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Presented by General Motors: Delivered daily, Influence gives you a comprehensive rundown and analysis of all lobby hires and news on K Street. | | | | | |  | | By Caitlin Oprysko | | | With Daniel Lippman ROYCE REGISTERS AS A SAUDI FOREIGN AGENT: Former Rep. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) has added another foreign government to his lobbying resume, his third foreign client in less than two months. Royce, once the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who now lobbies for Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, will join the firm’s team representing Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to a new filing with the Justice Department, to “facilitate meetings with federal government officials either via phone or email on behalf of” the ministry. — Brownstein has represented the ministry going back to 2016, DOJ filings show, and was paid around $1.8 million for its work on the kingdom’s behalf over the past year, according to a March filing with the department. — Royce has added several new foreign clients this summer. Toward the end of June, a Brownstein team including Royce signed former Libyan interior minister Fathi Bashaghi, who plans to seek Libya’s presidency in its December elections, to help promote “free and fair elections” in the country, but the contract was terminated weeks after it was signed. Royce registered in July to perform similar services for Congolese opposition leader Moise Katumbi as a subcontractor to King & Spalding. He also represents the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Korean Embassy, the Liberia Maritime Authority and the Liberian International Ship & Corporate Registry. — Lara Day, a spokesperson for Brownstein, said in an interview that there was nothing behind the timing of Royce joining the Saudi account, but added that his background and expertise as the top Republican on the Foreign Affairs panel was appealing to the client. Good afternoon and welcome to PI. Send lobbying tips: coprysko@politico.com. And be sure to follow me on Twitter: @caitlinoprysko. | | A message from General Motors: Driving the future of America: From designing the revolutionary new Ultium Platform to the first electric vehicles it will power, General Motors is investing billions not just in EVs and AVs, but in American manufacturing itself. | | | CHAMBER REGISTERS OPPOSITION TO SCOTUS EXPANSION: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has weighed in with President Joe Biden ’s commission on Supreme Court reforms, urging Biden to opt against expanding the number of justices on the bench, a move that liberals have pushed for for years. In her 10-page comment, submitted late last week, Chamber chief executive Suzanne Clark lays out past historical attempts to institute major reforms to the court’s makeup, including former President John Adams’ so-called midnight judges and former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ’s attempt at packing the courts to help enact New Deal programs, both of which ended poorly. — The “historical record counsels against any significant legislative changes to the Supreme Court without first going to the greatest lengths to ensure both the perception and the reality that the changes are neutral responses to long-term problems of judicial administration rather than the product of short-term political agendas,” Clark charged, noting that the Chamber was weighing in because as a voice for the business community in Washington, “an important function of the U.S. Chamber is to represent the interests of our members on issues regarding the rule of law, upon which the well-being of the nation and of its private sector depend.” She called on Biden and other political leaders “to reaffirm their predecessors’ unwillingness to achieve fleeting political or policy gains by sacrificing the integrity and independence of institutions envied around the world.” — Another public comment submitted to the commission that caught PI’s eye: The National Federation of Independent Business , which represents small businesses, wrote to the commission in June that “no valid reason exists to increase the number of justices” on the court. “America's small businesses depend on courts to provide stability and predictability in adjudication under the law,” executive vice president and general counsel David Addington wrote. He chastised those who would turn the high court “into a political football,” arguing that the court’s makeup hinging upon which political party prevails in a given election “would destroy the stability and predictability an effective free market economy requires. It would also destroy public confidence in courts, an essential element of a peaceful democracy.” The commission is accepting public comments until November. | | | | INTRODUCING OTTAWA PLAYBOOK : Join the growing community of Politicos — from lawmakers and leaders to pollsters, staffers, strategists and lobbyists — working to shape Canada’s future. Every day, our reporting team pulls back the curtain to shed light on what’s really driving the agenda on Parliament Hill, the true players who are shaping politics and policy across Canada, and the impact it all has on the world. Don’t miss out on your daily look inside Canadian politics and power. Subscribe to Ottawa Playbook today. | | | | | NEW BUSINESS: The advocacy group Guarding Against Pandemics has hired lobby shop Van Scoyoc Associates, as it ramps up a push to get $30 billion of pandemic preparedness funding included in Democrats’ reconciliation package, POLITICO’s Megan Wilson reports in Morning Pulse. Van Scoyoc is the group’s first outside lobbying hire, and comes as the $3.5 trillion package faces intensifying resistance from centrist Democrats. — “We’re not going to let up on this, we’re in it for the long haul,” Gabe Bankman-Fried, a former Hill aide and the group’s founder, told Megan. “We really want to — and have been — building a presence in D.C., a real advocacy for pandemic preparedness writ large.” — “Bankman-Fried founded the organization last year, with the backing of private funders, including his brother, cryptocurrency billionaire and Biden donor Sam Bankman-Fried ,” Megan reports. The group “has since spent big on advertising, shelling out $278,000 to urge lawmakers, including Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), to back the $30 billion pandemic preparedness allocation — and thanking others, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who already do. The group also launched a PAC this summer, with plans to contribute to candidates who support efforts to head off future health crises.” HOW MUCH FOREIGN AGENTS GAVE IN LAST YEAR’S ELECTION: “More than $33.5 million in individual political contributions came from foreign agents and lobbyists during the 2020 election,” OpenSecrets’ Anna Massoglia reports. Of that total, foreign agents registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act gave $8.5 million during the 2020 cycle, while another $25 million came from representatives of foreign clients and U.S. subsidiaries registered under the domestic Lobbying Disclosure Act. — The amounts include “all of foreign agents’ 2020 individual contributions to federal-level campaigns as well as outside groups like political action committees and super PACs that are registered with the FEC. PACs affiliated with firms of registered foreign agents contributed even more.” While foreign nationals “are prohibited by federal law from making contributions to political groups or campaigns to influence U.S. elections,” they “can hire foreign agents or lobbyists to advocate for their interests in the U.S. and lobbyists who are U.S. citizens are able to make political contributions, even to the same lawmakers they may be lobbying on behalf of foreign clients.” BOEBERT DISCLOSES HUSBAND’S CONSULTING WORK: “Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert’s husband made $478,000 last year working as a consultant for an energy firm, information that was not disclosed during Boebert’s congressional campaign and only reported in her financial disclosure forms filed this week,” per The Associated Press’ Nicholas Riccardi. — “In paperwork filed with the House of Representatives on Tuesday, the Republican congresswoman reported that her husband, Jayson Boebert, received the money as a consultant to ‘Terra Energy Productions ’ in 2020, and earned $460,000 as a consultant for the firm in 2019. Boebert did not report the income last year, when she stunned the political world by ousting incumbent Rep. Scott Tipton during the GOP primary in Colorado’s sprawling 3rd district, which stretches from ski resorts to energy-rich basins in the state’s west.” Boebert’s previous filing mentioned “‘Boebert Consulting — spouse’ on the candidate form, but listed her husband’s income source as ‘N/A,’” according to the AP. EXTREME MAKEOVER: UNION EDITION?: “The AFL-CIO on Friday is expected to name former President Richard Trumka’s No. 2, Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler, to finish out his term, a choice that members of the federation say will carry on the late president’s agenda and, they hope, the labor movement’s renewed momentum ,” POLITICO’s Rebecca Rainey reports. “But behind the scenes, Trumka’s sudden and unexpected death earlier this month has forced AFL-CIO officials to consider uncomfortable questions about the future of the movement and how it can reverse its eroding membership — discussions that many expected to confront in years, not months.” | | | |   | | | | | | — Matthew Berry has joined Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld as a partner in the communications and information technology section of its regulatory practice. He was previously general counsel and chief of staff to former FCC Chair Ajit Pai. — DonorsTrust announced three new hires: Carolyn Bolton is the communications and marketing manager and was previously a senior content specialist for a public-affairs firm in northern Virginia. Chris Bohn is a senior accountant and previously managed accounting operations at the Leadership Institute and is a Heritage Foundation and Jack Kemp alum. Gregory Conko is the senior director of programs and was previously a senior fellow and then executive director at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. — Molly Mitchell is joining Bully Pulpit Interactive to lead the firm’s marketing and external communications, per Playbook. She most recently was states press secretary at the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, and is a 2018 DCCC and Axios alum. — Jeremy Kessel is joining Reddit after nearly 12 years at Twitter, where he was most recently senior director for global legal policy. | | | None. | | | Coalition of Minority Business Owners (Super PAC)
HUMANITY FORWARD INC PAC (MOVE HUMANITY FORWARD PAC) (PAC)
Women for Liberty and Justice for All (PAC) | | New Lobbying Registrations | | Holland & Knight LLP: Walton County, Ga
Kasowitz Benson Torres LLP: Talen Energy
Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas, Inc.: Papierfabrik August Koehler Se
Mickenberg, Dunn & Smith, Plc: American Kratom Association
Mlj Strategies: Ankura Consulting Group, LLC On Behalf Of Target Corp.
Mlj Strategies: Ankura Consulting Group, LLC On Behalf Of Thorne Research
The Vogel Group: Refraction Asset Management Ltd.
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