* Group releases proposal to expand lobbying regulation
* Recommendation could cover Gingrich, Daschle
* Congress unlikely to act soon, but momentum building
By David Ingram
WASHINGTON, April 9 (Reuters) – A trade group for U.S.
lobbyists came out in favor of tighter regulation of their
profession on Monday, saying that too many people in the more
than $3 billion industry escaped scrutiny.
The American League of Lobbyists is in part targeting people
like Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich and former
Democratic U.S. Senator Tom Daschle, who make livings based on
their time in Congress but who call themselves consultants or
policy advisers, said president Howard Marlowe.
Such people should be forced to register with Congress and
disclose their spending and activity, as lobbyists do, Marlowe
told reporters on a conference call.
“We would hope that anybody who is an advocate would in
essence be brought in under our proposal,” Marlowe said.
Thousands of people could be newly covered, he said.
Lobbyists rank low along with Congress in opinion polls on
public trust. They are associated with corporate influence in
Washington. Highly successful lobbyist Jack Abramoff went to
prison for defrauding Native American tribes.
The move by the lobbyists’ league is part of an effort to
reverse the decline in their image.
“It seems to me that rather than just spend our time
defending, which we need to do, that we needed to come up with
positive recommendations for members of Congress,” Marlowe said.
Although Congress has shown little interest in amending
lobbying regulations this year, the latest proposal follows a
similar report in January 2011 from a task force organized by
the American Bar Association. The ABA recommendations went
further, proposing limiting the role lobbyists play as campaign
fundraisers.
Most significantly, the League would drop a rule already on
the books that says an employee of a lobbying firm must spend 20
percent or more of his time on lobbying before he must register
with Congress. The net impact would be more people qualifying as
lobbyists and subject to transparency, it says.
Its proposal would require ethics training for lobbyists,
and it would apply lobbying rules to religious organizations and
to states and localities that are currently exempt.
There were 12,700 registered federal lobbyists during 2011,
and they spent $3.3 billion in efforts to influence the U.S.
government, according to the Center for Responsive Politics,
which collects data on lobbying.
Lobbyists file reports each calendar quarter detailing which
issues and legislation they worked on and how much they spent.
(Reporting by David Ingram; Editing by Howard Goller and Paul
Simao)
