Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

1. After massive US lobbying press, Turkey open to direct talks with Armenia

   By Luke Rosiak Sep 2, 2009 5:08 p.m.

   A diplomatic breakthrough in the longstanding feud between Turkey and Armenia puts a renewed focus on the United States' role in that dispute last year. Turkey mounted the largest foreign lobbying effort of 2008 in order to deter the U.S. Congress from declaring events in that part of the world 85 years prior as a genocide. The lobbying onslaught appeared to have worked, we've written on our Foreign Lobbyist Influence Tracker, but under an agreement floated this week, the Wall Street Journal reports today, the countries have taken steps to open relations while agreeing to mount a joint historical investigation into the deaths, which numbered as high as 1.5 million.

   Read all about it

2. Informant in tiny nation toppled decades of banking secrecy

   By Luke Rosiak Aug 31, 2009 12:35 p.m.

   Swiss mega-bank UBS has dominated recent headlines with its reluctant release of a subset of the list of Americans using the accounts, long shrouded in secrecy, to avoid paying taxes to the US.

   Read all about it

3. "Man without a country" peddles international influence through tangled ties

   By Luke Rosiak Aug 26, 2009 5 p.m.

   None of the former officials who have signed up to lobby the U.S. government for foreign interests--a list that includes presidential nominees (Bob Dole) and congressional leaders (Richard Gephardt, Dick Armey)--has a resume as offbeat as that of Ari Ben-Menashe, a former Israeli spy who later tried to implicate the opponent of the president of Zimbabwe in an assassination attempt and now considers himself a "man without a country." He also had one of the richest contracts to lobby for a foreign client--though he apparently had no contacts with U.S. government officials whatsoever.

   Read all about it

4. Bush DOJ emails: "30% approval makes it a lot harder to push back, unfortunately."

   By Luke Rosiak Aug 18, 2009 2:51 p.m.

   Internal Bush Administration emails released by the Senate Judiciary Committee lend some insight into the culture of political operatives, administration officials and the space in between during the Department of Justice's replacement of U.S. Attorneys and subsequent investigation.

   Read all about it

5. The $333 Million Grant That Wasn't

   By Luke Rosiak Aug 6, 2009 7:21 p.m.
   Read all about it

6. With objection period on contract over, board will release contract

   By Luke Rosiak Jul 22, 2009 6:30 p.m.

   Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Read all about it

7. Less than three percent Palin's itemized PAC contributions from Alaskans

   By Luke Rosiak Jul 22, 2009 5:19 p.m.

   Less than three percent of the itemized money raised by resigning Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's leadership PAC came from Alaskans, newly filed campaign finance reports show. SarahPAC reported raising more than $730,000 in the last six months--less than half of the $1.6 million raised by Mitt Romney's PAC.

   Read all about it

8. PMA Group is gone, but earmark influence persists

   By Luke Rosiak Jul 9, 2009 8:36 p.m.

   While the dozen members of Congress most favored by contributions from PMA Group continued to request earmarks for the defunct firm's clients, two other lobby shops--Alcalde & Fay and Innovative Federal Strategies--appear to have had even more success in procuring earmark requests for fiscal year 2010 from the PMA top twelve.

   Read all about it

9. Open notebook: Following stimulus contracts

   By Luke Rosiak Jun 29, 2009 8:55 p.m.

   Recovery.gov might not be useful yet for "following every penny" of stimulus spending, but with a telephone, Google, USASpending.gov and some luck it might not be that hard. Pretty much at random, I picked out a bunch of congressional press releases touting stimulus dollars going to local communities, and started making calls. Here's some notes on where one inquiry led me.

   Read all about it

10. Campaign Software Makers All About Disclosure, Except their Own

    By Luke Rosiak Jun 17, 2009 4:26 p.m.

    NGP Software, a leading provider of software for electronically disclosing campaign contributions to the Federal Election Commission, is striving to keep its long-running legal battle with a competitor, Aristotle International, under wraps. In August 2005, plaintiff Aristotle filed suit against NGP alleging unfair business practices, claiming that the firm falsely advertised as serving only Democrats while selling an identical product at a heavy discount to political action committees that supported Republicans.

    Read all about it

Investigations by Sunlight Foundation reporter Luke Rosiak