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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Oct. 2, 2023
Last month, Congressional Black Caucus members traveled to Israel to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before continuing to Rwanda - a trip that represents some of the highest-ever spending by an interest group on private congressional travel. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on May 23, 2022
Interest groups are making up for lost time, spending on private congressional travel at the highest election-year rate since 2014. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Feb. 4, 2021
A GOP staffer has traded his extensive Middle East policy experience for a job with the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Jan. 6, 2020
Privately financed trips for members of Congress and their staff hit a 13-year high in 2019, thanks to record spending on travel to Israel. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Sept. 9, 2019
One out of seven representatives spent part of the August recess traveling to Israel, thanks to a private sponsor that dropped more than $1.45 million on the trip. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Aug. 5, 2019
Travel by Republicans has made up more than two-thirds of all privately sponsored congressional trips in 2019, thanks largely to one sponsor. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Jan. 28, 2019
Privately sponsored congressional trips to Israel hit a ten-year low last year, thanks to one influential group shying away from paying for election-year travel. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Jan. 16, 2018
Congressional members and staff sure wanted to escape Washington last year — and private travel sponsors spent the most money since 2005 helping them do just that. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Sept. 13, 2017
If Democrats and Republicans in Congress agreed on one thing this August, it was the importance of traveling to Israel. They just couldn't agree to travel together. read more
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Posted by Keturah Hetrick on March 20, 2017
Staff for at least half a dozen freshman members of Congress have already made their first overseas voyages courtesy of interest groups, and it may come as little surprise to Congress watchers that those trips were all to Israel. read more
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Posted by J. Todd Foster on March 18, 2016
Hillary Clinton is slated to speak at AIPAC's annual policy conference, which begins this weekend. Her Democratic opponent, Bernie Sanders, is not. read more
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Posted by Steve Shapiro on Oct. 27, 2015
The former legislative director for Rep. Grace Meng (D-N.Y.) has made the schlep from the Hill to K Street to take a position with AIPAC. read more
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Posted by Steve Shapiro on Oct. 16, 2015
A visit to Israel by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and his wife last month was the third most expensive privately financed trip a member has taken in the last 15 years. read more
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Posted by Steve Shapiro on Oct. 8, 2015
Rep. Jan Schakowsky's (D-Ill.) search for a new staffer this month has led her down J Street. read more
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Posted by Nate Hoffman on Aug. 28, 2014
August might be the perfect time to visit Aspen or Paris, but a handful of members instead chose to visit a battle zone: Israel. read more
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Posted by Katie Barrows on March 11, 2014
One lawmaker might have had a classic joke in mind - "Take my mother-in-law... please!" - with his latest overseas voyage. read more
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Posted by Katie Barrows on Feb. 3, 2014
Lawmakers and their staff broke a record for taking the most privately funded trips since 2007, when reforms came into effect after a major lobbying scandal. read more
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Posted by Nate Hoffman on Dec. 23, 2013
In his first six years in the Senate, Jon Tester (D-Mont.) never reported taking a single trip sponsored by private interests but he made his first one memorable. Last week, he reported his first trip, and a fairly momentous one at that. Tester, along with his wife Sharla and aide Jorge Rueda, traveled to Israel from Nov. 21-27, coincidentally just as the United States signed a nuclear deal with Iran. read more
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Posted by Katie Barrows on Sept. 23, 2013
U.S. lawmakers traveled this August in record numbers for the post-Abramoff era, with travelers jetting to such far-flung locales as China, Tanzania and Israel. read more
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Posted by Katie Barrows on Aug. 20, 2013
A group closely affiliated with the top pro-Israel lobby may have spent as much as $1 million or more this month to send members of Congress and top aides to Israel.The trip by the American Israel Education Foundation follows in a well-established tradition of lavishing attention on members of Congress, particularly freshmen who are getting their first look at the region. read more
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Posted by Garrett Snedeker on June 29, 2012
Chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), didn't have to travel outside her home state to speak at a private conference in December. However, she did neglect to file a trip disclosure from the event until now, more than five months late. read more
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Posted by Daimon Eklund on March 29, 2012
Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) didn't take a privately financed trip for his first two and a half years in office, but a personal tour of Israel appears to have been too good to pass up. read more
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Posted by LegiStorm on Jan. 26, 2012
Private interests spent a record amount to send members of Congress and their staff on trips on 2011, and the individual trips were longer and costlier than ever before.There were 1,600 privately funded congressional trips in 2011, worth a total of more than $5.8 million, the largest amount since ethics reforms were enacted in 2007 in the wake of the Jack Abramoff scandal. The total amount is the highest since 2005, when a record 4,917 trips were taken totaling $9.9 million. The record for money spent came in 2004, when 4,780 trips cost nearly $10.4 million. read more
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Posted by LegiStorm on Nov. 21, 2011
Congressional trips to Israel are now being sponsored by a new organization, this one whose leader who speaks often about modern Israel in Biblical prophecy. read more
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Posted by LegiStorm on Aug. 10, 2011
Nearly 20 percent of all members of the House of Representatives will travel to Israel this month courtesy of the American Israel Eduction Foundation (AIEF), according to the Washington Post. read more
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Posted by LegiStorm on March 1, 2011
Lawmakers and their staff took fewer privately-financed trips in 2010 than any other year since LegiStorm started tracking the data, but the average cost of those trips rose to its highest point. read more
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Posted by LegiStorm on Feb. 24, 2010
Despite last year's bitter partisan spats, it seems there was at least one area where Republicans and Democrats saw eye-to-eye -- free trips to Israel. read more
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Posted by Daimon Eklund on Sept. 28, 2009
A pro-Israel lobbying group has found a loophole in the rules limiting the ability of lobbying groups to pay for congressional travel - a loophole large enough that they are one of the leading sponsors of such travel. read more
