NEW FARA ADVISORY OPINIONS FOCUS ON NONPROFITS: The Justice Department this week released another batch of Foreign Agents Registration Act advisory opinions, several of which touched on the FARA statute’s exemption for nonprofits, think tanks, charitable organizations, and academic and religious institutions, an issue rarely addressed by the letters, which guide lawyers advising lobbyists on whether or not they need to register as foreign agents. — Taken with DOJ’s plans to offer up new FARA regulations, the focus on nonprofit activity in the latest batch of opinions signals that “the Justice Department does not appear inclined to carve out — at this time — exceptions for nonprofits as a group,” Brandon Van Grack, a former head of the FARA Unit now a the law firm Morrison & Foerster, said in an interview. “I think the big takeaway is that there is no special treatment for nonprofits.” — In one opinion, FARA Chief Jennifer Gellie concluded that the vice president for government relations of a foreign university was not exempted from registering under FARA because the person’s duties include conducting “outreach and advocacy” to U.S. officials “to promote [foreign university]’s mission, goals, and financial priorities.” Part of the role also includes seeking grant money from the U.S. government, which Gellie also determined constitutes political activities under the law and not “only … activities in furtherance of bona fide . . . scholastic [or] academic pursuits,” which triggers the exemption. — In another opinion , Gellie told a nonprofit global charity organization headquartered in a foreign country that it is obligated to register as a foreign agent because the organization seeks to “ increase friendship and goodwill between the [foreign country] and the rest of the world”; because the organization “believes and intends that its actions will influence members of the United States public to view the [foreign country] in a positive light and, thus, ultimately foster beneficial U.S. foreign policies in regards to the [foreign country]”; and because the president of the country selects the organization’s chairperson. — The opinions released this week didn’t all land in favor of registration, though. In a third opinion, Gellie determined that a university professor did not meet the requirements to register for providing what the professor described as an “independent analysis of issues of international law within your areas of expertise.” In an analysis of the advisory opinions, the law and lobbying firm Covington & Burling noted that this opinion “did not reach the academic exemption, instead concluding that the professor’s activity did not meet any of the FARA-enumerated activities.” — Van Grack noted that there is still uncertainty surrounding nonprofits’ obligations to register under FARA in certain situations, in part because DOJ is wary of creating exceptions that foreign governments and organizations could exploit, but argued that on the whole there was “nothing in the content of the analysis that necessarily jumped out as surprising” or that broke new ground. — Still, “these interpretations of the exemption should prompt nonprofits and other organizations relying on the academic exemption to consider whether registration may be required,” the Covington & Burling memo concludes. ANNALS OF AFGHANISTAN LOBBYING: “A top Washington lobbying shop has agreed to represent the U.S. parent company of a major Afghan telecom alleged by three former employees and four former senior Afghan government officials to have paid money and extended other favors to the Taliban as they fought a bloody insurgency over the last 20 years,” Daniel reports this afternoon. — “S-3 Group filed a lobbying disclosure Nov. 1 that it now represents Telephone Systems International, the holding company for Afghan Wireless, one of the largest mobile telephone operators in the country. The document, required by U.S. law, states three of its lobbyists — John Scofield, Jose Ceballos and Michael Long — will lobby on ‘access to wireless communication in Afghanistan.’” — “TSI would not specifically say why it hired S-3, but in order to operate legally in the U.S. and continue to do business in Afghanistan, the company has to undergo a thorough Treasury application process.” The hiring “highlights the dilemma of how to engage with Afghanistan after the Taliban’s victory,” as “analysts who follow the Afghan economy acknowledge that most telecom companies paid ‘taxes’ to the Taliban in order to operate in militant-controlled areas of the country as it waged an insurgency against the democratically elected government.” ‘TELEHEALTH CLIFF’ DRAWS LOBBYING FROM NONTRADITIONAL PLAYERS: “Ahead of an election-year spending showdown, lobbying efforts to make telehealth services more widely available are in overdrive,” POLITICO’s Megan Wilson and Ben Leonard report. — “In all, 485 entities listed lobbying on telehealth issues on disclosure forms in 2021, according to a POLITICO analysis, more than three times the number in 2019, before the coronavirus spread through the United States, forcing millions to turn to virtual medical care.” — “‘What happened is America kind of woke up, as well as, frankly, the lobbying stakeholders kind of woke up almost overnight, and said, “We don't want to lose this. This has become embedded in the way we deliver care,”’ said Dean Rosen, a partner at lobbying firm Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas who works on telehealth issues. ‘That's why you're seeing so many new folks lobbying on this.’” — “In 2021, disparate companies like tech giant Apple, defense behemoth Lockheed Martin, dairy cooperative Land O’Lakes and Zoom, the video platform that’s become ubiquitous with the Covid-19 pandemic, are pressing Congress to continue telehealth rules that helped expand access. And others already in the space increased their lobbying: For example, virtual health care company Teladoc spent $400,000 on lobbying in 2021, 60 percent more than it did in 2020, according to the analysis.” DON’T CALL IT A COMEBACK: “Declan Kelly, once a prominent adviser to Fortune 500 chief executives, has made a discreet comeback — just months after he was forced to quit Teneo, the public relations firm he co-founded, following allegations of sexual harassment,” the Financial Times’ James Fontanella-Khan, Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson and Arash Massoudi report. — “The 54-year-old has launched a new Madison Avenue-based company called Consello that focuses on investing, merchant banking, corporate development and mergers and acquisitions, according to the firm’s bare-bones website, which makes no mention of Kelly’s involvement.” — “Since he quit as chief executive of Teneo in June, Kelly had been operating under the radar for a handful of big clients, including Intel, according to two people briefed on his plans.” Kelly’s “attempt to engineer a revival comes less than a year since the Financial Times revealed allegations of his drunken misconduct at a Global Citizen fundraiser, which prompted him to relinquish his board seat at the charity and resign from Teneo. Consello, which means ‘advice’ in Galician, was formed in July last year, just a fortnight after Kelly left Teneo, according to company registration documents.” INTEL TAPS NEW TOP LOBBYIST: Intel has brought on Sarah Kemp as vice president of international government affairs, leading the company’s global government relations operations. Kemp was most recently associate vice president and head of global women’s health policy and ESG strategy at the health care company Organon , and is a Commerce and State department alum. Part of Kemp’s charge for the chipmaker will be to align the company’s “overall public policy positions across a range of fast-moving, business-critical areas, such as manufacturing, intellectual property, geopolitical strategy and transformative technologies like cloud, IoT and AI,” according to a press release. SPOTTED Wednesday night at a welcome reception for new BGR Group senior vice president Ret. Col. Dan Greenwood: BGR’s Haley Barbour, Jeff Shockey of Raytheon, Marc Short, former Ex-Im Bank CEO Kimberly Reed, Luke Murry of Marvell, and Shahira Knight of Deloitte. CORRECTION: Wednesday’s Influence misstated SAG-AFTRA’s roster of outside lobbyists. The union has retained Atlas Advocacy since 2019.
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