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Presented by the Coalition for Medicare Choices: Delivered daily, Influence gives you a comprehensive rundown and analysis of all lobby hires and news on K Street. | | | | |  | | By Caitlin Oprysko | Presented by the Coalition for Medicare Choices | With Daniel Lippman KINGSTON LOBBYING ON NEWSMAX CARRIAGE SPAT: Newsmax’s brawl with satellite provider DirecTV has spilled over onto K Street, your host reports. The conservative news channel, which disappeared from DirecTV’s airwaves in January amid a dispute over fees paid to carriers, has enlisted former Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) and longtime GOP aide Tommy Andrews of Squire Patton Boggs to escalate its fight in Washington, according to newly filed lobbying disclosures. — Kingston and Andrews, a former aide to ex-House Speakers Paul Ryan and John Boehner and former President Donald Trump, began working last month on issues related to the feud with DirecTV, as well as general “conservative censorship,” according to the filing. — Newsmax, which has peddled falsehoods about the legitimacy of the 2020 election, has accused DirecTV of removing the network from its lineup for its conservative views. The satellite TV giant, meanwhile, has said the decision to drop Newsmax was purely financial, stemming from Newsmax’s demands that it pay “tens of millions of dollars in licensing fees” to carry the channel when it is available for free on other streaming platforms. The cable provider also maintains it wants Newsmax to return to its air. — Republicans have rallied to Newsmax’s side with calls to boycott both DirecTV and AT&T, which owns 70 percent of the company, and sought to leverage the investigative might of Congress to squeeze both businesses. — DirecTV has begun to play defense of its own, launching a website, thetvtruth.com, to push back on censorship accusations while highlighting its other conservative offerings like Fox Nation and a newly added conservative channel featuring right-wing celebrities like Bill O’Reilly and Dana Loesch. — And in a response today to a letter from several GOP senators, a DirecTV executive dismissed claims of censorship as “disingenuous” and accused the channel of playing politics to extract financial concessions. The satellite provider pointed out that this was not its first carriage dispute with Newsmax, with the channel leaving its airwaves for about eight months in 2017. — “Notably, we are not aware of any Member of Congress or conservative activist at that time accusing DIRECTV of censoring or deplatforming Newsmax. It was clearly understood then for what it is now: a business negotiation,” Michael Hartman, the company’s general counsel, wrote to Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) “Except now, Newsmax is trying to inject an unfounded political argument into a business dispute.” Happy Thursday and welcome to PI, where in addition to asking for lobbying tips and in honor of AG Merrick Garland’s Taylor Swift fandom, your host wants to hear what CDs you (or your boss) have in the actual — not home — office: coprysko@politico.com. And be sure to follow me on Twitter: @caitlinoprysko.
| | | | A message from the Coalition for Medicare Choices: Despite strong bipartisan support for Medicare Advantage, the Administration is considering harmful cuts to the program that would result in higher premiums and fewer benefits. 85% of voters with Medicare Advantage believe that President Biden would be breaking his promise to protect Medicare if cuts are made to Medicare Advantage. More than 30 million seniors and people with disabilities depend on Medicare Advantage for high quality, affordable health care. Don’t cut their care. | | | ANTI-ANTITRUST FIGHT GETS PERSONAL: “Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan has made no secret of her desire to take on what she sees as the excesses of big business. But something seemed to click for corporate America on Jan. 5, when her agency announced a proposed rule that would ban noncompete agreements, contracts that employers use to keep departing workers from taking other jobs in their industry,” Bloomberg’s Emily Birnbaum reports. — “Tech and business groups, as well as the powerful network of anti-regulation groups funded by prominent conservative donor Charles Koch” have “honed in on Khan, who is turning 34 in March, as the primary symbol of what they see as wrong with President Joe Biden’s agenda.” — “Since 2021, Khan has been mentioned in 43 editorials, op-eds and letters to the editor in the Wall Street Journal. Jonathan Kanter, who heads the US Department of Justice’s antitrust efforts, appears in five. Khan’s critics have gotten personal at times, and some people say it’s impossible to ignore their sexist tone.” — One ad from the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute targeting the FTC warns “about ‘unelected bureaucrats’ destroying the agency, while flashing images of Khan’s face. A separate ad from the Taxpayers Protection Alliance, which receives money from Koch as well as Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Amazon.com Inc., accuses Khan of ‘weaponizing the FTC for her own political goals.’” — Sean Heather, an executive at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, “acknowledges that Khan is a useful political foil. … One corporate lobbyist, speaking on the condition of anonymity to speak frankly, says Khan has begun to inspire the nearly obsessive conservative ire previously directed at Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.” FLYING IN: PI spoke with former “Bachelor” lead Colton Underwood about his push to spotlight mental health issues among student athletes, for which he and several other current and former college athletes hit the Hill this week. — Underwood, whose foundation retains Invariant to lobby on the issue, was joined by lacrosse player Cailin Bracken and football players Sarah Fuller, Byron Perkins and Henry Miller for meetings with lawmakers, including Reps. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), Bobby Scott (D-Va.), Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) and Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) as well as Rafael Campos, the deputy director of public engagement for the surgeon general’s office. — The group is calling for legislation that would allow schools to apply for grants to implement programs including mental health coaching and virtual mental health care services specifically geared toward student athletes. — “The athletic community is a microcosm that reflects the whole world,” Bracken told PI. Underwood added that “if we can find a group of people like athletes that are under high pressure, and if we find a system or a protocol that works,” that can potentially be replicated in other high-risk communities. “We can really help start to solve this mental health crisis that we're in by just focusing on one specific group and sort of chipping away.” — Underwood, who is a former college and pro football player, was on the Hill last year highlighting the issue but noted that having more recent student athletes share their stories with policymakers who are further removed from that world was a deliberate choice to help cut through the sea of statistics or headlines about suicides among student athletes. — “They're the ones who really hit this home for a lot of members of Congress yesterday,” he said. “I think a lot of members saw them and said, ‘Oh, that could be my son. That could be my nephew, that could be my daughter.’” — Fuller added that it was important for the group to come to Washington to represent their peers. “I feel like I'm here on behalf of my teammates, and on behalf of the ones that I saw struggling and didn't know what to do, and I think we're all here on behalf of those that … maybe don't feel like they have a voice.” FACEBOOK FRIENDS: The White House has recently tapped several former allies of Facebook parent company Meta for high-profile roles in the West Wing, a prospect that’s alarmed antitrust supporters, per West Wing Playbook. — “The administration’s new communications director, Ben LaBolt, was recently the personal spokesman for Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan. Chief of staff Jeff Zients, who came on last month, served on the company’s board. They join Louisa Terrell, who’s been Joe Biden’s legislative affairs director for the duration of his presidency and was Facebook’s public policy director and a registered lobbyist for the company a decade ago.” — “Biden’s recent Wall Street Journal op-ed calling for bipartisan legislation ‘to hold Big Tech accountable’ has reassured the antitrust class about the administration’s commitment on the issue, which the president also underlined in his State of the Union address last month.” — But the company “clearly has interests before the government, and — now — more former allies to whom they can turn. In 2021 and the first nine months of 2022, only Amazon spent more money on registered federal lobbying (Meta spent $4.6 million on lobbying in the last quarter of 2022).” — “And at a moment when the FTC is suing Facebook and the DOJ’s antitrust division is often out-gunned by industry lawyers, operatives pushing for stronger regulations worry the addition of high-level staffers potentially more sympathetic to the company could matter on the margins,” with some lawmakers involved in antitrust efforts privately conceding “an optics problem.” FLY-IN SZN: The National Photonics Initiative brought representatives from photonics and optics companies and research institutions to Washington this week, where they met with lawmakers and staff to push for investments in science agencies and STEM workforce development and emphasized the importance of the industry. — The group met with Reps. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Guy Reschenthaler (R-Pa.) and staff from 30 other offices including that of Congressional Optics and Photonics Caucus Co-Chair Joe Morelle (D-N.Y.). — The American Association of Orthodontists has also been on the Hill this week to talk oral health literacy, student loan reforms, care for patients with congenital anomalies and flexible spending accounts and to raise consumer protection issues associated with direct-to-consumer medical products. The trade group’s PAC held a fundraiser on Tuesday and met with members and staff from around 60 congressional offices. — Autos Drive America, which represents international automakers with U.S. operations, had its board meeting in D.C. this week. The trade group hosted the White House’s John Podesta and met with Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Katie Britt (R-Ala.) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) to discuss trade and workforce issues, among others.
| | | | A message from the Coalition for Medicare Choices:   | | | | | | SPOTTED at a fundraiser for the DSCC hosted by Kountoupes Denham Carr & Reid’s Lisa Kountoupes, Lori Denham, Pat Hayes, MJ Kenny and Denise Mousouris, per a tipster: Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.); David Gilbert of Constellation Energy, Virginia Zigras of Charter Communications, Janelle McClure of Best Buy, Shelly Mui-Lipnik of AmerisourceBergen, Marty McGuinness of Unum, Anais Carmona of T-Mobile, Michael Hanson of the Retail Industry Leaders Association, Al Thompson of Intel, Aron Griffin of America’s Health Insurance Plans, Aparna Paladugu of Via Transportation, Eric Feldman of Airbnb, Braden Cox of Pinterest, Cristina Chou of Altice and Jourdan Lewis of Breakthrough Energy. — And at Royal Sands Social Club on Wednesday, celebrating the election of Rep. Linda Sánchez (D-Calif.) as the new chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus’ BOLD PAC: Ricky Le of Sanchez’s office, Andrew Noh of Rep. Marilyn Strickland’s (D-Wash.) office, Noel Perez of GM, Linda Shim of the White House, Jessica Vallejo of Microsoft and Norberto Salinas of Salinas Strategies. — Nick Lewis is starting the Lewis Law Firm PLLC, focusing on government and congressional investigations, corporate compliance, and workplace culture and conduct reviews. He’s a former senior counsel at Google and a McGuireWoods alum. — McKenzie Wilson is joining Building Back Together as its communications director. She was most recently communications director at Data for Progress. — Melissa Bartlett has joined the ERISA Industry Committee as senior vice president for health policy. She was previously a principal at Chamber Hill Strategies. — Rhonna-Rose Akama-Makia is now a managing director at Think Rubix. She was formerly the director of engagement and campaign manager for Chris Jones’ Arkansas gubernatorial campaign. — Brian Brown is joining TAG Strategies as chief revenue officer. He previously was president at RedRock Strategies. — Adam Baker has joined King & Spalding as a partner on the special matters and government investigations team in New York. Baker most recently served as assistant U.S. attorney in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey. — Espresso Systems’ Michael Mosier has joined the steering committee at the DeFi Education Fund. — Jerron Hawkins is now a policy adviser in the Justice Department’s office of community relations services. He previously was a strategic consultant for My Brother’s Keeper Alliance within the Obama Foundation. — Alondra Nelson is joining the Center for American Progress as a distinguished senior fellow. She previously was acting director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. — The NRCC has added Ryan Powers as research director, Jillian Davidson as senior research adviser and Josh Boyer as deputy research director. Powers previously was research director at the NRSC. Davidson previously was independent expenditure research director at the NRSC. Boyer previously was deputy research director at the Republican Governors Association. — Katie Mercer is now a senior manager with Walmart’s federal government affairs team. She previously was a senior adviser for public policy and government affairs at SHRM.
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Atlas Crossing LLC: Gambit Defense, Inc
Atlas Crossing LLC: Powerex Corp.
Biscayne Strategies, LLC: Associated Energy Group, LLC
Blank Rome Government Relations: Miller Boat Line, Inc.
C6 Strategies, LLC (Fka Ms. Dana W. Hudson): Mobilecoin Foundation
Capitol City Group, Ltd.: Esquel Enterprises Limited
Cfm Strategic Communications (Conkling Fiskum & Mccormick): City Of Dayton, Oregon
H&M Strategies LLP: Spotify
J.A. Green And Company (Formerly LLC): Arctos
J.A. Green And Company (Formerly LLC): Babington Technologies, LLC
J.A. Green And Company (Formerly LLC): Gambit
J.A. Green And Company (Formerly LLC): Safire Technology Group, Inc.
K&L Gates, LLP: Axon Enterprise, Inc.
K&L Gates, LLP: Flex Logix Technologies, Inc.
K&L Gates, LLP: Nauticus Robotics Holdings, Inc. D/B/A Nauticus Robotics
K&L Gates, LLP: Northwest Maritime Center
K&L Gates, LLP: Rain Enhancement Technologies, Inc.
Langley Consulting, LLC: Rural Investment To Protect Our Environment
Lot Sixteen LLC: The Aluminum Association
Lsn Partners, LLC: The University Of Texas At Arlington
National Hockey League: National Hockey League
Pat Williams And Associates: Oracle America
Policy Navigation Group: Medical Device Manufacturers Association
Squire Patton Boggs: Newsmax
Tides Group, LLC: Nextera Energy, Inc.
Western Hemisphere Strategies, LLC: Associated Energy Group, LLC
| | New Lobbying Terminations | | Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP (Formerly Hunton & Williams LLP): Csx Corporation
| | | | A message from the Coalition for Medicare Choices: Medicare Advantage is facing billions in cuts that would hurt the more than 30 million Americans who depend on Medicare Advantage for high-quality, affordable health care.
The consequences of cutting funding to Medicare Advantage are dire. A majority of senior voters with Medicare Advantage believe that cuts would impact their ability to afford health care.
Funding Medicare Advantage is an extremely important issue for senior voters. Voters with Medicare Advantage overwhelmingly believe that it is important for the federal government and the Administration to fully fund Medicare Advantage to cover increasing health care costs.
Medicare Advantage provides affordable health care to more than 30 million seniors and people with disabilities. 32% of Medicare Advantage enrollees are racial and ethnic minorities – compared to 21% of original Medicare enrollees.
Don’t cut their care. | | | | | | | Follow us | | | | |  |
