SUBJECT MATTER MERGES WITH KIVVIT: The lobbying firm Subject Matter is acquiring the strategic communications shop Kivvit, the latest private equity-fueled expansion on K Street. The combined firm, whose staff will number more than 200 people across offices in four states and D.C., will go by Subject Matter+Kivvit until a rebranding set for later this year. — The expansion comes a little more than a year after Los Angeles investment firm Coral Tree Partners acquired an ownership position in Subject Matter, one of a growing number of booming K Street shops attracting investments from deep-pocketed hedge funds. — The gold rush on K Street has fueled other mergers as firms seek to become a one-stop shop for clients seeking not just lobbying help but integrated grassroots and grasstops advocacy, digital, creative and data analytics operations. Last year, private equity investment paved the way for Hamilton Place Strategies to merge with half a dozen other firms to become Penta. — “The integration of policy and communications has never been more important than it is today. Kivvit gives our practitioners more tools to break through the noise to achieve results for our clients,” Subject Matter managing partner Steve Elmendorf said in a statement, while Will Wynperle, a partner at Coral Tree, predicted in a statement that “this is the first of a number of strategic acquisitions that help create the agency model of the future.” — Nicole Cornish who served as Subject Matter’s chief executive, will hold the same title with the combined firm and Molly Scherrman of Kivvit will keep her title of COO with the new firm, while Paul Frick, Jimmy Ryan, Dan Sallick, Eric Sedler and Elmendorf will remain managing partners at the new company. BUSINESS GROUPS: WE’LL TAKE WHATEVER IMMIGRATION REFORMS CAN PASS: More than 400 business groups have banded together for a new campaign pressuring lawmakers to get immigration reform over the finish line and to President Joe Biden’s desk. — “When it comes to individual priorities, our organizations may differ, but the one thing we agree on is that another year of inaction on border security and legal immigration reform is not an acceptable option,” groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Farm Bureau Federation, International Franchise Association, National Restaurant Association, National Retail Federation, TechNet and U.S. Travel Association wrote in a letter to the Hill this morning. — The trade groups are calling themselves the Legal Immigration and Border Enforcement Reform This Year — or LIBERTY — Campaign, and while their letter outlines half a dozen broad areas of interest, like additional resources along the border and at ports of entry or changes to visa programs for specialized workers — the business coalition is distinguishing this latest industry push by essentially arguing it’s willing to cede ground on specific demands for an immigration package in order to get something passed. — “Attempts to address these problems ‘comprehensively’ have all met with failure,” the coalition wrote, pointing instead to bipartisan pushes that have combined “subsets of policies to improve border security with policies that will improve the operation of our legal immigration system.” — “Ultimately, elected officials will have to negotiate what can secure the necessary votes in both Houses of Congress and the President’s signature,” the groups wrote, with the hope being that “any progress that Congress can make can become the foundation for additional reforms.” PHRMA TAKES FIGHT WITH PBMS TO THE AIRWAVES: The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America is launching a seven-figure nationwide ad buy spanning TV, radio, social media and print that slams pharmacy benefit managers — part of a yearslong campaign against the industry, Megan reports. — The ad focuses on a criticism that PBMs — which negotiate discounts on medicines with drugmakers and choose which drugs a health plan will cover — favor covering higher-cost drugs because they can extract larger rebates, a claim the industry denies. The ad blitz is the latest in a flurry of high-dollar industry group advertising to push preferred policies as momentum for bipartisan health care measures grows on Capitol Hill. — America’s Health Insurance Plans, the top insurer industry group, recently kicked off its own seven-figure ad blitz that hits pharmaceutical manufacturers and blames them for high drug costs. Earlier this year, PBMs launched a seven-figure nationwide ad campaign to promote the benefits of the industry, which is pushing for patent reform legislation and slamming a Senate Commerce Committee bill aimed at the industry. LAYOFFS HIT SIERRA CLUB: “The Sierra Club on Friday announced an organizational overhaul that will include layoffs as well as new hires as the group aims to cut costs and expand its efforts in red states,” E&E News’ Robin Bravender reports. — “The environmental group’s board voted Thursday night to approve a 2023 budget that ‘will require creating new positions, eliminating some old positions, and re-imagining other positions,’ the organization’s Deputy Executive Director Ana Yáñez Correa told staff in an internal email Friday.” — The total number of cuts has yet to be finalized, said Ben Jealous, who took over the environmental group earlier this year. “A major focus of the restructuring, Jealous said, will be to ensure that the Sierra Club has a director in all 50 states. The group now has directors in 38 states and is in the process of hiring for eight more states. ‘We are retooling for this climate moment, and that means retooling to be strong everywhere across the country,’ Jealous said.” CRITICS EYE JUSTICES’ TIES TO ACADEMIA: Supreme Court justices “appointed by presidents of both parties have for years accepted travel and honoraria from academic institutions — a tradition that has transcended ideological boundaries, as the late Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg repeatedly demonstrated,” but which ABC News’ Lucien Bruggeman writes is attracting new scrutiny amid a more intense focus on ethics issues surrounding the high court. — “A spokesperson for the court did not respond to specific questions from ABC News. She said, ‘The Justices comply with the Ethics in Government Act, which permits judges to accept travel reimbursement relating to appearances and teaching engagements, and directs them to disclose reimbursements on their financial disclosure reports.’” — “But to critics, the existing rules remain woefully insufficient and contribute to an atmosphere of mistrust. … ‘So long as the justices are reporting the free trips on their annual disclosures, no laws are being violated,’ said Gabe Roth, executive director of Fix the Court, a leading Supreme Court watchdog. ‘But it’s reasonable to be concerned about the propriety of this situation, especially with the Courtvs ethics issues being top of mind.’” — “Top-tier law schools pay unknown sums to fly justices on both ends of the political spectrum across the globe for speaking engagements and teaching stints while also filing amicus briefs intended to sway the court’s high-stakes opinions.” — “‘If an entity’s stated goal is to influence the outcome of legal cases — and that’s the purpose of many of these amicus briefs — the fact that any justice would accept compensation or travel expenses to a desirable foreign location from that entity is deeply troubling,’ said Virginia Canter, chief ethics counsel at the government ethics group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.”
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