When the typical American thinks about corruption in Washington, they probably imagine movie-like scenarios in which an obese man with a cigar summons a congressman, hands him a briefcase full of cash in a darkened room, and the congressman in turn does the donor’s bidding. Real-life corruption doesn’t look like this at all. It looks like the K Street Project.
I’ve noted this initiative in the past, but feel like it’s important enough to repeat until the embarrassment is better known. Fortunately, Elizabeth Drew has a terrific piece on the Project in the current issue of The New York Review of Books that everyone needs to go read.
If you’re not familiar with the K Street Project, it is a scheme launched 10 years ago after the GOP takeover of Congress. Newt Gingrich and Grover Norquist looked at DC’s infamous K Street, home to the city’s powerful lobbying industry, and noticed a problem: some of the lobbyists weren’t Republicans. It was a calamity that demanded a remedy — and the K Street Project was born.
The idea was simple enough: seize control of Washington’s lobbying apparatus through intimidation, hardball political tactics, and even private threats when necessary, until K Street had been purged of Democrats altogether and Republicans (who could fill GOP campaign coffers indefinitely) dominated. Any lobbying firm or trade association that expected to have any access, influence, or success with the federal government would have to acquiesce — or face the consequences.
As Drew noted, it’s been effective in more ways than one.
[Washington lobbyist Jack] Abramoff’s behavior is symptomatic of the unprecedented corruption — the intensified buying and selling of influence over legislation and federal policy — that has become endemic in Washington under a Republican Congress and White House. Corruption has always been present in Washington, but in recent years it has become more sophisticated, pervasive, and blatant than ever. A friend of mine who works closely with lobbyists says, “There are no restraints now; business groups and lobbyists are going crazy — they’re in every room on Capitol Hill writing the legislation. You can’t move on the Hill without giving money.”
This remark is only slightly exaggerated. For over ten years, but particularly since George W. Bush took office, powerful Republicans, among them Tom DeLay and Senator Rick Santorum, of Pennsylvania, have been carrying out what they call the “K Street Project,” an effort to place more Republicans and get rid of Democrats in the trade associations and major national lobbying organizations that have offices on K Street in downtown Washington (although, of course, some have offices elsewhere).
The Republican purge of K Street is a more thorough, ruthless, vindictive, and effective attack on Democratic lobbyists and other Democrats who represent businesses and other organizations than anything Washington has seen before.
At one point, in discussing the Project with Grover Norquist, Drew noted that there were any number of Democratic lobbyists who were not particularly ideological and were happy to serve corporate interests. In other words, these Dems don’t need to be purged; the Republicans’ corporate agenda would thrive even if they were employed. Norquist wouldn’t hear of it: “We don’t want nonideological people on K Street, we want conservative activist Republicans on K Street.”
It’s frightening to consider how effective this has been. Seasoned and capable lobbyists have been fired because DeLay, Santorum, and other Republicans behind the K Street Project have demanded it. Business associations who are considering applicants for job openings are told, in no uncertain terms, that they will face retribution unless they hire a Republican. The politics of fear drives the process.
At times, the GOP has used all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. In one infamous example, Gingrich and DeLay intentionally blocked a vote on an intellectual property bill in the House because the Electronics Industry Association announced it intended to hire a new director — who happened to be a Democrat. Gingrich and DeLay told the group, hire a Republican or we won’t pass your bill.
In another one of my favorite examples, Services Committee Chairman Michael Oxley (R-Ohio) pressured the Investment Company Institute (ICI), a consortium of mutual fund companies, to fire their chief lobbyist because she was a Democrat. Oxley’s staff suggested to industry officials that a congressional probe of the mutual fund industry might ease up if ICI complied. As Drew noted, a Republican now holds the top job at the Investment Company Institute.
The Motion Picture Association of America hired as its new head Dan Glickman, a former Democratic representative from Kansas and secretary of agriculture in the Clinton administration, and the Republicans punished the MPAA accordingly.
Republicans had warned the MPAA not to hire a Democrat for the job. After Glickman was hired, House Republicans removed from a pending bill some $1.5 billion in tax relief for the motion picture industry. Norquist told me, “No other industry is interested in taking a $1.5 billion hit to hire a Clinton friend.” After Glickman was selected, the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call reported last year, “Santorum has begun discussing what the consequences are for the movie industry.” Norquist said publicly that the appointment of Glickman was “a studied insult” and the motion picture industry’s “ability to work with the House and the Senate is greatly reduced.” Glickman responded by hiring prominent Republicans, including House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s former spokesman, for major MPAA jobs.
It’s going to get worse.
Despite its effectiveness, “the K Street Project is far from complete,” according to Norquist, who says, “There should be as many Democrats working on K Street representing corporate America as there are Republicans working in organized labor — and that number is close to zero.” He wants the project to include not just the top jobs in K Street firms, but “all of them — including secretaries.”
It’s times like these that the Republican machine in Washington more closely resembles an organized crime family than a governing political party. This gang isn’t just corrupt; it’s taken legal corruption to a masterful level.