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Caught Our Eye items are posted daily. LegiStorm Pro subscribers have access to all posts a few hours before other users, and are also able to search the full Caught Our Eye archive. Log in as a LegiStorm Pro user or learn more about subscribing.

Buchanan LD leaves for pharmaceutical industry

Posted by Andy Gottlieb on Nov. 9, 2023

A top staffer for Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.) has moved to the U.S. subsidiary of a Japanese drugmaker. 

Aaron Bill is now associate director for government affairs and public policy at Daiichi Sankyo Inc. He most recently served as legislative director and health counsel for Buchanan and previously worked for Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) and Reps. Phil Roe (R-Tenn.) and Steve Chabot (R-Ohio), among many Republicans during his combined decade-plus career on the Hill.

Bill's wife followed a similar path. After serving as chief of staff for Rep. Larry Bucshon (R-Ind.), Teresa Buckley Bill moved to the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America in 2017. She is now senior director for government affairs at Gilead Sciences Inc.

Trickster Burkman brings home the bacon, thanks to mysterious "solar company"

Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Nov. 7, 2023

Despite a felony guilty plea, right-wing trickster and conspiracy theorist Jack Burkman just had his most lucrative lobbying period since the Obama administration - if you can believe his reporting.

Burkman's lobbying firm, J.M. Burkman & Associates, disclosed at least $493,000 in income from 40 clients during the third quarter, according to the firm's disclosures. That's the firm's highest federal lobbying income since 2015, when J.M. Burkman & Associates brought in $555,000 in Q1.

In Q3, $330,000 - two-thirds of the firm's reported income - came from a single client, PJM Power Ventures. According to filings, Burkman has brought in a total of $430,000 from PJM Power Ventures since signing the organization as a lobbying client in March.

In a disclosure from earlier this year, J.M. Burkman & Associates described PJM Power Ventures as "a solar company," though the New York address listed for the entity does not appear to exist. No trace of a company with that name seems to exist on the internet outside of Burkman's lobbying filings. It is unclear if PJM Power Ventures is related in any way to energy-transmission company PJM Interconnection, whose CEO is a Biden appointee to an energy advisory panel.

The firm's purported work for PJM Power Ventures focuses on Department of Energy issues and congressional solar power issues, per a filing from last month.

Burkman and fellow lobbyist Jacob Wohl pleaded guilty last year to felony telecommunications fraud for their part in a robocall voter-suppression scheme against Black voters. Both Burkman and Wohl are also known for their attempts to frame Robert Mueller, Pete Buttigieg and Anthony Fauci for sexual assault.

In March, a federal judge ruled against the pair in a New York lawsuit related to the robocall scheme. Criminal charges in Michigan are pending. The Federal Communications Commission fined the pair more than $5 million in June.

Amid his guilty plea in 2022 Q4, Burkman's firm made $148,000 in lobbying revenue. In 2020 Q1, before the robocall incident, J.M. Burkman & Associates made $154,000.

Sen. Cassidy adviser heads to Berkshire Hathaway Energy

Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Nov. 1, 2023

Amid the Louisiana delegation's ascent to the one of the most powerful in Congress, a staffer with deep ties to the state has moved to power-distribution holding company Berkshire Hathaway Energy.

Blake Schindler was most recently Sen. Bill Cassidy's (R-La.) policy adviser on energy and the environment, among other legislative issues. Schindler had worked for Cassidy since 2014, when the now-senator was still a representative. Schindler, himself a Louisiana native, is also an alumnus of former Sen. David Vitter (R-La.).

Schindler's long-standing Louisiana ties may prove beneficial in his new role as a director at BHE. With Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) as the House's top two, the state has taken on a greater significance in both chambers.

Ex-Rep. and pardoned felon Duncan Hunter registers as first-time lobbyist

Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Oct. 30, 2023

Former Rep. Duncan D. Hunter (R-Calif.), who resigned from Congress in 2020 after pleading guilty to a felony, has disclosed that he's spent months as a federal lobbyist for a company with longstanding ties to the congressman and his family.

Hunter is lobbying for technology research-and-development firm Trex Enterprises on adoption of "radar on... major airport runways in order to minimize damage and/or loss of life due to [foreign objects] on runways," per a recent filing.

The lobbying work began in March, according to the disclosure, which Hunter filed earlier this month. The Lobbying Disclosure Act requires qualifying lobbyists to disclose any new clients within 45 days of the work's start.

This isn't Hunter's first dealing with Trex. Hunter's uncle reportedly founded the company in 1978 but has since left. The congressman and his father, former Rep. Duncan L. Hunter (R-Calif.), each secured millions of dollars in earmarks for Trex during their respective congressional tenures. And the younger Hunter's campaign accepted over $12,000 in donations from Trex employees from 2007-2014, according to Federal Election Commission data.

In December 2019, Hunter pled guilty to felony misuse of campaign funds and resigned from Congress the following month. He was later pardoned by then-President Donald Trump just two weeks before he was supposed to begin an 11-month prison sentence.

UMich lobbyist finds her way back to Senate Democrats

Posted by Keturah Hetrick on Oct. 26, 2023

A longtime Democratic staffer has returned to the Senate following a brief University of Michigan lobbying stint.

Since leaving her position as federal-relations director for the university, Amanda Beaumont has joined the Appropriations Committee's Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Subcommittee, where she is a professional staff member under subcommittee Chair Tammy Baldwin (R-Wis.).

Beaumont spent a decade with the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee until joining the Univeristy of Michigan at the beginning of this term. She is also an alumna of then-Sens. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) and Al Franken (D-Minn.), as well as a former Alliance for Excellent Education lobbyist.

About Caught Our Eye

We spend a large part of our days looking at data. Documents often come in by the dozens and hundreds. And while most are boring - how interesting can staring at a phone directory or salary records be, for example? - we find daily reasons for interest, amusement or even concern packed in the documents. So we are launching a new running feature that we call "Caught our Eye."

Longer than tweets but shorter than most blog posts, Caught our Eye items will bring back the interest in reviewing documents and researching people. Some items might bring hard, breaking news. Others will raise eyebrows and lead some into further inquiry. Others might be good for a joke or two around the water cooler. All will enlighten about the people or workings of Capitol Hill.

Caught our Eye items will be published each morning for LegiStorm Pro subscribers. Non-Pro site users will be able to receive the news items a few hours later. In addition to having immediate access to the news, LegiStorm Pro users will have a handy way to search and browse all past items.