Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

1. Super PAC profile: Pro-Perry Make Us Great Again has ties to former staff, major donor

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Jan 5, 2012 3:20 p.m.

   One of the highest spending super PACs so far, the pro-Rick Perry Make Us Great Again is headed by the Texas governor’s former chief of staff Mike Toomey.   A Texas lobbyist, Toomey is a longtime friend and confidant of Perry's who was behind Perry’s switch in party affiliation in 1985 after he was elected to the Texas legislature. He has a reputation of being Perry's “enforcer.”

   Read all about it

2. Bank executives plead case to administration officials over Volcker rule

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Oct 24, 2011 12:32 p.m.

   Top executives with major banks met regularly with federal agency officials who were writing a draft rule meant to curtail risky Wall Street trading — known popularly as the Volcker rule, named for the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Paul Volcker — federal agency meeting records show.

   Read all about it

3. Super committee related issues feature in hundreds of lobbying reports

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Oct 24, 2011 11:23 a.m.

   K Street firms got little respite this past quarter, between lobbying on the debt ceiling early in the summer and then quickly shifting their focus to the "super committee," recently released lobbying reports show.

   Read all about it

4. Super committee member Van Hollen doubles campaign cash intake over last quarter

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Oct 18, 2011 11:19 a.m.

   The campaign of super committee member Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., took in more than twice as much money in the third quarter of 2011 as it did in the second, newly released Federal Election Commission records show. Overall, two of the six House members of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction--popularly known as the "super committee"--reported increased fundraising totals in the third quarter.

   Read all about it

5. Dodd Frank: How rating agencies contributed to the financial crisis

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Aug 18, 2011 9:56 a.m.

   The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, passed in response to the financial crisis of 2008, added new regulations and new regulators for some—but not all—of the institutions whose actions led to the crisis. Over the next several days, we’ll be taking a look at each of the major groups of contributors to the economic crisis, who the major players were, what political influence they brought to bear on Congress and regulators, how Dodd-Frank intends to regulate them, and, using our new Dodd-Frank Meeting Logs tool, what rules these groups are trying to influence as agencies implement the legislation.

   Read all about it

6. Becerra, Clyburn, Van Hollen are House Dem Picks for Super Committee

   By Nancy Watzman and Anupama Narayanswamy Aug 11, 2011 5:11 p.m.

   House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has tapped three close allies who are on powerful House committees to serve on the Joint Special Committee to find new ways of cutting the budget to roll back the national deficit. Her picks are: Reps, Chris Van Hollen from Maryland, James Clyburn from South Carolina, and Xavier Bacerra from California.

   Read all about it

7. Report: Reid names Murray, Baucus and Kerry to Super Committee

   By Nancy Watzman and Anupama Narayanswamy Aug 9, 2011 5:58 p.m.

   Politico is reporting that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., plans to nominate Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., as the co-chair to the special joint committee convened to propose reductions in the debt, and Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and John Kerry, D-Mass., as his other picks. The announcement of picks to what has been dubbed the super committee will be formally announced on Wednesday.

   Read all about it

8. “Super Congress”: industry ties to some possible picks

   By Nancy Watzman and Anupama Narayanswamy Aug 3, 2011 10:17 a.m.

   With President Obama’s signature on the bill to raise the debt ceiling, congressional leaders now have 14 days to select the lawmakers who will quickly become the most lobbied politicians in town: the “Super Congress” of twelve lawmakers, six Democrats and six Republicans from both chambers who will be charged with the task of finding $1.5 trillion in cuts or revenue to lower the deficit. Nobody knows yet who will take on this task, but it’s a sure bet that whoever it is will already be in debt themselves -- to the lobbyists and industries who fund their campaigns and who have a huge stake in the outcome of the deal. That debt will only grow bigger as monied interests use all the tricks of their trade to influence the deal.

   Read all about it

9. Special interests lobby on the debt ceiling

   By Anupama Narayanswamy Jul 20, 2011 6:07 p.m.

   As Congress and the White House continue to search for a mechanism to raise the debt ceiling (the Senate "gang of six" have offered a new plan to end the deadlock), some of the biggest spending-special interests in the country are weighing in on the issue, according to a search of new lobbying disclosure records that are being released today.

   Read all about it

10. Lobbyists swarm agencies as Dodd-Frank is implemented

    By Anupama Narayanswamy Jul 19, 2011 11:34 a.m.

    Throughout the last Congress, which adopted far-reaching reforms of the financial sector through the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, there were an average of 577 clients lobbying on issues related to the act. Eventually some 1,172 clients—including banks, ratings agencies, investment banks, securities firms and a host of other interests with a stake in the legislation—listed Dodd-Frank or related issues on their lobbying disclosure forms. And in 2011, lobbyists for some 488 clients are still lobbying on the bill, according to the most recent data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

    Read all about it

11. Upstate New York race sees the first of the outside spending this cycle

    By Anupama Narayanswamy May 19, 2011 11:12 a.m.

    The May 24 special House election in upstate New York is attracting the first slew of outside spending in the current election cycle. Party committees and other nonprofit groups have spent more than $1.88 million on this race so far.

    Read all about it

12. Mexican government hires lobbyists, lawyer to help nationals facing capital punishment

    By Anupama Narayanswamy May 12, 2011 2:45 p.m.

    The Mexican consulate in Tuscon hired Arizona-based lawyer Gregory Kuykendall  for legal service and advice for Mexican nationals charged with crimes that could lead to a death sentence and for those already sentenced, recently filed disclosures under the Foreign Agents Registration Act filing show.

    Read all about it

13. Update on House disbursements: A few notes on how to use the data

    By Anupama Narayanswamy Mar 24, 2011 1:56 p.m.

    We've received a few calls about the House disbursements data we published, questioning the total amount spent by various offices. The House Committee on Administration provides two sets of numbers: summary numbers for each office's spending by quarter, including a grand total and a breakdown by category, and detailed files listing every disbursement reported for that quarter. There is a discrepancy between the totals reported in the summary section and the totals arrived at by adding all of the individual disbursements reported in the detail view of our downloadable data. Despite the discrepancy, a review of the data shows that both sets of numbers are accurate, as far as they go.

    Read all about it

14. House Members, Committees and Offices Spend $1.36 Billion in 2010

    By Anupama Narayanswamy Mar 21, 2011 10:21 a.m.

    In 2010, members, committees and other offices of the U.S. House of Representatives spent more than $1.36 billion on salaries, benefits, office equipment, travel, consultants and other expenses. Of that, the largest expense--about $1 billion--was for salaries and benefits, followed by spending on rent and communication costs, technology and related maintenance costs.

    Read all about it

Investigations by Sunlight Foundation reporter Anupama Narayanswamy