Allow me to shed some light on the running dispute between Bob Ehrlich and my friends at the Maryland Democratic Party over whether or not Bob Ehrlich is a lobbyist. Mr. Ehrlich says he's not a lobbyist because he hasn't registered as one, but as you'll see below, you don't have to register as a lobbyist to be a lobbyist.
Mr. Ehrlich blew his credibility on the question when he lied to the Baltimore Sun. In April, the Sun's Julie Bykowicz reported,
"Ehrlich is not registered as a lobbyist at the state or federal levels, however, and said he does not meet with his former colleagues in Congress or the State House to push legislation. None of the 21 other employees in Womble's Baltimore office lobbies either, he said [my bold].
But he wasn't telling the truth....
Bob Ehrlich said none of the employees in Womble Carlyle's Baltimore office is a lobbyist, but two employees of that office, J.P. Scholtes and Ed Miller, both of whom were high ranking staffers when Mr. Ehrlich was governor, registered to lobby Congress for Ribera Development LLC. Not surprisingly, Ribera Development LLC was not listed on a roster of clients given to the Baltimore Sun by Mr. Ehrlich's spokesman earlier this year.
Mr. Miller, who was implicated in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal while serving as Mr. Ehrlich's deputy chief of staff, mysteriously left Mr. Ehrlich's firm without explanation, but not before Ribera Development paid Mr. Ehrlich's firm [CORRECTION: $45,000] to lobby Congress. Incidentally, Ribera Development is a client of Ehrlich running mate hopeful Larry Hogan.
Womble Carlyle also registered to lobby Congress on behalf of AmeriDream, a firm that Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell included on a list of "sample clients from the Maryland office." Over the past two years, AmeriDream has paid Womble Carlyle $80,000 to lobby Congress.
So Bob Ehrlich lied about lobbying activity in his office, and his firm's website advertises his lobbying services...
Government Affairs – Led by Governor Ehrlich, our Maryland team has the access to ensure that our clients’ interests are represented in legislative debates at the state, local and federal levels.
Let's sort this out: Mr. Ehrlich says he isn't a lobbyist, but he advertises that he is a lobbyist, then he says no one in his office is a lobbyist, but two prominent staffers from his office registered as lobbyists, and Womble Carlyle is registered to lobby for another of Mr. Ehrlich's clients. It really doesn't matter whether Mr. Ehrlich himself or someone who works for him does the actual lobbying because it's clear that Mr. Ehrlich is getting paid a lot of money by special interests seeking government favors, as the Sun's Julie Bykowicz reported in the same article,
"Henry Fawell, Ehrlich's longtime spokesman who works with him at Womble, said the former governor's job is to "utilize his network of contacts in the private sector to bring new clients to the firm." In other words, Fawell said, after Ehrlich gets a client in the door, another Womble employee - typically someone based in Washington - takes over the account."
You don't have to register as a lobbyist to be a lobbyist
Under federal law, a lawyer like Mr. Ehrlich in a law firm like Womble Carlyle can spend up to 25 percent of his time working for a particular client on "lobbying activities" without having to register as a lobbyist. Mr. Ehrlich's spokesman has already conceded that Mr. Ehrlich recruits lobbying clients for his law firm, which is presumably how he "made a lot of money," as he recently said.
There's nothing new here; when Mr. Ehrlich was governor, his best friend, the Baltimore lawyer, David Hamilton, unashamedly sold access to the governor, otherwise known as lobbying, while skirting lobbyist registration requirements so he could continue to shake down Maryland businesses for Mr. Ehrlich's campaign. In the strictest technical sense, Mr. Hamilton was not a lobbyist, but he made no apologies for selling access to his friend, then-Gov. Ehrlich, and delivering millions of dollars in state business to his clients...
"We didn't have a government relations practice before he was elected," Mr. Hamilton told Matthew Mosk at the Washington Post, "but clients started coming to us and saying, 'Can you help us?' And it's worked out pretty well."
Today Mr. Hamilton is the managing partner of Mr. Ehrlich's lobbying law firm. If you're wondering why Womble Carlyle’s North Carolina home office might have allowed four of Mr. Ehrlich’s former staffers who weren’t lawyers to camp out there, collecting salaries while producing little evidence of any work product other than Mr. Ehrlich's four-year quest for re-election, consider this:
Can you imagine how heavily Mr. Hamilton is drooling at the prospect of Mr. Ehrlich regaining the reins of Maryland government so his new law firm can parcel out the taxpayers' money and concessions to the highest bidders lining up at his door?
- Steve Lebowitz, Annapolis
Note to wiseguys: I once was a lobbyist. In the early-1990's I represented small breweries and wineries before the Maryland General Assembly, and I represented importers and exporters before Congress. Unlike Bob Ehrlich, I didn't cash in on access, contacts and celebrity gained from being an elected official, and needless to say I'm not seeking the public's trust through statewide elected office.
It is not a stretch to suspect that special interests paying Mr. Ehrlich hefty fees for "government affairs" service from his lobbying law firm expect that he will service their needs from the governor's mansion should he get re-elected, which is exactly why a politician like Mr. Ehrlich can’t credibly cross back into public service after he has crossed the line into special interest lobbying.
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