community behind
the Bush candidacy.
Business was generally pleased with the first four years under Bush, but Tuesday's victory now
brings within grasp some of the things it was unable to secure in his first term.
The list, according to interviews with lobbyists and trade associations, includes making tax cuts for
capital gains and dividends permanent, limiting liability lawsuits, changing bankruptcy laws and
opening previously restricted land in Alaska and elsewhere for energy exploration.
Business groups also count on more narrow shifts, such as changing health insurance rules in a way
that benefits some of the GOP's most ardent allies, easing corporate government reform measures
at the Securities and Exchange Commission, and making specific adjustments to the tax code.
Assembling interest group wish lists and agendas is a postelection rite in Washington, a modern-day
spoils system in action. For businesses, spending time and money on a campaign is a practical and
tactical decision, literally an investment.
Bush's first term brought tax cuts, loosened rules on clean-air standards and workplace safety
sought by business, and Medicare reforms emphasizing private sector solutions.
Campaign support from business this election did not come in the form of higher direct contributions
to campaigns -- business giving roughly matched the $1.2 billion donated in 2000.
The big push came from a new direction as trade associations and Washington lobbyists, flexing
their grass-roots skills as never before, produced elaborate get-out-the-vote drives in battleground
states.
Thousands of businesses urged their employees to vote and educated them on pro-business
positions. Business interests are claiming credit for making the difference in key states narrowly
won by Bush and other Republican candidates.
There were other firsts: Some business trade associations, including the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce, made clear they would like to see Bush win, the first time they have indicated a
favorite in a presidential contest.
The greatest contribution of Washington-based business organizations, however, was the on-theground effort for candidates in hard-fought congressional races.
Nowhere was this more dramatically displayed than in South Dakota, where former Republican Rep.
John Thune defeated Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle. Washington business lobbyists made an
extraordinary effort to usher Dashcle from power because they said they were frustrated with his
role in blocking tax cuts, energy legislation and liability limits.
"It was Tom Daschle the obstructionist who motivated us to stand up publicly and form Team
Thune," a coalition of two dozen trade associations and lobbying firms, Van Dongen recalled.
The group was modeled after efforts used in Georgia and Minnesota Senate races in recent years.
"We recognized we can take the mechanism of a Washington legislative coalition and reposition it
for political purposes," Van Dongen said.
In short order, the coalition raised half a million dollars for Thune from corporate contacts. By
election day, it had funneled 200 volunteer lobbyists and lawyers from Washington to South Dakota,
matching the labor organizers and Democratic lobbyists supporting Daschle. Similar business teams
were organized to support the successful GOP Senate candidates in South Carolina and North
Carolina.
Some Washington lobbying shops were nearly empty in the days before the election. At Piper
Rudnick, senior partners estimate that up to 60% of the firm participated in campaigns.
A senior policy advisor at Piper, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas), was active
with an organization he co-chairs called FreedomWorks/Citizens for a Sound Economy. The
corporate and member-funded organization made more than 1 million telephone calls in
battleground states. Armey is already logging the returns from such efforts.
"The president, within 48 hours of the election, said he is going to hit the ground running," Armey
said last week. "In his press conference he spoke of tort reform, social security and tax reform.
Those are some of the biggest issues out there."
They are also among the issues that Armey and his organization have backed -- and that interest
some of Piper's clients.
The Chamber of Commerce will not reveal its overall budget for the campaign, although informed
sources estimate it will approach $40 million, the result of corporate contributions.
The drug industry was the biggest spender of any industry in the 2000 and 2002 elections. Its
contributions, always difficult to trace, were even more obscure this cycle.
In 2000 and 2002, it sent money to nonprofit groups with names like Citizens for Better Medicare
that ran millions of dollars worth of broadcast ads in key states. The industry spent $30 million to
$50 million on those campaigns during each of those cycles.
This year, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Assn., an industry trade association, has
been less visible in part because campaign finance laws limited the use of corporate funds in
broadcast political ads. Some organizations that PhRMA backs ran print ads and did mailers in key
states and made calls urging support for candidates who supported the Bush Medicare proposal and
opposed drug importation from Canada. Drug companies were significant donors to the Chamber
of Commerce campaign efforts this year.
PhRMA spokesman Jeff Trewhitt declined to discuss campaign-related spending but said the
organization had two major priorities: keeping the Bush Medicare drug plan on track in 2006 and
blocking efforts to permit importing drugs from Canada. The association's members were concerned
about proposals by Democratic candidate Sen. John F. Kerry that would encourage Medicare to
bargain for lower drug prices.
Banking and investment houses are excited about the president's plan for social security reform and
health savings accounts that include private investment accounts. In addition, banks and credit card
companies list bankruptcy reform on the priority list. Bankers also want legislative and executive
branch action allowing them to move into real estate, a move opposed by realtors, another major
group of donors.
Coal and utility companies continued to be a significant source of support for Republicans. Their
wish list includes an energy bill and a market-based plan to control mercury and other pollutants.
Oil and gas companies that have been loyal benefactors of the Bush-Cheney ticket are likely to see
immediate results. The Interior Department is expected to announce decisions in the next few
weeks that would permit some oil and gas drilling on once-protected land on Colorado's Roan
Plateau and New Mexico's Otera Mesa.
The business trade associations that advocated most strongly for Bush have as a top item on their
list a new kind of health insurance that the groups could offer their members. Association health
plans would allow small businesses to pool together to offer greater health insurance options than
they could on their own.
The associations say such plans would provide health coverage for uninsured small-business
employees, a group that suffers because small firms often cannot afford to offer health insurance.
The sale of such insurance could yield substantial revenue for trade associations themselves, which
would in some cases become the marketers of these plans.
The president publicly backed association health plans in the final days of the campaign.
"We are fresh from having proved to ourselves that we can change the outcome of elections," said
Michael Baroody, executive vice president of the National Assn. of Manufacturers. "Using the same
tools -- employee involvement and education -- we can change the outcome in policy terms across
the wide spectrum of issues from legal reform to tax relief."
*
A winning investment
Business organizations spent millions of dollars supporting Republican candidates in this year's
election. Now many hope their wish lists will be fulfilled.
Contributions to federal candidates and parties in 2004:
Industry
Real estate
Securities/investment
Health professionals
Insurance
General contractors
Commercial banks
Oil and gas
Business trade groups
Total given to GOP
(in millions)
$43.0
$34.7
$34.0
$18.8
$15.5
$15.4
$14.4
$1.7
% given to
GOP of total
contributions
59%
51%
63%
67%
75%
64%
81%
85%
Politics & Policy
Drug-Industry Ads Aid GOP --- `Educational Grant' Funds Seniors' Prescription-Benefit
Campaign
By Tom Hamburger
1191 words
18 June 2002
The Wall Street Journal
A4
English
(Copyright (c) 2002, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)
Washington -- TELEVISION VIEWERS in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, this month could hardly escape the
message: "Thank Congressman Nussle for fighting to add prescription drugs to Medicare." The
upbeat ad, featuring tender scenes of grandparents, ran more than 100 times just in June's first 10
days.
That makes the continuing advertising campaign something of a prescription itself for Rep. Jim
Nussle as he fights for a seventh term. The Republican is getting a heavy dose of hoped-for political
inoculation, at someone else's expense, against Democrats' charges that the GOP is blocking a longpromised Medicare drug benefit for senior citizens.
Whom does Mr. Nussle have to thank? The well-heeled pharmaceuticals lobby is largely bankrolling
the commercials and the conservative United Seniors Association is listed as sponsor. Near-identical
versions of the political ad are running in more than a dozen other Republicans' districts.
Hardly a person in Washington thinks Congress and President Bush will agree on a prescription-drug
benefit this year, given the parties' ideological divisions: Democrats want to add such a benefit to
Medicare; Republicans want to encourage market-based options. Meanwhile, Democrats see political
advantage in the impasse, since most voters tell pollsters they trust Democrats on the drug issue
more.
Nervous Republicans have gone on the offensive, with their industry ally's help. The drug lobby
mostly is financing the massive $4.6 million "issue ad" campaign in 18 competitive congressional
districts, 16 of them Republican-held, providing yet another example of big-dollar donations flowing
into politics beyond the reach of campaign-finance laws.
Ads are running in the districts of GOP Reps. Richard Pombo of California and Ernest Istook of
Oklahoma, where Democrats are hoping for upsets. Two conservative Democrats, Reps. Collin
Peterson of Minnesota and Ralph Hall of Texas, are named in ads in their districts, praising their
support of drug-benefit legislation; both backed GOP drug proposals in the past.
Leaders of both parties in the House have drafted rival drug-benefit bills in recent weeks, and the
House GOP formally introduces its proposal today. The plan has an estimated price tag of $350
billion over 10 years, about half the Democratic proposal's projected cost. But even if the House
does pass a bill, the legislation has little chance of approval in the narrowly divided Senate.
In any case, drug-industry executives prefer the Republicans' market-oriented approach, in part
because they think it would be less likely to lead to government limits on drug prices.
Apart from the pro-GOP bias in the "issue ads" that the pharmaceuticals companies are
underwriting, the drug lobby also favors the Republican Party with campaign contributions. So far
this year, about three-quarters of the industry's $12 million of donations has gone to GOP
candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, the nonpartisan organization that tracks
campaign contributions. For tomorrow night's gala GOP dinner to raise $25 million for House and
Senate candidates, the point man for raising corporate contributions is J.P. Garnier, chief executive
of pharmaceuticals maker GlaxoSmithKline.
Democrats seek to turn the GOP's advantage against it, reminding voters at every opportunity of
the close relationship between the unpopular drug companies and Republicans. In introducing the
Democrats' drug-benefit plan last week, House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt denounced the
GOP proposal as "an industry plan bought and paid for with contributions from the biggest
pharmaceutical companies in America."
Despite such talk, Republican strategists believe the GOP-led House's passage of a drug bill will
inoculate their candidates. "The fact that the House will have passed a prescription-drug bill will
take away the Democrats' ammunition, and will make Senate Democrats look worse for failing to
pass it," predicts Carl Forti, a spokesman for House Republicans' campaign committee.
Democrats also benefit from so-called issue ads, especially from their own special-interest allies
among environmentalists, abortion-rights advocates and organized labor. But the $4.6 million for
six weeks of drug-related ads in targeted congressional districts is the biggest air-war so far this
election year. By comparison, abortion-rights groups have spent $3.7 million on ads in seven states
since the beginning of the year.
Under the campaign-finance overhaul that just became law, such ads from these supposedly
independent groups would be banned within 60 days of an election when they broadcast the name
of the political candidate. But that law doesn't take effect until after this year's elections Nov. 5, so
nothing limits this sort of advertising.
Almost every frame of the 30-second drug-benefit ad lists its sponsor, the United Seniors
Association. What isn't divulged is that the Republican-leaning organization received a "large
unrestricted grant" from the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers of America -- or
PhRMA, pronounced "Farma" -- the industry's trade and lobbying group.
Viewers also wouldn't know that the ad-agency executive who produced the campaign is Tim Ryan,
PhRMA's past marketing director. In the 2000 election season, Mr. Ryan founded the grass-rootssounding Citizens for Better Medicare at the behest and expense of major drug companies. Citizens
for Better Medicare spent $50 million on TV ads in 26 congressional districts, introducing the nation
to a perky senior, "Flo," who intoned, "Keep the government out of my medicine cabinet." All but
four of the industry-supported candidates won.
Drug-industry officials believe the 2000 investment in Citizens for Better Medicare paid off in a year
in which Democratic candidates, including presidential nominee Al Gore, vilified the industry for its
drug prices. In addition, drug companies also had sent $10 million to the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce for drug-policy ads, and spent $27 million on individual campaign contributions -- 70%
to Republicans.
United Seniors' Chairman Charles Jarvis says his group backs the Republican drug proposal because
its 1.5 million members believe the GOP's market-oriented plan holds the best approach for seniors.
Neither Mr. Jarvis nor PhRMA spokesman Jeff Trewhitt will say how much of the multimillion-dollar
ad campaign was paid for with drug-industry donations. PhRMA's Mr. Trewhitt simply acknowledges
that his group gave United Seniors "an unrestricted educational grant," and consults frequently with
Mr. Jarvis. Both insist the seniors group decides what to do with the money.
The need for Republicans to address the drug issue was brought home to Capitol Hill last month by
party consultants from the firm Public Opinion Strategies. The company's presentation showed Mr.
Bush riding high in polls for his response to the Sept. 11 attacks. But the polling reports showed
strong advantages for Democrats on domestic issues, including health care and prescription drugs,
and concluded, "Voters are more likely to agree with Democrats' assertion to focus on problems
here at home."
A slide shown to party members during the pollster's briefing suggested a solution: "Republicans
passing a prescription-drug benefit would go a long way to leaving Democrats with very little on the
table to try and use against us."
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Influence Market: Industries that Backed Bush Are Now Seeking Return on Investment --Tobacco Wants to Kill a Suit, Oil, to Drill in Alaska; Patient Privacy Targeted --- White
House Stresses Merits
By Wall Street Journal staff reporters Tom Hamburger, Laurie McGinley and David S. Cloud
4426 words
6 March 2001
The Wall Street Journal
A1
English
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)
WASHINGTON -- For the businesses that invested more money than ever before in George W.
Bush's costly campaign for the presidency, the returns have already begun.
MBNA America Bank was one of the largest corporate donors to the Bush campaign and other GOP
electoral efforts last year. The bank and its employees gave a total of about $1.3 million, according
to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan clearinghouse here. Charles Cawley, MBNA's
president, was a member of the Bush "pioneers," wealthy fund-raisers who each personally
gathered at least $100,000 for the presidential campaign.
Mr. Cawley hosted Bush fund-raising events at his home in Wilmington, Del., last year and, in 1999,
at his summer home in Maine, north of the Bush family retreat in Kennebunkport. At the Maine
affair, 200 guests gathered in the early evening on the large porch of the Cawley home, situated on
a hill with a sweeping view of the Atlantic Ocean. Guests sipped cocktails and heard a brief talk by
the candidate.
The money didn't stop on election day. Mr. Cawley and his wife each gave the maximum of $5,000
to help fund Mr. Bush's fight in the Florida vote recount. Mr. Cawley gave an additional $100,000 to
the Bush-Cheney inaugural committee, the most the committee would take from a single donor.
Last week, MBNA's investment began paying off. The company, one of the nation's three largest
credit-card issuers, has been pushing for years to tighten bankruptcy laws that allow certain
consumers filing for court protection, in effect, to disregard obligations to credit-card companies and
other unsecured lenders. On Wednesday, the White House announced that President Bush would
sign a bill now moving through Congress that would make it tougher for consumers to escape such
debts. If enacted, the measure could translate into an estimated tens of millions of dollars in
additional annual earnings for each of the big credit companies.
MBNA's vice chair, David Spartin, says his firm has no way to estimate how the legislation would
affect the company's bottom line. MBNA has backed the bill for years "because we think it is good
for consumers," as it will "reduce the cost of credit for everyone," Mr. Spartin says. The donations to
President Bush and other candidates were made because "we think they would make excellent
public officials," he adds. No MBNA official "has ever spoken to President Bush about the bill," Mr.
Spartin says.
Many corporations feel like a new day is dawning in Washington. "We have come out of the cave,
blinking in the sunlight, saying to one another, `My God, now we can actually get something done,'
" says Richard Hohlt, Washington lobbyist for several other major banks which, like MBNA, are
backing an industry coalition whose members provided some $26 million to Republicans during the
1999-2000 campaign cycle.
President Clinton last year vetoed a similar bill that would have toughened bankruptcy law.
Consumer groups argue that such legislation would weaken protection for working families, many of
whom have been the targets of aggressive credit-card marketing.
Also in action last week were members of a large coalition of Mr. Bush's business backers who want
to roll back new federal rules designed to protect workers from repetitive-motion injuries.
In a private meeting with congressional leaders last Tuesday, President Bush signed off on a plan to
kill the ergonomic regulations, using the powers of the Congressional Review Act. That act, passed
in 1996, gives Congress 60 days to reject regulations issued by federal agencies. But it was never
used during Mr. Clinton's term because to take effect, a resolution rejecting new rules has to be
approved by the president.
Repealing the ergonomic rules ranks high on the priority lists of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce,
the National Association of Manufacturers and the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors.
The trade groups technically don't endorse candidates, but each of them mounted major grass-roots
and advertising campaigns that benefited Mr. Bush and other Republicans in the 2000 elections.
A repeal would be a particularly hard loss for organized labor, which has fought for enactment of the
ergonomic rules for 10 years, saying they are needed to protect workers from wrist, back and other
injuries.
On employee safety, consumer bankruptcy and a host of other issues, Bush administration officials
maintain they are acting strictly on the merits, not the money. Proponents of the bankruptcy bill, for
example, point out that personal bankruptcy filings reached a record 1.4 million in 1998. The bill
that would toughen the bankruptcy law won strong bipartisan support in the House last week,
passing 309-106.
Business advocates maintain that the ergonomics rules include an overly broad definition of
"musculoskeletal disorders" and that the new standards give employees claiming to have such
disorders overly generous treatment: 90% of their salary and benefits for up to three months.
But as strongly as they believe in their arguments, business lobbyists acknowledge it's no accident
that, following their massive support for the GOP, Republicans are moving quickly to address some
of their top issues.
Mr. Bush ran the most costly presidential campaign in American history. Donors to his campaign
and the Republican National Commmittee contributed a total of $314 million. Of that, more than
80% came from corporations or individuals employed by them. Al Gore and the Democratic National
Committee raised $213 million, receiving strong support from labor organizations and their
members. But more than 70% of the Democratic total also came from businesses and their
employees.
These totals can be seen as somewhat inflated because most donors to either party work for a
business. But the amounts don't include separate contributions from trade associations or
independent business advertising. "The role of business last year was huge, and it overwhelmingly
benefited Republicans," says Larry Makinson of the Center for Responsive Politics.
As the bankruptcy and ergonomics bills move through the Senate over the next few days, business
groups also will be looking for early action on other key issues. Here's a preview.
With then-Vice President Al Gore and many Democratic congressional candidates railing against
alleged profiteering by drug companies, the industry made its biggest-ever contributions to the GOP
cause.
Drug companies contributed $14 million to Republican campaigns over the past two years and spent
an additional $60 million to fund their own independent political-advertising campaign. Industry
executives will be lobbying the new administration on a wide range of issues, such as the proposal
to overhaul the Medicare program and include a prescription-drug benefit for senior citizens. The
industry wants to make sure such a benefit doesn't lead to drug-price controls.
But that fight isn't likely to command center stage for many months. In the meantime, drug
companies will press for a rewrite of federal rules protecting the privacy of patients' medical
records. The rules were announced with much fanfare in the final weeks of the Clinton
administration. The drug companies recently got a sign that they, too, were making progress with
the new administration.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, in a move that infuriated consumer
groups, invited additional public comments on the rules until the end of this month. The industry is
hoping the move will lead to more delays and, ultimately, significant revisions.
Last December, Mr. Clinton heralded the rules as "the most sweeping privacy protections ever
written." For the first time, patients would have access to their medical files and could correct
mistakes. Providers, such as hospitals and health plans, would be required to get written permission
from patients to use or disclose patients' health information. Providers also would have to create
sophisticated record-keeping systems and privacy policies to document compliance with the rules.
Hailed by privacy advocates, the rules include provisions anathema to nearly every segment of the
health-care industry. Drug makers, HMOs, drugstore chains and hospitals say that while they back
the goal of increased privacy, the rules have a potential cumulative price tag in the tens of billions
of dollars, much of it to overhaul data-collection and information-technology systems.
The companies warn that the new requirements mean that pharmacies would need signed customer
consents on file before they could do something as simple as sending a prescription home with a
neighbor. The drug industry also says that research critical to boosting corporate innovation and
tracking the safety of drugs would be inhibited. Academic researchers seeking personal health
information from hospitals would have to get authorization from the patient or undergo a special
privacy review by a hospital panel.
Privacy advocates such as Janlori Goldman of the Health Privacy Project at Georgetown University
counter that such dire predictions are inaccurate and "hysterical."
Technically, the regulations apply to the use of information by hospitals, doctors, pharmacists and
HMOs. But they have big implications for drug companies, which depend on access to that data for
research and marketing. Among the drug companies most concerned is Merck & Co., because of its
Merck-Medco unit. Like other pharmacy-benefits managers, which obtain contracts from HMOs and
employers to keep drug costs down, Merck-Medco fears it would it be hindered in its ability to track
physician-prescribing patterns and other information.
Taking the lead on combating the rules is the Confidentiality Coalition, an industry group that meets
at the offices of the Healthcare Leadership Council, overlooking Farragut Square, a few blocks from
the White House. Dubbed the "Anti-confidentiality Coalition" by privacy advocates, the alliance has
120 members, including Merck, Eli Lilly & Co., Cigna Corp. and Medtronic Inc., the big medicaldevice maker. A core group of 20 to 30 lobbyists shows up regularly for strategy sessions.
During the second week in February, an industry contingent met with Sally Canfield, a senior
counselor to Mr. Thompson of HHS. The industry team included Laurie Michel, a lobbyist for Merck,
and Laura Gogal, vice president and chief counsel of the Federation of American Hospitals, the trade
association of for-profit hospitals. Ms. Canfield was well known to the industry group because of her
own past posts as a lobbyist for insurer Mutual of Omaha Inc. and a staffer to GOP Rep. Jim
McCrery of Louisiana, who often works on health issues.
Meanwhile, Craig Fuller, who served as chief of staff to former President George Bush and now
heads the National Association of Chain Drug Stores, met recently with Mr. Thompson to make the
case on privacy and other issues. Mr. Fuller's current constituents include such behemoths as CVS
Corp. and Walgreen Co.
The drug industry provides a case study of how the ties between the new Bush administration and
its business backers run much deeper than money. There is often a shared worldview among people
who have been colleagues and friends in both the private sector and government.
Raymond Gilmartin, chairman and chief executive of Merck, and Anne Marie Lynch and Bill Walters,
top officials at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, the industry's main
trade group, all served as advisers to the Bush transition team on health issues.
Deborah Steelman, a prominent lobbyist whose clients include Bristol-Myers Squibb and the drugindustry trade group, was sounded out for a top job at the Department of Health and Human
Services, but declined. Mitch Daniels, a Lilly executive, accepted the offer he got to be director of
the White House Office of Management and Budget, which oversees both budget and regulatory
issues.
When it comes to being well-connected with the new administration, few industries rival tobacco.
Cigarette makers are hoping those ties help accomplish such goals as snuffing out a multibilliondollar federal lawsuit against it.
Cigarette companies adopted a much lower profile in the last election than drug companies, in part
because Republican strategists worried that featuring close ties to tobacco would anger many
voters. But the money flowed liberally. Tobacco interests contributed roughly $90,000 to Mr. Bush's
campaign, part of the $6.7 million they provided to the Republican Party and its candidates in the
last election cycle. Democrats received $1.4 million from tobacco interests.
Beyond the campaign, industry titan Philip Morris Cos. was one of the most generous contributors to
Mr. Bush's inaugural, giving $100,000 itself and another $100,000 through its subsidiary, Kraft
Foods. Along with a number of inauguration tickets, these donations entitled company executives to
two tables at a candlelight supper attended by President Bush and Vice President Cheney the night
before their swearing-in.
Philip Morris has numerous longstanding ties to the Bush administration. Karl Rove, a senior White
House adviser, worked as a political consultant for the company from 1991 to 1996. Kirk Blalock, a
Philip Morris public-relations official, took a job in the White House in January as a liaison to the
business community. Handling the inaugural donations for Philip Morris was Thomas Collamore, a
vice president for public affairs who worked for President Bush's father, both in the White House and
the Commerce Department. Charles Black, an informal adviser to Mr. Bush during his campaign, is
also a Philip Morris lobbyist in Washington.
Mr. Thompson of HHS received more than $70,000 in Philip Morris campaign-related contributions
during his years as Wisconsin governor. He disclosed before his Senate confirmation earlier this
year that he owned between $15,000 and $50,000 in Philip Morris stock. An administration
spokesman says that Mr. Thompson didn't realize he owned the company's stock because it was in a
blind trust and that he planned to sell it.
British American Tobacco PLC's Brown & Williamson unit and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Holdings Inc.
are also well-positioned. Both companies are represented by Barbour, Griffith & Rogers, a lobbying
firm stocked with Republican operatives, including former GOP Chairman Haley Barbour and Lanny
Griffith, a former White House aide to Mr. Bush's father.
The industry's first objective is to get rid of a massive federal lawsuit, launched by the Clinton
administration, that accuses cigarette makers of "racketeering" and lying about the health risks of
smoking for 50 years. The case is pending in federal court in Washington.
Tobacco companies are so confident the Bush team will drop the suit that they claim to have no
plans even to ask for it to be withdrawn. "We are not lobbying on this at all," says Philip Morris
spokeswoman Peggy Roberts. Many in the industry say they think an aggressive push to kill the suit
would be counterproductive, causing the Bush administration to worry about the perception that it is
eager to do a huge favor for one of its most-generous donors.
One way to squelch the suit would be for Congress to cut or eliminate funding for it, which for the
current fiscal year is budgeted at $23 million. Although skittish about approaching the Bush
administration directly, Philip Morris officials say they have no qualms about lobbying this year for
such a funding cut. Another possible scenario for terminating the suit is for the Justice Department
to reach a settlement with the companies.
Mr. Bush has avoided making a definitive statement about the tobacco suit. But referring to the
case in August, he said, "I think we've had enough suits," adding, "The lawyers I talk to don't feel
they [the Justice Department] have a case."
Complicating the situation is the presence of one key person on the Bush team who historically
hasn't had an easy relationship with the big tobacco companies: Attorney General John Ashcroft,
who now oversees the federal suit. Mr. Ashcroft's dim view of the industry arises from having seen
several friends die from cancer, aides say.
At a get-acquainted meeting with tobacco lobbyists soon after being elected to the Senate in 1995,
Mr. Ashcroft damped the atmosphere with a diatribe. "Let me tell you up front that I believe you
guys are the merchants of death, and I don't support your product or your industry," Mr. Ashcroft
was quoted as saying by two people at the meeting.
Yet three years later, as Mr. Ashcroft was considering entering the race for the presidency, he took
a different position. When the Senate Commerce Committee considered legislation to restrict
tobacco marketing and raise cigarette taxes, Mr. Ashcroft was the only vote against the bill on the
20-member committee, even though he still denounced the industry. His vote was a surprise to
industry lobbyists, who were even more pleased when his persistent attacks on the proposed $1.10a-pack rise in cigarette taxes helped kill the measure on the Senate floor.
An aide to Mr. Ashcroft says that, while critical of the tobacco industry, Mr. Ashcroft concluded that
the bill contained excessive tax increases and required too much bureaucracy to implement the
marketing restrictions.
During his confirmation hearings in January, Mr. Ashcroft said that he had "no predisposition" to
dismiss the federal lawsuit. He promised to consult with career attorneys at the Justice Department
and make a decision based on a "careful examination of the facts and the law."
When George W. Bush became president-elect, American Airlines was ready. On the Sunday after Al
Gore conceded the bitterly contested election, the Dallas-based unit of AMR Corp. rolled a brandnew 737-800 onto the tarmac at the airport near Austin, the Texas capital. It had been specially
painted in the airline's distinctive 1960s colors -- a silver fuselage with a bold red lightning bolt.
The triumphant charter flight, paid for by the campaign, ferried Mr. Bush and his inner circle,
including aides Andrew Card, Condoleezza Rice and Karen Hughes, from Austin to Dulles for their
first round of meetings here. The president-elect and his staff were treated to a dinner of
Chateaubriand, shrimp Caesar salads and hot chocolate-chip cookies, baked on board.
"As a Texas-based airline, it was an honor and a privilege to carry Mr. Bush," Don Carty, the chief
executive officer, said at the time. "American Airlines is proud to have the president-elect's vote of
confidence."
Mr. Carty was an early booster, and, like Mr. Cawley of MBNA, one of Mr. Bush's pioneer fundraisers. He personally gave the maximum donation of $5,000 to support Mr. Bush's legal fight
following the contested Florida vote. The company also gave the maximum $100,000 gift to the
Bush inaugural committee.
What American and other big companies hope for is a change in antitrust policy. In the airline's case
that would mean the government's backing off the antitrust suit President Clinton's Justice
Department brought against it. The suit, filed in 1998 and scheduled to go to trial in May in federal
court in Wichita, Kan., alleges that American used illegal tactics to squelch competition at its Dallas
hub. The case is being watched closely as a sign of the new administration's approach to antitrust
enforcement.
The Bush team must decide whether to proceed with the trial as planned, or settle. Charles James,
the nominee for Justice Department antitrust chief, hasn't been confirmed, and career officials at
the Justice Department say they expect the case to be pursued on its merits.
But there are already signs that the administration may view the case skeptically. Timothy Muris,
who has been close to Mr. James since the two worked together at the Federal Trade Commission
during the Reagan years, has openly questioned the wisdom of the Clinton suit because it relies on
an expansive interpretation of antitrust law. A law professor at George Mason University in
Arlington, Va., Mr. Muris helped shape antitrust policy for the Bush transition team and is expected
to be named chairman of the FTC, which also enforces antitrust laws.
Mr. James won't comment on American's case but has said he generally doesn't favor antitrust
cases that "make new law."
Of all the business interests that backed Mr. Bush, oil companies have the clearest ties and
strongest personal meaning to the new president. He is a former oil man who revels in his
attachments to Texas, and his best friends are oil men, too. Promoting the industry is an instinctive
impulse for the president that goes beyond campaign contributions.
When Mr. Bush announced Mr. Cheney, former chairman of Halliburton Inc., as his running mate,
Hollywood director Rob Reiner joked that the GOP's idea of diversity is having "two guys heading
the ticket from two different oil companies."
The personal connections were strengthened with money. The oil industry donated more than it
ever has before: $32 million during the past two years, with 80% of it going to Republican causes.
As a result, "all the stars are aligned this year," says Roger Herrera, who heads a lobbying effort to
allow oil drilling in Alaska's costal plain, known as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Mr. Herrera is a courtly, Oxford-educated oil company geologist, who has made more than 50
appearances before congressional committees, taken hundreds of politicians on guided tours of
Alaska and built one of Washington's most innovative and influential lobbying operations, known as
Arctic Power. Until now, his decade-long efforts to open up Alaska's coastal plain for oil and gas
development have been consistently frustrated. In 1989, there was the Exxon Valdez oil spill; in
1991, a Senate filibuster threat; and in 1995, a veto by President Clinton.
Now, Mr. Herrera promises, things will be different. He's counting on the combined power of the
new president, who favors drilling in the coastal plain, and Alaska's powerful congressional
delegation, Senators Ted Stevens, Frank H. Murkowski and Rep. Don Young. All three of these
veteran Republicans chair influential committees. In the White House, Mr. Cheney's energy-policy
task force is directed by Andrew D. Lundquist, former staff director for Sen. Murkowski's Senate
Energy Committee.
To build support last week, Alaska's Governor Tony Knowles, in town for a governors conference,
took two days to discuss oil exploration with skeptical Democrats on Capitol Hill. "I am going to be
in contact with people who have expressed opposition but seem to be amenable to reason," he told
reporters last Tuesday. He went to the Hill that day carrying support and strategic advice from all
corners of the new administration. He had met with Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Energy
Secretary Spencer Abraham and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd
Whitman.
This powerful network of industry allies will face a daunting alliance of more than 400 environmental
organizations determined to stop Alaska drilling in the interest of preserving the area's pristine
condition. But this year, Mr. Herrera says, the industry group feels up to the task.
--John Wilke and John Fialka contributed to this article.
--Journal Link: What should large corporate donors to Bush's campaign receive in return? Participate
in the Question of the Day in the online Journal at WSJ.com/JournalLinks.
Politics & Policy
Drug Firms Underwrite U.S. Chamber's TV Ads
By Jim VandeHei and Tom Hamburger
Staff Reporters of The Wall Street Journal
458 words
6 October 2000
The Wall Street Journal
A24
English
(Copyright (c) 2000, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)
WASHINGTON -- In an effort underwritten substantially by drug companies, the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce will spend as much as $20 million between now and Election Day defending Republicans
on a range of health-care issues.
By funneling money through the Chamber, the pharmaceutical industry hopes to counter a drive by
the Clinton administration and congressional Democrats to create a Medicare prescription-drug
benefit and to help elect political candidates -- mostly Republicans -- who favor a nongovernmental
solution to the problem of high drug costs.
The Chamber's salvo is just the latest example of the unprecedented sums flowing into issue ads in
an effort to influence this year's elections. Since the ads don't directly advocate the election or
defeat of a specific candidate, they aren't subject to federal election-law regulation.
The drug industry already has spent at least $35 million on its own ads through Citizens for Better
Medicare, a group created and largely funded by pharmaceutical interests. Some industry officials
feel that because it has a strong local presence through local chapters around the country, the
Chamber has more credibility with voters and greater freedom to run hard-hitting ads.
The Chamber also plans to run ads on other health-care topics, such as HMO reform, which will be
financed by companies representing other industries.
The ad campaign began this week in Michigan, a battleground state for the presidential and
congressional elections, and next week will extend to more than a dozen states. In Minnesota, the
Chamber plans to spend $2 million over the next four weeks, according to a congressional candidate
who is tracking ad buys there.
Bruce Josten, the top lobbyist for the Chamber, confirmed that the organization plans to spend
"multiple millions of dollars" on the campaign, and that he "solicited pharmaceutical companies" for
money. The companies involved in the early planning discussions included Eli Lilly & Co., BristolMyers Squibb Co. and several others.
The campaign is designed to defend Republican candidates who have been hit hard with TV ads
financed by the AFL-CIO and Democratic Party. Democrats and their allies have made prescription
drugs the top issue of this year's elections. "The business community cannot concede the playing
field," Mr. Josten said.
In Michigan, GOP Sen. Spencer Abraham, a top Democratic target this fall, has been battling his
opponent over the issue of prescription drugs. The Chamber is running ads in Detroit, Lansing and
Grand Rapids. "Call Debbie Stabenow," one ad says, "and tell her Michigan doesn't want the bad
medicine she is prescribing."
--Greg Hitt contributed to this article.
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Politics & Policy
GOP Wants Businesses to Counterstrike Against Ad Campaigns by Labor Groups
By Jim VandeHei
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal
934 words
25 September 2000
The Wall Street Journal
A38
English
(Copyright (c) 2000, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)
WASHINGTON -- Republican leaders, scrambling to help GOP House members under fire for voting
to block new workplace-safety rules, urged a group of business lobbyists last week to run up to $1
million in ads defending the lawmakers.
At a hastily arranged meeting, lobbyists for several industries involved in the fight over proposed
Occupational Safety and Health Administration work standards to prevent repetitive-motion injuries
were given a list of 13 House Republicans being blasted by the AFL-CIO for opposing the rules. A
top GOP leadership aide implored the lobbyists to quickly arrange and broadcast independent
television and radio ads in the lawmakers' districts to counter the union attack and help keep the
House in Republican control, participants say.
The meeting produced no commitments, however, and what advertising the groups do conduct will
probably come later in the fall and cover different issues, lobbyists said.
The meeting highlights what Republican leaders say is a question that mystifies them at this point in
the fall campaign: why aren't business groups more active in independent efforts to help GOP
lawmakers who help them?
Business interests have contributed millions in direct campaign aid and unregulated "soft-money"
donations for Republicans. But save for the drug industry, they "have been slow" to respond on
their own to attack ads being mounted against GOP candidates by the AFL-CIO and other proDemocrat groups, says Rep. Roy Blunt (R., Mo.), a deputy House GOP whip.
In the end, campaign analysts believe both parties will be able to spend record sums on advertising.
AFL-CIO political director Steve Rosenthal says "the bottom line is that the amount of money that
unions spend on politics is a spit in the ocean compared to business."
But right now, many Republicans sound panicked. Reps. Anne Northop (R., Ky.) and Robyn Hayes
(R., S.C.), pleading for help, have told GOP leaders that internal polls show their support slipping
after the labor federation started airing spots criticizing their voting records.
"Labor was up [with ads] early in many of the races with vulnerable incumbents," said Amy Walter
who follows House races for the Cook Political Report, a political newsletter. That early spending set
off "the equivalent of an arms race," she said.
The drug industry, through an umbrella group called Citizens for Better Medicare, has spent $38
million this election, more than any outside group. The ads tend to favor Republicans, but political
observers say they are not nearly as effective or intense as those financed by the AFL-CIO and
other pro-Democrat organizations.
The ergonomics ads feature a blue-collar worker afflicted by repetitive-stress disorders, and urge
voters to call their local GOP congressman because their "politics causes pain."
Republicans want their business allies to start spending more money on television ads and do it
now.
At last week's meeting, Republicans summoned lobbyists who represent food distributors,
wholesalers, trucking and other industries to jump-start a pro-business campaign, with an initial
emphasis on ergonomics. A similar message was sent to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and
other groups, according to a top GOP leader. The lobbyists, however, appeared unconvinced.
"There's no chance we will raise that much money, if any," says a lobbyist familiar with the
meeting. "We don't like the [GOP's] tactics, and most businesses don't like spending that kind of
money this early."
This type of response, Republicans say, has allowed the AFL-CIO to dominate the air war early, and
endanger several pro-business lawmakers whose races have tightened considerably in recent
weeks.
Democrats have expanded their focus -- once confined to about 20 House races -- in the effort to
erase the GOP's seven-seat majority. To do this, the Democratic Congressional Campaign
Committee and the AFL-CIO have inundated Republican-leaning districts with television ads since
early August. The AFL-CIO also targeted more than 60 races.
Mrs. Northup, for example, is a pro-business conservative from Louisville, Ky., who won election
two years ago with 51% of the vote and in 1996 with 50%. Her swing district in Kentucky, a
battleground in the presidential race, is considered prime ground for Democrats to knock off an
incumbent.
During the past month and half, she has been hit by ads financed by five outside groups: the AFLCIO; the Sierra Club; the League of Conservation Voters; Campaign for a Progressive Future, which
advocates gun control; and, most recently, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People. During the second week of September alone, the Democratic party, labor and other
sympathetic groups spent $167,800 on issue ads running in her district.
Outside of the Republican Party, only Citizens for Better Medicare came to Mrs. Northup's rescue,
spending $99,623 in issue ads. The lack of outside help forced her to tap her own campaign war
chest much earlier than she had wished.
Help could be on its way for Republicans. The Health Benefits Coalition, representing insurance
companies and health maintenance organizations, has vowed to defend several GOP lawmakers on
the prescription-drug issue. The Business Roundtable plans to spend millions of dollars on ads
defending pro-trade lawmakers, particularly Republicans, starting in a few weeks. The Chamber of
Commerce will spend $5 million on the elections, some of it on ads. But, unlike labor, the
Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable plan to help Democrats, too.
--Tom Hamburger contributed to this article.
Main News; National Desk
THE RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE; Workplace Now Terrain of Politics
Tom Hamburger
Times Staff Writer
2030 words
29 October 2004
Los Angeles Times
Home Edition
A-1
English
Copyright 2004 The Los Angeles Times
PELLA, Iowa
In this week's frenzied competition to boost voter turnout, the quiet effort of companies like
Vermeer Manufacturing could prove crucial for the Bush campaign.
Vermeer, a family-owned industrial and agricultural equipment maker, is urging its 1,700
employees to vote -- and is providing them with industry-prepared election guides to help them
decide how to cast their ballots.
The guides include candidates' positions on specific legislation and score lawmakers on the
percentage of the time they voted with business. Republicans tend to score well in such "key vote"
surveys; Democrats do not.
Sen. John F. Kerry received a zero score, for example, a point made repeatedly by the National
Assn. of Manufacturers, which encourages Vermeer and its 13,000 other member companies to
distribute the candidate summaries.
In elections past, large companies expressed their political preferences in cash, often with "soft
money" checks written to parties and advocacy groups running issue ads.
Now, with campaign finance reform limiting those contributions and expenditures, thousands of
employers are going grass-roots.
These direct contacts with employees in battleground states could undercut the economic message
that Kerry and other Democrats are using to woo working-class voters and boost turnout of those
who give the nod to Bush.
The business campaign could prove critical in such states as Iowa, where Democrat Al Gore won
narrowly in 2000 but Kerry is struggling. Recent polls show the race there deadlocked.
To elect "business-friendly" candidates, the manufacturers group partnered with the Business
Industry Political Action Committee, or BIPAC, four years ago to show companies how to talk
politics with their workers. The so-called Prosperity Project had one full-time field staffer.
This year, the project has 80 field organizers in 14 targeted states, including six in Iowa. More than
700 companies and trade groups have joined, up from 184 in 2002. The list includes hundreds of
small- and medium-sized companies like Vermeer and more than half of the largest 50 multinational
firms in the country.
Separately, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business
have launched voter education efforts that are equally ambitious and more pointedly critical of the
Democratic ticket.
At the AFL-CIO, officials say they are unfazed by the corporate effort to steal a page from labor's
get-out-the-vote playbook. Even this year's ramped-up business campaign pales next to union
outreach in its scope and credibility with workers, they say.
At Vermeer, a nonunion plant, the company's e-mail and in-house newsletters direct employees to
an elaborate website that uses an interactive template developed by BIPAC. The site provides
information on voter registration and absentee balloting and detailed descriptions of candidates for
state and federal office.
The language and the presentations are evenhanded, reflecting BIPAC's oft-stated commitment to
a nonpartisan approach. But the linked voting charts evaluate incumbents' positions on tax, liability
reform, free trade, healthcare and other legislative priorities for business and assigns a score at the
bottom.
Vermeer, whose chief executive, Mary Andringa, is a National Assn. of Manufacturers board
member, was not active in get-out-the-vote efforts in previous elections, nor did the firm donate to
parties.
But the 56-year-old company founded by her father has been rocked by an economic downturn that
pared about half its workforce a couple of years ago.
"We know our industry and our jobs are dependent on the domestic economy and the overseas
market," she says. "We need to do what we can to help get people informed."
Andringa believes the Bush administration "is trying to help business." She won't push her personal
views on her employees, she says, but wants them to be informed on issues that affect the
company -- and the jobs it offers.
She ticks off a list of federal actions that could benefit Vermeer: passage of energy, highway and
tort-reform bills. She cites benefits already accruing from tax credits for research and development
and equipment depreciation as well as administration forest policy, which has boosted sales of the
company's brush chippers and organic grinders that turn tree stumps and limbs into mulch.
After growing slowly in the two previous election cycles, such employer activism has entered the
mainstream in 2004. Companies that do not communicate with workers about political issues have
become the exception, amounting to a quiet revolution in the way business conducts itself in the
political world.
"If everything goes well, this project will have generated 20 million voter contacts before election
day," says John Engler, the former Republican governor of Michigan who was recently named head
of the manufacturers association.
Business, he adds, is finally adopting some of the tactics long used by labor but applying them with
more subtlety.
"We have registered more than 700,000 new voters, many of them in battleground states. It could
be that these new votes will make the difference," Engler says.
The man directing the Prosperity Project, Darrell Shull, says this year's goal "is to increase business
turnout by 2%." In Iowa, that meant reaching more than 21,500 new voters who would go to the
polls armed with information provided by companies. To reach that goal, BIPAC sought to
communicate with at least 215,000 people. That was exceeded in Iowa and 13 other priority states.
Still, Chamber of Commerce officials bemoan the effect of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance
reform law on business influence. It is the reason business is not as visible on the airwaves as it
was in previous campaigns.
But if businesses haven't been writing checks for broadcast ads this year, they are trying to make
up for it in their communication with staff.
Legally, employers can be quite aggressive in talking politics with their workers, but corporate
reticence has been a major barrier to making business more of an electoral force, BIPAC says.
The law allows employers to engage in politics, including inviting candidates to the workplace and
endorsing them. Companies can urge certain categories of employees to vote for specific
candidates.
However, the categories are broad. They include managers, executives and shareholders. At many
companies, all workers are shareholders and thus fair game for management's endorsements.
Federal election and tax laws sharply restrict the coordination of political campaigns with the
activities of special-interest groups such as business and labor, and both groups -- and the
Republicans and Democrats -- declare that they scrupulously follow the rules.
To mobilize local business, the chamber this year hired a record 287 field organizers, concentrating
them in presidential battleground states and those with specially targeted races. In South Dakota
alone, the chamber has 55 local organizers working largely in support of former Republican Rep.
John Thune's bid to unseat Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle.
At the AFL-CIO, spokeswoman Denise Mitchell says the business effort won't compare to labor's
plan, which includes nearly 5,000 paid organizers nationwide and more than 100,000 volunteers on
election day. The message from a union, she adds, has more credibility with employees at election
time than that from an employer.
However, Engler points to surveys showing that employees want and trust information from their
employer about state and federal issues. In recent years, BIPAC has emphasized that it is legal and
appropriate to talk about these issues with employees. And although organized labor's impact is
undeniable, unions represent a mere 13% of the nation's workforce today.
At Vermeer, half a dozen employees who volunteered to talk to a reporter reacted positively to the
information they have received from the company.
"Everyone in Iowa is about ready to blow up their TVs. So it is really nice to be able to go to this
website and get factual information without all this bickering back and forth," says Jan Anderson, a
data entry clerk and administrative assistant at the plant. She said candidates' voting records on
manufacturing had a big impact on some of her co-workers.
"They were actually able to see how people voted in terms of manufacturing issues, and it caused
some of them to open their eyes and realize there's more out there than what they have been led to
believe" in media reports and campaign ads.
Pella, where Vermeer is located, is a conservative town, but there are "hard-core Democrats" at
the company who are not pleased with the scores candidates received, one company official says.
The distribution of the information, however, is viewed as positive and many report that it has
boosted talk of politics in the plant. Employees say they know of several co-workers who had used
the company website to help them register to vote or obtain absentee ballots.
The impact of these personalized efforts by small companies and business field organizers should
not be underestimated in the battleground states this year, political analysts say.
"There are sloppy assumptions among Democrats that they have this ground game covered," says
Lawrence Jacobs, a political scientist at the University of Minnesota. "Personal communication is
key, and the Republicans and their allies in the business community have made real advances."
*
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
Turnout tool
In what promises to be another close presidential election, companies large and small are
encouraging their employees to vote and learn more about the candidates. Many are distributing
guides that rate the candidates on issues important to business. President Bush tends to fare well in
these issue guides, while Sen. John F. Kerry does poorly. Below left is an example of a National
Assn. of Manufacturers guide; on the right, part of an 11-page guide prepared by the National
Federation of Independent Business.
The issues
Halting changes in air pollution law
Blocking energy development in Alaska refuge
Passing budget resolution
Tax reduction bill
Blocking offshore energy review
Blocking tax increase on top earners
Implementing Kyoto climate treaty
Sinking liability reform
NAM*
position
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Sen.
Kerry's
vote
Yes
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
The issues: Supports income tax relief for individuals and small businesses?
President Bush: Yes. Signed into law the 2001 Economic Growth and Tax Relief Act that reduced tax
rates, and the 2003 Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Act that accelerated individual tax cuts. Also
supports making the tax cuts permanent.
Sen. Kerry: No. Voted against both the 2001 and 2003 tax relief acts. Now, as a candidate for
president, Kerry supports repealing the income tax relief for families making over $200,000 a year.
The issues: Supports permanent repeal of the 'death tax' (estate tax)?
President Bush: Yes. Signed into law the 2001 Economic Growth and Tax Relief Act that repealed
the 'death tax.'
Sen. Kerry: No. In a Senate vote, opposed permanent repeal of the 'death tax.'
The issues: Supports increasing section 179 expensing?
President Bush: Yes. Signed into law the 2003 Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Act that increased
expensing to $100,000. He now supports making this cut permanent.
Sen. Kerry: Yes. As a U.S. senator, sponsored legislation to make current expense levels
permanent.
The issues: Supports protecting private property owners from excessive regulation?
President Bush: Yes. Pushed hard for the 'Healthy Forest' provision, which included property rights
language to protect private property owners.
Sen. Kerry: No. Supports expanding endangered species and wetlands programs that would take
thousands of acres of private property through regulation.
The issues: Supports overturning the Clinton administration's OSHA ergonomics rule on repetitive
stress injuries?
President Bush: Yes. Signed into law a repeal of former President Clinton's rule.
Sen. Kerry: No. Cast a vote against repealing the ergonomics rule.
The issues: Supports maintaining the small-businesses exemption to the Family and Medical Leave
Act?
President Bush: Yes. Believes that small businesses should be exempt from the Family and Medical
Leave Act.
Sen. Kerry: No. As a senator and presidential candidate, John Kerry supports legislation expanding
the act.
* National Assn. of Manufacturers
Sources: National Federation of Independent Business; Vermeer Manufacturing Co.
Political Cover: Major Business Lobby Wins Back Its Clout By Dispensing Favors --- Some
Members Can Hide Behind Chamber's Name To Pursue Private Ends --- Targeting
`Unfriendly' Judges
By Jim VandeHei
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal
2366 words
11 September 2001
The Wall Street Journal
A1
English
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)
WASHINGTON -- Last summer, Philip Anschutz, chairman of Qwest Communications International
Inc., wanted to defeat legislation that could have prevented his company from expanding overseas.
But the billionaire investor, who shuns publicity, preferred to keep a low profile.
Enter Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Donohue, who
considered Mr. Anschutz a potential $1 million donor to the chamber, eagerly proposed a solution:
His organization would step up its efforts to derail the legislation, and it would keep Mr. Anschutz
and his associates fully informed.
It wasn't the first time Mr. Donohue had helped a corporate chieftain out of a jam. By selectively
offering such personalized assistance, the 62-year-old executive has transformed the way the
nation's flagship business organization does business. Since taking over the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce four years ago, he has more than doubled the group's fund-raising tally to $100 million
annually. His most striking innovation has been to offer individual companies and industries the
chance to use the chamber as a means of anonymously pursuing their own political ends.
Internal chamber documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal show that the organization has
created several special accounts to take in money for projects on behalf of individual companies or
groups of companies with a common policy goal. In some cases, the money is spent just days after
it comes in the door. The chamber, like many nonprofit organizations, isn't required to report the
sources of its funding, which makes it an attractive vehicle for those such as Mr. Anschutz who
sometimes like to operate under the radar. Mr. Anschutz couldn't be reached for comment.
Mr. Donohue, who is 62 years old, defends the chamber's special projects, saying all of them are
consistent with the organization's pro-business mission and its role as an advocate for the American
business community at large. And, he adds, none of them conflict with the interests of any of the
chamber's 150,000 dues-paying member companies. "The chamber is not for sale," Mr. Donohue
says, though he adds that he is constantly marketing its lobbying and legal services to companies
who could use them.
Many companies are buying. Last fall, for example, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., DaimlerChrysler AG,
Home Depot Inc. and the American Council of Life Insurers all kicked in $1 million each for one of
the chamber's special projects: a TV and direct-mail advertising campaign aimed at helping elect
business-friendly judges. The participants had all been targets of costly lawsuits, and the chamber's
campaign gave them a way to fight back -- without disclosing their identities. That allowed them,
among other things, to avoid attracting the attention of the nation's trial lawyers, who were
spending millions of their own to help elect plaintiff-friendly judges.
Wal-Mart spokesman Tom Williams says his company joined the campaign because "we're always
looking for ways to drive down costs for our business and save money for our customers." He says
that the fact that Wal-Mart's sponsorship of the ads wouldn't be made public didn't figure into its
decision. Nor did the prospect of anonymity sway the ACLI, says Phil Anderson, a spokesman for the
Washington-based trade group. Rather, he says, the group wanted to "get people to make different
political decisions" and "fix" the legal system.
"Finally," says Mr. Donohue, the "business community is finding out" that class-action lawsuits are
"sucking the vitality out of their ability to develop products and do business" without ending up in
court. "And somebody -- thank you very much -- was smart enough to organize" the campaign.
Although Mr. Donohue promised contributors anonymity in the effort, some balked. General Motors
Corp., which contributed $250,000 to defeat product-liability legislation, "told them that our
[money] cannot be used in judicial races," says GM spokesman William H. Noack. "We did not think
it was appropriate," because GM doesn't typically contribute such "soft money" to political
campaigns.
Still, Mr. Donohue raised more than $5 million for judicial campaign ads in Michigan, Mississippi,
Ohio, Indiana and Alabama. Many of the targeted judges had rendered verdicts against one or more
of the companies contributing to the effort. In Mississippi, where the chamber spent about $1
million on the state's Supreme Court elections, it still is engaged in a court battle to protect the
identities of its donors.
In mid-September, a few weeks after the money earmarked for the judicial races starting rolling in,
Bruce Josten, one of Mr. Donohue's closest colleagues, approached more than a dozen
pharmaceutical companies. He asked them each to pony up a sizable sum of money to run a
separate set of ads under the chamber's banner. The idea was to help defend the views of GOP
candidates that sided with the industry in the debate over a Medicare prescription-drug benefit.
At the time, Democrats were pounding Republican candidates and the drug industry for not
supporting the initiative, which could have lowered drug prices as well as drug-company profits. The
industry, arguing that the legislation would kill its incentives to invest in new drugs, struck back,
launching a series of ads through its trade group. But many GOP leaders considered the ads
ineffective. Mr. Josten says he offered drug-company executives a "better messenger" -- the
chamber. The idea that the chamber would seem to be a less self-interested spokesman than the
drug trade association wasn't a "tough sell," he adds.
Eleven drug makers, including Merck & Co. and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., contributed $1.22 million
each to the campaign, internal chamber documents show. Schering-Plough Corp., which isn't a
member of the chamber, chipped in a similar amount. The companies were asked to wire the money
to the chamber, which, in turn, paid media-buying companies to place the TV ads under "the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce" logo. The chamber collected a total of $15 million between Sept. 29 and
Oct. 27, as the ads began airing.
The pharmaceutical companies would neither confirm nor deny that they contributed to the
campaign. Ronald Asinari, a spokesman for Schering-Plough says his company "supports programs
that facilitate public debate of new ideas that best represent the company's point of view."
GOP strategists say the chamber's ads helped Republican candidates -- Reps. Ernie Fletcher of
Kentucky and Mike Rogers of Michigan, for example -- win in several House and Senate races where
health care was a major issue. The ads also helped the candidates focus their own spending on
other issues.
Mr. Donohue says the chamber's political campaigns benefit all chamber members because the
money is spent on pro-business initiatives. "We gave them a means to do this. We gave them a
mechanism to do this. We showed them that we have the courage to do this," he says. As for the
fund raising, says the sharp-tongued Brooklyn native, "I'm good for getting it."
Indeed, fund raising has been an important part of Mr. Donohue's crusade to re-establish the
chamber as an influential player here in Washington. The group's prestige reached its peak during
the Reagan years, because of its zealous support for the president's supply-side economic program.
But by the mid-1990s, the group's clout had waned. Many of its allies trace the low point to 1994,
when Richard Lesher, Mr. Donohue's predecessor, endorsed Hillary Clinton's ill-fated national
health-care program, sparking a revolt among his members.
When Mr. Donohue, a former leader of the American Trucking Associations, took over the chamber
in 1997 after Mr. Lesher's retirement, he pledged to dispel what he said was the chamber's image
as "a sleeping giant, missing in action from many important battles."
Over the next few years, he hired a stable of lobbyists, mainly Republican aides to the GOPcontrolled Congress, and a new team of policy experts. During the same period, the chamber
started to draw a growing percentage of its members and contributors from among the nation's
biggest companies. Those companies helped the chamber raise $35 million in 2000 for general
operations, up sharply from $3 million four years ago, and kicked in another $20 million for special
projects.
Mr. Donohue has benefited along the way. He says his salary this year will top $1 million, about
twice that of his predecessor. The chamber also will spend another $1 million this year to lease and
run the eight-seat private jet that it keeps at Mr. Donohue's disposal under terms of his contract.
The executive, who rides around Washington in a chauffeured Lincoln, is known for throwing some
of the city's most lavish parties on the chamber's behalf. At one recent fete at the National Building
Museum, pop star Bruce Hornsby provided the entertainment.
Late last year, Mr. Donohue landed a seat on the Qwest board and stock options in the company
worth $750,000. He also sits on the boards of Sunrise Assisted Living Inc., XM Satellite Radio
Holdings Inc. and Union Pacific Corp. "I operate at the same level as CEOs. They expect me to be on
boards," Mr. Donohue says.
Mr. Donohue feels he has become so visible that he pays security companies to sweep his house,
office and business cars for wire-tapping devices as often as twice a year. He fears that trial lawyers
or agents from China or Cuba might be trying to listen in on his conversations.
Mr. Donohue says his plane and parties are little more than tools to help him raise more money and
make the chamber the most powerful business lobby in town. "Are we more powerful? Damn right
we are," he says. The chamber, he adds, continues to spend the vast majority of its money on
bread-and-butter issues that appeal to most of its members: freer trade, lower taxes and regulatory
and legal reform. But he makes no apologies for the group's aggressive efforts on behalf of some of
its deepest-pocketed constituents.
Take, for example, its service to Ford Motor Co. and other major auto makers in the wake of last
year's recall of 6.5 million Firestone tires. Firestone tire failures on Ford Explorer vehicles had been
implicated in the deaths of more than 100 Americans. The fatalities inspired a fervent crusade by
GOP Sen. John McCain of Arizona, among others, for legislation to subject certain manufacturers of
defective products to criminal penalties.
The legislation could have exposed the auto makers to billions of dollars in new lawsuits and might
have influenced product-liability cases in other industries. Mr. Josten, the chamber's executive vice
president, reached out to the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, the Rubber Manufacturers
Association, which represents tire makers, and lawyer Victor Schwartz, who represented tire maker
Bridgestone-Firestone Inc., to develop a response.
Mr. Josten and his collegues mounted a fierce lobbying effort against the McCain bill and helped
convince their GOP allies in the House to introduce an alternative that provided business with far
more protection from lawsuits. The alternative measure was signed into law by President Clinton six
days before the 2000 election.
The successful campaign was run out of the chamber's Institute for Legal Reform, which, according
to internal documents, has received $250,000 from GM, $200,000 from Toyota Motor North America
U.S.A. Inc., $150,000 from Ford and $50,000 from DaimlerChrysler. Ford felt it would be "more
effective to work with a broad-based coalition of companies" with common interests rather than on
its own, says company spokeswoman Ellen Dickson.
Several manufacturers and insurance companies also contributed to the Institute for Legal Reform.
Wal-Mart and insurer Aegon USA Inc., for instance, each kicked in $1 million, while State Farm
Mutual Automobile Insurance Cos. contributed $500,000. Sen. McCain credited the institute with
persuading GOP senators to keep his bill from ever reaching the floor.
Around the same time, the chamber's campaign on behalf of Mr. Anschutz was in full swing. It was
urging lawmakers to reject a bill introduced by Sen. Fritz Hollings, a South Carolina Democrat, that
would have barred partially [Bstate-owned foreign companies, such as Deutsche Telekom AG, from
merging with a U.S. telecom firm. Mr. Anschutz's Qwest was among several companies that had
expressed interest in merging with Deutsche Telekom.
At first, Mr. Donohue's decision to oppose the legislation "raised a lot of eyebrows" at the chamber,
says one of the organization's senior officials. The chamber typically avoids taking a position that
could hurt any of its members, and cross-border telecom mergers were likely to produce both
winners and losers. But Mr. Donohue says he felt that global expansion was good for the entire
telecom industry, not just the handful of companies involved in the Deutsche Telekom talks.
For help, Mr. Donohue approached the companies involved in the talks. Deutsche Telekom rebuffed
his appeal for a donation. But VoiceStream Wireless, which was in advanced negotiations with the
German company, agreed to join the chamber and gave it $100,000. Qwest joined, too, and kicked
in $100,000. Spokesmen for both companies said their contributions weren't related to the lobbying
campaign.
In early October, Mr. Donohue got AFL-CIO chief John Sweeney to join him at a news conference to
denounce the legislation as bad for the U.S. economy. That left the measure as good as dead.
Deutsche Telekom completed its merger with VoiceStream earlier this year.
Mr. Donohue is still hoping to talk $1 million out of Mr. Anschutz and dozens of other business
leaders. "We're only about a third of the way of where we are going to get before I get out of here,"
says Mr. Donohue. "We're going to get bigger [and] stronger."