Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

1. Washington Post cites Russian role in Kyrgyzstan unrest

   By Bill Allison Apr 12, 2010 4:56 p.m.

   The Washington Post reports that "Kremlin-friendly television stations and newspapers" and Russian economic sanctions played a key role in the toppling of Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev.

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2. Correction: Fees for Livingston Group corrected in FLIT

   By Bill Allison Oct 23, 2009 3:26 p.m.

   Due to a data entry error, the Foreign Lobbying Influence Tracker contained duplicate entries for fees paid to the Livingston Group by some its clients. We have eliminated the duplicate records. Some of the totals we reported in the two main stories that accompanied the release of the database have changed:

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3. Scaled-down missile defense system comes after ramped-up lobbying effort

   By Luke Rosiak Oct 21, 2009 8:28 p.m.

   Lobbyists for the nation of Poland marked a win today as the country expressed relief at a scaled down US-sponsored missile shield, as the Associated Press reported, a turning point in negotiations between the countries in which Poland relied not just on diplomats, but on K Street lobbyists paid hundreds of thousands of dollars , too. The Obama administration last month agreed to dramatically scale down an Eastern European defense system that offended Russia and put a wary Poland on edge. The Bush plan would have used Poland as a potential launching point for missiles intercepting projectiles from Iran, but some viewed its ulterior target at Russia.

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4. Rep. Wexler heads to think tank funded by big Democratic donor

   By Luke Rosiak Oct 14, 2009 7:57 p.m.

   Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla., a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, is resigning from Congress and accepting a job at the Center for Middle East Peace & Economic Cooperation, a nonprofit with offices in Florida and Washington, D.C., that's funded by Slim-Fast founder S. Daniel Abraham.

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5. Corruption charges prompt Congo to lobby Congress

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Sep 25, 2009 3:40 p.m.

   In the past few years a handful of private equity or hedge funds have garnered a reputation as "vulture funds," a term coined to describe companies that profit from the debt of extremely poor countries. The hedge funds buy defaulted debt for pennies on the dollar, then sue them later for the full amount owed in U.S. and European courts.

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6. Defense contractors join Turkish lobbying effort in pursuit of arms deals

   By Luke Rosiak Sep 17, 2009 2:13 p.m.

   The Defense Department's request last week for congressional approval of the sale of $8 billion worth of PAC-3 missiles to Turkey was the latest victory for a disparate group of interests including defense contractors, finance and energy corporations, trade groups, the Turkish government and a well-financed network of domestic advocacy nonprofits. Intersecting interests have led them to join forces and lobby on a number of issues, including the characterization of distant historical events.

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7. Turkey's influence over lawmakers surfaces in Ohio hearing

   By Luke Rosiak Sep 10, 2009 10:28 p.m.

   Labeling the killing of 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923, many at the hands of Ottoman government, an act of genocide has been a controversial issue in Turkey, among some historians, in the U.S. Congress, and now in the unlikely venue of the Ohio Board of Elections, where recent hearings indirectly considered the government of Turkeys connection, if any, to Turkish advocacy groups in Washington.

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8. After massive US lobbying press, Turkey open to direct talks with Armenia

   By Luke Rosiak Sep 2, 2009 5:08 p.m.

   A diplomatic breakthrough in the longstanding feud between Turkey and Armenia puts a renewed focus on the United States' role in that dispute last year. Turkey mounted the largest foreign lobbying effort of 2008 in order to deter the U.S. Congress from declaring events in that part of the world 85 years prior as a genocide. The lobbying onslaught appeared to have worked, we've written on our Foreign Lobbyist Influence Tracker, but under an agreement floated this week, the Wall Street Journal reports today, the countries have taken steps to open relations while agreeing to mount a joint historical investigation into the deaths, which numbered as high as 1.5 million.

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9. Informant in tiny nation toppled decades of banking secrecy

   By Luke Rosiak Aug 31, 2009 12:35 p.m.

   Swiss mega-bank UBS has dominated recent headlines with its reluctant release of a subset of the list of Americans using the accounts, long shrouded in secrecy, to avoid paying taxes to the US.

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10. "Man without a country" peddles international influence through tangled ties

    By Luke Rosiak Aug 26, 2009 5 p.m.

    None of the former officials who have signed up to lobby the U.S. government for foreign interests--a list that includes presidential nominees (Bob Dole) and congressional leaders (Richard Gephardt, Dick Armey)--has a resume as offbeat as that of Ari Ben-Menashe, a former Israeli spy who later tried to implicate the opponent of the president of Zimbabwe in an assassination attempt and now considers himself a "man without a country." He also had one of the richest contracts to lobby for a foreign client--though he apparently had no contacts with U.S. government officials whatsoever.

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11. Raising Their Ugland House: Cayman Islands Lobbies to Keep Haven Safe

    By Bill Allison Aug 20, 2009 10:37 p.m.

    When President Barack Obama promised in May to raise an additional $210 billion in taxes a year by closing corporate loopholes and cracking down on individual tax cheats, he pointed to an address in the Cayman Islands listed by 12,000 corporations as the kind of abuse his proposals would shut down. "Either this is the largest building in the world or the largest tax scam in the world," the President said.

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12. Adding it up: The Top Players in Foreign Agent Lobbying

    By Anupama Narayanswamy and Luke Rosiak, Sunlight Foundation and Jennifer LaFleur, ProPublica Aug 18, 2009 1 p.m.

    It isnt just U.S. companies or groups that push for their causes on Capitol Hill. Thousands of times each year, lobbyists for foreign governments and other overseas organizations reach out to members of Congress and other U.S. leaders to make their case on issues important to them.

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13. FARAdb Reveals Who Lobbyists Meet to Influence Congress

    By Anupama Narayanswamy Oct 2, 2008 7:11 p.m.

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14. Contract but no Contacts: McCain Campaign Official's Firm Collects Millions from Saudis but no Meetings with Members of Congress

    By Anupama Narayanswamy Apr 15, 2008 2:50 p.m.

    In the five years prior to joining Arizona Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign, Thomas Loeffler's lobbying firm contacted U.S. government officials, including members of Congress, staff and executive branch officials, an average of 58 times during every six month reporting period on behalf of the government of Saudi Arabia. In the year that Loeffler has served on McCain's campaign, employees at the firm reported only one contact on behalf of the Saudis, though it continued to receive fees from the oil kingdom some $3.5 million in all, according to the federal disclosure documents.

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Foreign Lobbying Influence Tracker

See how lobbyists representing foreign governments and government-controlled entities tried to influence federal policy in this database that lets you search the detailed disclosures required under the Foreign Agent Registration Act. The database, which we’re updating, currently covers filings made in 2008.

The database is available online at ForeignLobbying.org. Here's where you'll find our original journalism--tales of international intrigue based on the oft-overlooked filings.