President Trump promised to drain the special-interest swamp in Washington, but the city’s lobbyists expect boom times ahead as corporate America gears up for a Republican-controlled capital and learns to grapple with a chief executive willing to target individual companies for praise and scorn.
After years of partisan gridlock in Washington, Trump and congressional Republicans are moving to dismantle Obama-era regulations and some of the biggest legislation of the last eight years, including the Affordable Care Act and the so-called Dodd-Frank law that brought new federal oversight of the financial sector after the 2008 financial crisis.
At the same time, Republicans are proposing a raft of their own proposals. Trump, for instance, has promised a $1 trillion plan to rebuild and expand roads and other infrastructure over a decade. House Republicans want to rewrite much of the tax system.
“Suddenly, the possibility of an overhaul of the entire tax code is in play versus years ago when the question was: What can you accomplish in a divided government?” said David Schnittger, a longtime aide to former House Speaker John Boehner and now a spokesman for the public-policy practice at Squire Patton Boggs.
For companies and interest groups, a unified Republican government in Washington marks a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to advance your agenda,” said Matt Johnson, a top Republican lobbyist at the powerhouse Podesta Group.
The frenzied start to the year represents a dramatic turnaround for the lobbying world.
In recent years, the slow pace of legislation on Capitol Hill and the economic downtown that followed the financial crisis, helped slow lobbying activity. The number of registered lobbyists fell significantly — from 14,822 lobbyists in 2007 to just 11,143 in 2016, according to the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics.
“You are going to see spending up this year,” said Paul Miller, a lobbyist who serves as president of the industry’s trade group, the National Institute for Lobbying & Ethics. Miller, whose clients include small businesses and health care and transportation interests, said his “pace has been frenetic” in the first three weeks of the Trump presidency.
After years of partisan gridlock in Washington, Trump and congressional Republicans are moving to dismantle Obama-era regulations and some of the biggest legislation of the last eight years, including the Affordable Care Act and the so-called Dodd-Frank law that brought new federal oversight of the financial sector after the 2008 financial crisis.
At the same time, Republicans are proposing a raft of their own proposals. Trump, for instance, has promised a $1 trillion plan to rebuild and expand roads and other infrastructure over a decade. House Republicans want to rewrite much of the tax system.
“Suddenly, the possibility of an overhaul of the entire tax code is in play versus years ago when the question was: What can you accomplish in a divided government?” said David Schnittger, a longtime aide to former House Speaker John Boehner and now a spokesman for the public-policy practice at Squire Patton Boggs.
For companies and interest groups, a unified Republican government in Washington marks a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to advance your agenda,” said Matt Johnson, a top Republican lobbyist at the powerhouse Podesta Group.
The frenzied start to the year represents a dramatic turnaround for the lobbying world.
In recent years, the slow pace of legislation on Capitol Hill and the economic downtown that followed the financial crisis, helped slow lobbying activity. The number of registered lobbyists fell significantly — from 14,822 lobbyists in 2007 to just 11,143 in 2016, according to the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics.
“You are going to see spending up this year,” said Paul Miller, a lobbyist who serves as president of the industry’s trade group, the National Institute for Lobbying & Ethics. Miller, whose clients include small businesses and health care and transportation interests, said his “pace has been frenetic” in the first three weeks of the Trump presidency.