About: Lee Fang
Bio: Lee Fang is a reporter for The Intercept. He has a longstanding interest in how public policy is influenced by organized interest groups and money. He was the first to uncover and detail the role of the billionaire Koch brothers in financing the Tea Party movement. His interviews and research on the Koch brothers have been featured on HBO’s “The Newsroom,” the documentaries “Merchants of Doubt” and “Citizen Koch,” as well as in multiple media outlets. He was an investigative blogger for ThinkProgress (2009-2011) and then a fellow at the Investigative Fund of the Nation Institute and contributing writer for The Nation. In 2012, he co-founded RepublicReport.org, a blog to cover political corruption that syndicates content with TheNation.com, Salon, National Memo, BillMoyers.com, TruthOut, and other media outlets. His work has been published by VICE, The Baffler, The Boston Globe, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Progressive, NPR, In These Times, and The Huffington Post. His first book, “The Machine: A Field Guide to the Resurgent Right,” published by The New Press, explores how the conservative right rebuilt the Republican Party and its political clout in the aftermath of President Obama’s 2008 election victory. He is based in San Francisco.
Lobbyists Help Rebrand Industrial Sludge As “Organic … Compost”
How do you turn toxic sludge — including medical, industrial and human waste — into compost used for home gardening? Well, if you’re a large corporation, you hire a small army of lobbyists and public relations experts to pressure government regulators and aggressively fool the public. The Center for Media and Democracy’s Sara Jerving reports:
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Lobbyists In Florida Work To Privatize Public Libraries
Budget cuts across the country have provided a new opportunity for corporations looking to cash in. Radio station WMFE reports that Osceola County in Florida recently moved to adopt a privatization effort as a result of budget cuts. Library Systems and Services, a private company based in Maryland, won the contract to administer six county
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Republic Report Sends Letter To 36 Retiring Members of Congress: Stop Backdoor Bribery, Disclose Your Job Negotiations With K Street
Is your member of Congress serving you, or serving himself? Many lawmakers, when they approach retirement, begin negotiating with lobbying firms to receive multimillion dollar salaries after they leave office. In some cases, a Senator or Representative will slip language into a bill or write an earmark that benefits a special interest, and when they
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ANALYSIS: When a Congressman Becomes a Lobbyist, He Gets a 1,452% Raise (on Average)
Update: Republic Report has launched an effort to bring transparency to the revolving door. See our letter to retiring lawmakers here; David Halperin explains why here. Selling out pays. If you’re a corporation or lobbyist, what’s the best way to “buy” a member of Congress? Secretly promise them a million dollars or more in pay
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Under Pressure From Secretly Funded Slush Fund, Senator Hatch Lashes Out At Efforts To Bring Accountability To Secret Campaign Groups
Poor Senator Orrin Hatch. FreedomWorks, a group run by Dick Armey, a congressman who left office to become a corporate lobbyist, is running a series of ads to defeat Hatch in the Utah Republican primary. As iWatch News reports, FreedomWorks has used an accounting trick to move 100% secret money from its 501(c)(4) to its
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Bribery By Another Name: While Still In Office, Congessman Heath Shuler (D-NC) Already Negotiating With K Street To Become A Lobbyist
One way corporations and special interests rule Washington is by promising lucrative salaries to lawmakers and their staff members. Once a public official makes a deal to go to work for a lobbying firm or corporation after leaving office, often with the promise of a million dollars or more in salary, he or she becomes
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Exclusive: As Kony 2012 Mania Sweeps Nation, Lobbyists and CEOs Demand That Obama Rollback Regulations On “Conflict Minerals”
“Kony 2012” is sweeping the country, compelling Americans to confront an international criminal known as Joseph Kony, a Ugandan warlord who abducted children into his militia and is believed to be hiding in the jungles of central Africa. We hope this successful campaign will also help shine a light on a new effort by K
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Corruption Kills: After Being Suppressed For Two Decades By Lobbyists, Study Reveals Link Between Diesel Exhaust And Cancer
High-powered businessmen and lawyers conspiring to suppress government reports about how pollutants cause cancer for potentially thousands of workers — it sounds like a throwback to the tobacco wars, or something in the movies. But this type of thing happens every day in Washington, D.C. in ways that are often obscured from the public and
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