NEWS CORP ADDS SENATE GOP AIDE: “Media giant News Corp. has hired a new lobbyist to aid its ongoing fight against the country’s largest technology companies,” Bloomberg’s Emily Birnbaum reports. — “Rachel Bissex, a former senior aide on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has garnered a reputation for opposing Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Meta Platforms Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. on Capitol Hill. She’s now News Corp.’s vice president of federal government affairs, the company said on Wednesday night.” — “Bissex previously worked for Senator Lindsey Graham , a South Carolina Republican, and Colorado Republican Representative Ken Buck — two of the Republican party’s most fervent critics of the big tech companies.” — “The move comes as News Corp. and a handful of smaller tech companies gear up for a potential Republican takeover of the House or Senate. News Corp. and Fox Corp., which are both owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch , have stepped up their lobbying push to regulate the tech giants. They’ve targeted Republicans with the message that the companies have accumulated too much power and control over the digital ecosystem.” — “The Bissex hire is part of a broader shakeup of News Corp.’s lobbying operation after longtime global head of government affairs, Toni Bush, retired earlier this year. Bush was replaced by her colleague Todd Thorpe, who now heads the office.” FIRST IN PI — HENSARLING, ATKINS JOIN AFP ADVISORY COUNCIL: Koch-backed political group Americans for Prosperity has tapped several big name conservatives to form a new grassroots advisory council looking to take advantage of changing political winds in Washington come the start of the next Congress. — Initial members of the council will include former Rep. Jeb Hensarling, former SEC Commissioner Paul Atkins, political commentators Guy Benson and Erick Erickson, former Florida House Speaker Jose Oliva and Yancey Bros. Chair Jim Stephenson, who will help the group advance its grassroots influence — just as Republicans are set to sweep into power in Congress again atop a wave of various economic concerns that AFP sees as an opportunity for growth. MCCARTHY FLOATS A SHAKEUP AT THE CHAMBER: House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is escalating his clash with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce , telling the group’s “board members and state leaders the organization must undertake a complete leadership change and replace current president and CEO Suzanne Clark,” Axios’ Hans Nichols and Jonathan Swan report. — “McCarthy’s direct conversations make clear he will not work with Clark and her leadership team if Republicans win control and he becomes House speaker. But he’s charting a potential path forward for the business group to reestablish a relationship with the GOP conference.” — “Mark Ordan , chairman of the board of directors, told Axios that Clark continues to have the ‘complete support’ of the executive committee. ‘The U.S. Chamber of Commerce team serves a vital role in the daily defense of American business,’ he said. ‘We serve our members, not a political party.’” — “‘Staying true to that mission requires a smart, savvy, vigorous leader like our CEO Suzanne Clark,’ he said. ‘It is for that reason that our governing body, the executive committee of the board of directors, is unequivocally enthusiastic about Suzanne’s performance and the importance of her ongoing tenure as CEO of the U.S. Chamber. She has our complete support.’” WHICH CEOS DO (AND DON’T) HAVE BIDEN’S EAR ON THE ECONOMY: “In early 2022, as it became clear that a steep rise in consumer prices would be more severe and longer-lasting than his own aides had predicted, President Joe Biden began to widen the circle of people giving him economic advice ,” Bloomberg’s Nancy Cook reports. — “While his predecessors might have turned to Wall Street giants like Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Biden’s White House reached out to corporate executives such as Apple Inc.’s Tim Cook, Bank of America Corp.’s Brian Moynihan, and the leaders of retailers Target Corp. and Walmart Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.” — “Biden’s most frequent calls were with labor leaders, several of whom the president’s known for years. He talked occasionally with former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers … and gleaned tidbits of information about the US economy from people he ran into at church, golf and his grandkids’ field hockey games back home in Delaware.” — “The president had much less contact with oil companies, many tech CEOs and big Wall Street players such as Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co. Biden’s circle came to reflect his political sensibilities: working-class people and union members more likely to shop Walmart than Amazon.com Inc. and hold accounts with Bank of America than investment firms.” FOR YOUR THANKSGIVING TRAVEL SPOTIFY QUEUE: Strategic comms shop Seven Letter has launched a new podcast, “Control,” hosted by a pair of former GOP Hill aides about — you guessed it — potential Republican control of Congress. Brendan Buck and Annalyse Keller will host the pod. — The inaugural episode features Buck’s old boss, former House Speaker Paul Ryan, and Ryan’s advice — and words of caution — for McCarthy, his probable successor as GOP speaker. Future episodes following the election and into the new Congress in January will aim to peek around the corner to preview what to expect from a Republican majority on oversight and policy issues alike. ABRAMS GROUP’S PAYMENTS SPLIT ETHICS WATCHDOG: The day that government ethics lobbyist Craig Holman was quoted in a POLITICO report calling massive legal payments from Stacey Abrams’ voting rights group to a law firm run by the campaign chair of Abrams’ Georgia gubernatorial campaign posed a “very clear conflict of interest,” an official from Abrams’ group, Fair Fight Action, complained to Holman’s employer , watchdog group Public Citizen, The New York Times’ Michael Powell reports. — “The next day, Public Citizen retracted Mr. Holman’s statement, writing that its organizational position was ‘that the contractual arrangement described in the story is normal and non-objectionable. It raises no legal or ethical concerns.’ … The sequence of events raised questions about whether Public Citizen, an esteemed public interest advocate, backed down under pressure from liberal supporters of Ms. Abrams.” — While Holman has stood by his stance, “his boss, Robert Weissman , the president of Public Citizen, disagreed. ‘I think that Craig made a mistake,’ he said in an interview. ‘Our take is that he characterized something as a conflict that is not. Hiring someone you know as your counsel is very common and not problematic.’” A GOP election lawyer defended the arrangement as well, but even he, like “nearly every lawyer contacted” by the Times, “questioned the mountainous legal bills accrued in the case.”
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