LegiStorm

Flynn Intel Group, headed by Mike Flynn, Donald Trump's most prominent national security adviser, has enlisted the help of a boutique lobbying firm in its continued work representing a low-profile Dutch company.

According to the filing, SGR LLC is advising Flynn Intel Group "on U.S. domestic and foreign policy" and lists Inovo BV as an affiliated organization. Earlier this fall, Flynn Intel Group first disclosed its "organization consulting" work with Inovo, a Dutch company with no online presence and apparently not related to a similarly named egg-testing company. As LegiStorm reported then, the company's identity and purpose are unclear.

Sphere Consulting created SGR as a sister company in 2014. Sphere was founded and is managed by Jim Courtovich, a former adviser to Senate Republicans.

If this were a typical election year, an estimated 19 of the current crop of more than 60 outgoing members of Congress would be setting themselves up with jobs in lobbying. But with Donald Trump being elected president, this is no ordinary election year. 

As a part of his plan to "drain the swamp" of Washington politics, Trump has proposed ethics reforms that would extend the moratorium from one year to five for outgoing members and ex-congressional staffers looking to lobby their former chambers of employment. And he has vowed to tighten the loopholes that allow members to avoid registering as lobbyists.

Since 2001, 29.4 percent of outgoing congressional members and delegates have registered as federal lobbyists, according to LegiStorm's analysis. If this year's class of outgoing members join K Street at the same rate, as many as 19 will have to delay lobbying by an additional four years, likely leading to a decrease in the long-term proportion of members who make their way through the revolving door.

As part of the lobbying firm's expansion of its health-policy division, Cavarocchi Ruscio Dennis Associates has picked up Rep. Joyce Beatty's (D-Ohio) legislative correspondent, who worked with the congresswoman on health care, among other issues.

David Eaton, who had worked for Beatty since 2014, joins the firm as a health policy associate.

CRD, whose recent clients include Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the American Brain Tumor Association and the Academy of Radiology Research, already had a robust relationship with the health-care industry when the firm announced the expansion of its health-care policy work in late October.

The Federation of State Medical Boards has given Rep. Steve Israel's (D-N.Y.) press secretary a clean bill of health. 

Joe Knickrehm, who joined Israel's office from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2014, is now the non-profit's communications and public affairs manager. 

The trade association, which represents 70 state medical and osteopathic boards around the country, has reported spending at least $590,000 on lobbying so far this year, on medical issues ranging from interstate compact legislation to tele-medicine regulation.

Harley-Davidson is riding into town — with a lobbyist.

The company's first in-house lobbyist comes seven years after the company hit the brakes on its federal advocacy, ending its contract with lobbying firm Steptoe & Johnson in 2009. The company's subsidiary, Harley-Davidson Financial Services, has lobbied through Peck Madigan Jones since 2009.

April Canter, who previously spent five years as a lobbyist for the American Nurses Association, joins Harley as its government affairs manager. She previously lobbied for the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and served as a staff assistant to former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Her husband is former White House photographer David Bohrer.

Harley Davidson's current lobbying issues include the Recognizing the Protection of Motorsports Act of 2016, which would amend the Clean Air Act to modify air-emission rules for competition vehicles, and the Military Lending Act.