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.
David Jolly’s Clients Won Earmarks From His Old Boss, Bill Young
David Jolly, the Republican congressional candidate vying for the special election in Florida next week, has not only made a career out of lobbying. Records reviewed by Republic Report show that Jolly’s clients won millions of dollars in taxpayer earmarks from his old boss, the late Rep. C.W. “Bill” Young (R-FL), an appropriator known for
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Obama Nominates SOPA Lobbyist for TPP Trade Post
This morning, President Obama nominated Robert Holleyman as deputy U.S. trade representative. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Holleyman will help lead the effort to pass the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. Notably, Holleyman is a former lobbyist who led efforts to pass the Stop Online Piracy Act legislation, better known as SOPA, when he
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Official Backing Conflicted KXL Study May Have Exposed State Dept. to Security Risk
Internal e-mails from the State Department show that a State Department official named Keith Benes played a leading role within the agency in defending the use of ERM, a former TransCanada business partner, in conducting the Environmental Impact Study of the Keystone XL pipeline. Benes drafted talking points and pushed back against press inquiries about
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Governors’ Coastal Drilling Coalition Tied to Oil Lobbying Firm, Metadata Reveals
Since 2011, a group of governors have sought to expand coast oil and gas drilling through an organization called the Outer Continental Shelf Governors Coalition. On Monday, Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-VA) became the first Democrat to join the effort, which includes Republican governors from North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama, Alaska, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Gov.
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Congressional Committees Overseeing NSA Run by Former NSA Contractor Lobbyists
Two congressional committees with oversight of the National Security Agency (NSA) — the House Homeland Security Committee and the House Intelligence Committee — are managed by former lobbyists for major NSA contractors. Alex Manning, a senior lobbyist for IBM who specialized in cyber intelligence influence for the company, became a Staff Director for the Homeland
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Bob Barr’s Missing Résumé
Former Representative Bob Barr (R-GA), a central figure in the Clinton impeachment inquiry, is seeking to return to Congress. But left unsaid in his official campaign biography for the open 11th district in Georgia is a private-sector career filled with work for the lobbying industry and for causes that run counter to Barr’s political persona.
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Chevron’s Lobbyist Now Runs the Congressional Science Committee
For Chevron, the second largest oil company in the country with $26.2 billion in annual profits, it helps to have friends in high places. With little fanfare, one of Chevron’s top lobbyists, Stephen Sayle, has become a senior staff member of the House Committee on Science, the standing congressional committee charged with “maintaining our scientific
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Keystone XL Fight Pointless, Says ‘Green’ Pundit at Fossil Fuel-Funded Think Tank
Yesterday, NPR’s Robert Siegel invited Paul Bledsoe — whom he introduced only as a former climate change advisor to the Clinton administration — to discuss why the Obama administration should go ahead and approve the Keystone XL pipeline. Bledsoe has appeared across the media in recent days promoting a theory that the Keystone XL will
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