Pay to Play Law Blog : Pay to Play Lawyer & Attorney : Bribery, Campaign Contributions

 In 2007, the New York City Council adopted Local Law Number 34, which amended the City Campaign Finance Law to severely limit contributions from people having “business dealings with the City,” including “lobbyists.” The term “business dealings with the City” is broadly defined to cover contracts with the City, concessions and franchises, and the acquisition of disposition of real property, among other activities.   As well as limiting the amount of contributions, the amendments to the Campaign Finance Law made such contributions ineligible for matching funds through the City’s publicly funded campaign finance program. And, the amendments extended the existing ban on corporate contributions to City candidates to contributions from LLCs, LLPs, and partnerships. 

Queens Republican and former lieutenant governor candidate Tom Ognibene, Democratic State Senator Martin Dilan, and the New York State Conservative Party, among others, sued the New York City Campaign Finance Board and City officials, challenging the “pay-to-play” restrictions as unduly burdening protected political speech and violating the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 130 S. Ct. 876 (2010). Citizens United held that the government could not ban corporations and unions from expenditures to advocate for the election or defeat of a candidate.  

In the Ognibene suit, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York found for the Campaign Finance Board and granted their motion for summary judgment, dually holding that the ‘doing business’ contribution limits served the important government interest of preventing actual and apparent corruption, and were narrowly drawn. The District Court also upheld the prohibition on matching funds and the extension of the contribution ban to various business entities.

In its Opinion issued on December 21, 2011, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court, holding that the ‘doing business’ restrictions are an indirect constraint on protected speech, subject to the more lenient burden that the government demonstrate that the restrictions are justified by a legitimate state interest. 

“Contributions to candidates for City office from persons with a particularly direct financial interest in these officials’ policy decisions pose a heightened risk of actual and apparent corruption, and merit heightened government regulation,” Judge Paul A. Crotty wrote in the main opinion.  

The Second Circuit found that the restrictions served the City’s anti-corruption interest and were “closely drawn” to address that interest; distinguishing the contribution limits in the New York City Campaign Finance Law from the “expenditure” restrictions in Citizens United.

Despite this unanimous ruling from a three-judge panel of the Second Circuit, it may only be a matter of time before an appeal is lodged with the U.S. Supreme Court. Stay tuned to this blog moving forward for additional coverage…..  

The newest Philly reform effort of note is the city’s lobbyist registration regulation, which was signed into law in June 2010 but will not go into official effect until January 3, 2012. This regulation, labeled as Regulation No. 9 by the Philadelphia Board of Ethics, will for the first time in the city’s history require individuals who attempt to influence legislative or administrative action, or who endeavor to obtain city contracts, to register as lobbyists. In addition, the rule will place significant disclosure requirements on most lobbyists, lobbying firms, and lobbying principals operating in Philadelphia. Specifically, the regulation will require most registrants (those expending more than $2,500 or lobbying more than 20 hours per quarter) to periodically report their lobbying expenditures on gifts, hospitality, transportation, lodging and other associated activities. In addition, the new rule will mandate that registered Philadelphia lobbyists publically divulge basic information about the nature of their lobbying contacts and communications with city officials and employees. 

Beyond these fundamental disclosure requirements, Regulation No. 9 will also prohibit contingency fee lobbying among registrants, mandate lobbyist training, and impose a number of conflict-of-interest rules on city lobbyists. In addition, the regulation will prevent registered city lobbyists from serving as officers for the political committees and political action committees of candidates seeking elected office in Philadelphia. Also, interestingly, the new rule prohibits any registrant from transmitting, uttering, or publishing any false, forged, counterfeit or fictitious communication to a city official or employee for the purpose of influencing legislative or administrative action. How broadly the false statement provision will be enforced moving forward will be interesting to watch. All told, however, Regulation No. 9 appears to take significant steps toward bringing Philadelphia’s municipal lobbying rules up to speed with those in place in other major cities around the county.

Enactment of Philadelphia’s lobbyist registration regulation comes on the heels of another noteworthy reform put into place by the city council and Board of Ethics earlier this year. This reform, known as Regulation No. 8., went into effect in late March, and is designed to severely limit improper, partisan political activity on the part of city officers and employees. Like a mini-version of the federal Hatch Act, Regulation 8 seeks to prevent appointed Philadelphia officials and employees from using city resources to engage in partisan political activities. Likewise, the regulation seeks to prohibit city officials and employees from utilizing their status or title as a means of influencing or coercing participation in political activities. Along these same lines, Regulation 8 endeavors to prevent improper, partisan political behavior through the following mechanisms: (1) a ban on collecting, receiving, and soliciting political contributions for a partisan purpose; (2) a ban on membership in national, state, and local political party committees; (3) a ban on political campaigning and political management activities; (4) a ban on circulating nomination petitions or papers for political candidates; and (5) a ban on get-out-the-vote participation when such activities are organized or sponsored by a political party, candidate, or partisan political group.

In practice, these provisions are designed to preserve a proper separation between impartial policy making and partisan political activity by city government officials and employees … a line that has not always been so clear in Philadelphia. Whether Regulation 8 will accomplish this goal moving forward, however, remains to be seen. This is particularly the case in light of a few of the broad carve-outs contained within the regulation. Exceptions to the political activity restrictions discussed above exist for a wide range of partisan political behavior, including engaging in most political activities organized by civic, community, labor, and professional organizations, and campaigning for or against referendum questions and municipal ordinances. Likewise, the regulation also exempts city council employees from having to comply with several of the aforementioned prohibitions, including the exclusion on partisan political campaigning and management. It is doubtful that the loopholes in Regulation 8 are broad enough to swallow the entire rule, but how they affect overall compliance is certainly something to keep an eye on in the future. 

For many, reforms like Regulation No. 8 and Regulation No. 9 might seem like too little, too late on the part of the Philadelphia city government and Board of Ethics. After all, over the past few decades, the City of Brotherly Love has become an environment more synonymous with appearances of cronyism and corruption than transparency and good governance. But in a city known for its comeback stories, I wouldn’t count out meaningful political reform quite yet.

The first of those recently-passed bills was Assembly Bill 1584 (AB 1584), which was passed by the state legislature in 2009 as part of an effort to increase transparency in the management of public employee pension fund assets.  Specifically, AB 1584 required all California pension funds to adopt disclosure policies that would require the reporting of all campaign contributions and gifts made to pension fund board and staff members by “placement agents” and external investment managers.  Likewise, the bill mandated that all outside investment managers disclose information regarding the fees they pay to placement agents for the purpose of securing asset management business opportunities with state and local pension funds across California.  

The second of those complementary pieces of legislation was Assembly Bill 1743 (AB 1743), which was passed by the state legislature in 2010 as part of an effort to build on the transparency provisions of AB 1584 by explicitly restricting the ability of placement agents and external investment managers to engage in pay-to-play activities associated with California’s public employee pension funds.  As this blog highlighted at the time of the bill’s passage, AB 1743 placed a broad swath of placement agents, external investment managers, and external investment management firm staff under an obligation to register as lobbyists with the State of California.  In addition, AB 1743 banned these same individuals from making campaign contributions to the elected board members of California’s pension funds and prohibited them from setting up contingency fee arrangements to manage such pension fund assets.

While not as groundbreaking as either AB 1584 or AB1743, SB 398 does build upon each of those bills and make some noteworthy changes to California’s pay-to-play regulatory framework for pension fund placement agents and external investment managers.  Specifically, SB 398 modifies existing law in the following ways:

·                     The bill revises the definition of the terms “external manager”, “placement agent”, “investment fund”, and “investment vehicle” to clarify that almost all managers of securities and assets for California public employee pension funds, whether directly or through managed funds, are subject to the disclosure and lobbyist registration rules put in place by AB 1743 for external managers and placement agents.  Despite this fact, however, SB 398 does exempt investment management companies that are registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) pursuant to the Investment Company Act of 1940 and that make public offerings of their securities from having to comply with the statutory disclosure and registration standards.

·                     The bill extends AB 1743’s “safe harbor” exemption from state-level lobbyist registration so that it also applies to local-level lobbyist registration requirements.  Under AB 1743’s safe harbor provision, investment managers of public pension funds need not pursue state-level lobbying registration if they meet three separate requirements: (1) they are registered with the SEC as investment advisers or broker-dealers; (2) they obtain their pension fund business through competitive bidding processes; and (3) they agree to be subject to the California fiduciary standard imposed on public employee pension fund trustees.  In turn, SB 398 extends a similar exemption to investment managers who would otherwise be required to register as local-level lobbyists on account of their management of local public employee pension fund assets.

Since SB 398 was passed by the state legislature and signed by the governor as an “urgency” measure, it is now the active law of the land in California.  It remains to be seen, however, what sort of impact it will actually have on the ethics of public pension fund asset management.  While its changes will certainly have some effect on investment managers and placement agents doing business with public employee pension funds in California, it will certainly not be as significant an effect as either AB 1584 or AB 1783.  After all, individuals working in the pension fund investment management business have to be slowly getting used to California’s growing pay-to-play regulation habit.

In light of this fact, perhaps the most interesting thing to watch in the wake of SB 398’s passage just might be the reaction of California localities to the extension of AB 1743’s safe-harbor exemption.  How will localities with a history of tackling pay-to-play issues (like Los Angeles) react to the state’s intrusion into municipal issues such as the regulation of local public employee pension fund management?  We shall see if any drama ensues in the Golden State… Stay tuned…

This week saw two such ordinances seek admission to New Jersey’s growing family. First, Montclair, New Jersey proposed an ordinance, which would, if passed, debar contractors and their companies, which have made local political contributions in excess of $300 (and in some instances $500) within the preceding year from contracting with the township. The provision further provides for two relatively punitive provisions for its violation. First, the proposed law makes clear that a violation “shall be a material breach of the terms of a Montclair agreement or contract for Professional Services or Extraordinary Unspecified Services”, which virtually ensures that discovery of inadvertent violations of the ordinance shall be the first order of business for any losing bidder contemplating a bid protest. Second, making matters worse for the intentional or unintentional violator, contractors discovered to have transgressed (by a disgruntled bid protestor or others) would be barred from bidding on township contracts for four years. Ouch.

A second pay-to-play ordinance is being contemplated by the Bergen County, New Jersey Board of Chosen Freeholders. This  ordinance has drawn criticism not for the penalties it imposes but rather for the exemptions it contains (one payer’s “exemption” is another player’s “loophole”). At issue in the Bergen County ordinance is a provision that its penalties and restrictions do not apply to contracts procured via open, competitive bidding (the so-called “fair and open process” exception). While it might strike some (such as myself) that contracts awarded through a transparent and open bidding process do not require the same, strict level of safeguards in the form of complex, and often punitive, restrictions on campaign activity, the “fair and open process” exception has   drawn  fire in the township. This clause has drawn the ire of Jersey residents  before and shows no sign of abating any time in the near future.

Until New Jersey finds a way to adopt a common regulatory standard throughout the state, it will remain safely ensconced as the clear national leader in multiple, contradictory political procurement regulatory schemes.

While you’re holding your breath for that development, I strongly recommend that any entities or individuals seeking to navigate New Jersey pay-to-play or doing business with the State’s numerous townships to bookmark this extremely handy reference to the State’s numerous (literally over 100) current pay-to-play provisions. I further recommend that anyone seeking to navigate the State’s famous turnpike be on the lookout for these signs.

Our latest contestants in this Sisyphean legal drama are a united band of like-minded law school professors looking to utilize the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as a vehicle to counter the perceived negative impact of Citizens United. It appears this group has concluded that the imposing moniker “Committee on Disclosure of Corporate Political Spending” (the “Committee”) sounds more authoritative than “a united band of like-minded law school professors”. I think I agree with them on that. 

Under either moniker, this group has filed a petition for rulemaking with the SEC requesting draft regulations that require public companies to disclose to shareholders information regarding the use of corporate resources for political activities. The main gist of its petition – stricter SEC disclosure rules are necessary to ensure that corporate political activities are subject to the appropriate level of shareholder scrutiny in the wake of Citizen’s United. The Committee bases this conclusion on the following contentions:

First, it asserts that there is strong data indicating that public investors have become increasingly interested in receiving information about corporate political spending. To support this statement, the like-minded professors reference a 2006 Mason-Dixon poll indicating that 85% of shareholder respondents held that “there is a lack of transparency surrounding corporate political activity.” They also make note of a FactSet Research Systems analysis that indicates 50 out of 465 shareholder proposals appearing on public-company proxy statements in 2011 involved political spending issues.

Second, the Committee grounds its request in the belief that there is increasing momentum toward political spending transparency in the corporate community, as evidenced by the growing number of large public companies that have voluntarily adopted policies requiring disclosure of their political expenditures. To this point, and perhaps undercutting the urgency of their call to action, the professors highlight a study by the Center for Political Accountability indicating that nearly 60% of S&P 500 companies voluntarily provide shareholders with information regarding corporate spending on political activities.

Third and finally, the Committee bases its request on the idea that stricter SEC regulation of corporate political disclosure will lead to better corporate oversight and accountability mechanisms. At present, the professors assert, shareholders are unable to hold directors and officers accountable when they spend corporate funds on politics in a way that departs from the interests of the company. From the Committee’s point of view, this is due to the fact that public information regarding corporate political activity is out of the average shareholder’s reach (because it is either dispersed among too many regulatory bodies or not gathered at all). By requiring companies to disclose to one central entity (the SEC), it is the professors contention that there will be better information available to shareholders, and in turn, a subsequent improvement in corporate accountability.

Based upon these assertions, the Committee’s petition recommends that the SEC initiate a rulemaking project to adopt a series of regulations that mandate periodic disclosure of corporate political spending. Whether the SEC will take heed of the Committee’s request remains to be seen, but the petition itself has already begun to draw a mix of criticism and support from members of the business, legal, and academic communities.

For example, just a few days after the Committee’s petition was submitted, Keith Paul Bishop – the former California Commissioner of Corporations and an adjunct professor at the Chapman University School of Law – filed a response letter with the SEC refuting the professors’ contentions and requesting that no such rulemaking project be initiated by the Commission. In his response, Bishop contends that the Committee’s proposal will only add to the already extensive public disclosure burden faced by reporting companies and that it is unnecessary in light of the growing trend toward voluntary corporate disclosure. He also argues that it is not the role of the SEC to mandate corporate expenditure on public disclosure of political activity when statistics show that not even a third of 2011 proxy proposals on the subject enjoyed shareholder support.

In contrast, official comments filed by Mark Latham, founder of VoterMedia.org, and executives from the International Corporate Governance Network expressed strong support for the Committee’s request. Specifically, both comments revealed a common respect for the Committee’s belief that the disclosure of corporate political spending is necessary to help stave off abuse or the breach of business ethics by officers and directors.

The debate over who has the better side of the argument will rage on in the coming months as the SEC weighs the proposal and determines whether to take any action. One would have to expect the Obama Administration to lend its support to the Committee’s cause in it’s typical “no fingerprints here, I don’t know what you’re talking about” approach. The response from the corporate community will undoubtedly be more mixed and more direct, but it will be interesting to see what reaction emerges from groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and The Conference Board’s newly formed Committee on Corporate Political Spending (to which, BIAS ALERT, I am an advisor). Stay tuned….

Interestingly, Fulton County’s Commission didn’t simply reject the resolution, they made sure to give the bill sufficient medical attention to permit the orderlies to wheel it in to the room where they could execute it properly and with finality. The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported on the gruesome course of events thusly:

 Fulton County commissioners didn't just reject Vice Chair Emma Darnell's proposal to limit contractors' donations to political campaigns. They killed it.

Darnell sought to prohibit any company or individual from bidding for county work if they have donated more than $500 to a commission candidate, or have given gifts to commissioners or county employees, during the past year.

The board opposed the plan 4-2, then, on a motion from Commissioner Tom Lowe, voted 4-2 to officially deny it so it can't be brought up again. Lowe called the idea stupid and bad for business

Not everyone sees the issue the same way. On the same day Fulton County was doing its work, the Brigantine Beach, New Jersey, City Council voted a strikingly similar piece of legislation onto the books. The Brigantine Beach ordinance, based largely on an Atlantic County, NJ, ordinance, and drafted with the assistance of the Atlantic County counsel, bans all professional contractor contributions one year before bidding and limits successful bidders to $300 candidate contributions after that with aggregate total limit contributions from a corporation holding a city contract to no more than $2,500 annually.

The regulatory patchwork continues to be sewn together stitch by stitch with no sign of uniformity on the horizon.

 A careful read of Commissioner Emma Darnell’s website announcing the resolution shows that someone appears to have inadvertently attached a privileged legal analysis from the Indiana Attorney General to the Indiana Senate to the end of her proposal concluding that a virtually identical resolution, “if enacted by the City of Fort Wayne, would be invalid as an attempt to regulate, without specific statutory authority, conduct which is regulated by a state agency.” (emphasis added)

One can only speculate as to the reason why such a legal opinion would be attached to the proposed Fulton County resolution. One potential possibility would be that the Commission is already concerned that the resolution as proposed is legally invalid. On the off-chance that Commissioner Darnell’s website changes subsequent to this post, here is a screen-grab of the resolution along with the apparently inadvertently attached legal opinion as it was originally circulated.

Without offering any legal advice upon which anyone should rely, it would appear that Georgia’s constitutional and statutory structure mirrors that which concerned the Indiana Attorney General when he analyzed the Fort Wayne pay-to-play proposal. As is the case in Indiana, the Fulton County proposal clearly seeks to regulate conduct related to campaign financing and contributions. As is the case in Indiana, Georgia’s “Home Rule” provisions limit the power of municipalities to matters not preempted by the General Assembly through general law and not specifically enumerated as matters of state authority under O.C.G.A § 36-35-6. Included among those powers reserved to the state are authority over election procedures and campaign finance rules, which are specifically administered by the State Board of Elections and Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission in accordance with the requirements of general law and the state constitution.

In fairness, there are some in Indiana who disagree with the analysis and conclusion reached by Indiana Attorney General Zoeller; including Fort Wayne’s former city attorney. Nonetheless, this would appear to be a good opportunity for Fulton County to slow down, exhale, and reconsider.

For the purposes of determining whether a person has reached the $500 threshold, Commissioner Darnell’s resolution proposes aggregating all contributions or gifts made by an individual, their parents, siblings, spouse, or children as well as by any company that the individual controls or holds a 10% stock interest in. With respect to company contributions and gifts, the proposed resolution would aggregate all contributions or benefits conferred by any “officers, directors, partners, members, or salaried employees of the entity, and of any affiliated or subsidiary entities.”

Yes, you read that right. Under the proposed resolution, a company such as Delta Air Lines would theoretically be debarred from contracting with Fulton County (they have an airport in Atlanta, don’t they?) if even one of its salaried employees pays for a birthday cake for a next door neighbor who just happens to be a Fulton County employee. (Transparency Note: Delta Air Lines is a client of our firm, but this example could just as easily apply to any corporation having any employee who inadvertently makes a $500 campaign contribution or any gift to a County Commissioner or county employee).

As this blog has noted before, well-meaning and good-intentioned efforts to restrict back room dealing almost always get hoisted upon the petard of the broad language necessary to prevent circumvention but predictably results in negative, unintended consequences. The Law of Good Intentions almost always loses out to the  Law of Unintended Consequences.  Under this proposal, compliance costs will skyrocket, as will the likelihood of unnecessary and inefficient bid protest litigation due to inadvertent violations. In light of these potential effects, simple disclosure of all campaign and gift activity in the contracting process strikes me as the much more sensible approach.

I also have concerns that such restrictions will needlessly limit campaign activity and chill political speech inside of Fulton County. The words I wrote two years ago here still ring true to my ear:

While few would argue that the procurement process in Atlanta doesn't need more sunshine, the Common Cause proposal appears to go a few steps to far. Most troublesome is the proposal to prohibit persons who make contributions of over [$500] from bidding on any … contracts for the next year, as the prohibition applies even if the contract in question was not in existence at the time of the contribution. Restricting contribution amounts in this manner would undoubtedly chill the making of political contributions for City of Atlanta elections altogether, as any person or entity with any potential interest in any City contract in the future could not make contributions without the fear of being locked out of all future business. This is the sort of broad restriction that has proven to be problematic in jurisdictions such as Colorado. Similarly problematic is the apparent willingness to consider contributions by spouses and children of contributors in making prohibition determinations. Again, Colorado should serve as a cautionary tale here.

Needless to say, Common Cause Georgia, and many others, do not share my concerns. Whether Fulton County’s proposed resolution passes tomorrow or not, however, the waves of “restriction as reform” continue to hit the beach.

Under these new pay to play rules, securities-based swap dealers and their “covered associates” would specifically be barred from engaging in swap transactions with a “municipal entity” for a two-year period if they choose to make certain types of political contributions to officials of that municipal entity. This Proposed Rule 15Fh-6 is modeled on, and intended to complement, existing restrictions on pay to play practices under Advisers Act Rule 206(4)-5, which imposes restrictions on political contributions by investment advisers providing or seeking to provide investment advisory services to public pension plans and other government investors, and MSRB Rules G-37 and G-38, which impose such restrictions on municipal securities dealers and broker-dealers engaging or seeking to engage in the municipal securities business. The pay to play restrictions are also similar to rules the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) recently proposed for non-securities-based swaps.

According to SEC Chairwoman Mary L. Schapiro, these new pay to play provisions and the other business conduct standards in the proposed rules will work to “level the playing field in the securities-based swap market by bringing needed transparency to this market and by seeking to ensure that customers in these transactions are treated fairly.” That is yet to be seen, but all five SEC commissioners nevertheless voted unanimously to propose the rules and introduce them through formal public notice. The proposed rules will remain open for public comment until August 29, at which point the SEC will take any submitted remarks under advisement and make a final vote as to their implementation.

It will be interesting to see how business leaders and public officials alike react to the SEC’s proposal during the upcoming notice and comment period. Businesses, and in particular investment firms, have had to adjust to a litany of newly proposed regulations and pay to pay rules in the wake of the passage of the Dodd-Frank Act. As such, it has left companies universally unsure as to what types of activities are permitted and prohibited in their day-to-day business. Public officials, however, have been quick to applaud any and all efforts by the federal government and its numerous business regulatory bodies to restrain “unsavory” corporate practices – practices that the SEC, MSRB, CFTC, and other entities assert have contributed to the current economic downturn and led to the misappropriation of billions upon billions of dollars in taxpayer money. Over the next few months, we shall see if both trends continue and if the movement toward increased federal regulation of business conduct and political speech persists.

Because the Nevada court had ruled in such a broad fashion – virtually guaranteeing legislators the constitutional right to vote on a matter notwithstanding any state-imposed restrictions – it was relatively easy for outside observers to characterize the case as a “decision, [that] if upheld, threatened ethics laws nationwide”. The issue, thus framed, became relatively easy even for the chronically fractured Supreme Court.

Where opportunity for clarity was lost, unfortunately, was with respect to the permissible scope of ethics and pay-to-play laws in seeking to regulate behavior based on the conduct of others. One of the hallmarks of modern pay-to-play legislation is the need to prevent “circumvention” by casting ever-widening nets of relationships for which the regulated community is responsible for. This blog has bemoaned the compliance challenges posed by unreasonably broad compliance circles (such as here and here) and the issue has been taken up by the United States Second Court of Appeals.

In the present case, Nevada’s law prohibited legislators from voting on matters which might be impaired by the legislator’s “commitment” to members of his/her family, blood relatives, those related by adoption or marriage, employees, members of the household, and those with “substantial and continuing” business relationships with the officer. As if that weren’t vague enough, Carrigan actually got zapped on an even broader, and more vague, clause 281A.420(8)(e) capturing commitments or relationships “substantially similar” to those defined above. Such vague legislating would appear to be ripe for constitutional challenge. Unfortunately, as the U.S. Supreme Court gleefully pointed out in the last section of its opinion, Carrigan neglected to raise the issue in his petition for certiorari and the Court saw “no reason to sidestep” the rule that omitted arguments are considered waived.

It would thus appear that an opportunity to provide guidance, and pre-empt my whining about overbroad pay-to-play statutes, has been lost.

 Notably, that alert observed:

To learn more about what, exactly, the President has in mind, one needed to be on board Air Force One (headed to California on a Presidential and DNC fundraising swing, ironically enough) to hear White House Press Secretary Jay Carney say the following:

Q Jay, there was -- there were reports this morning that the administration is considering an executive order requiring companies seeking government contracts to disclose their contributions to groups that under current law would be secret. Is that correct?

MR. CARNEY: Well, what I can tell you is there is a draft -- there’s a process, and it’s in the -- it’s part of a process. There’s a draft, and the particular specifics of that executive order could change over time, so I can’t talk about the specifics. What I can tell you is the President is committed to improving our federal contracting system, making it more transparent and more accountable. He believes that American taxpayers deserve that, and that's what he intends to pursue through this executive order.

Q Is there any political goals behind this?

MR. CARNEY: Quite the contrary. He believes very strongly that taxpayers deserve to know whether or not the contractors that their money is going to is being used -- how they're spending their money, and how -- whether they're -- how they're spending in terms of political campaigns. And his goal is transparency and accountability. That's the responsible thing to do when you’re handling taxpayer dollars.

Q Is he likely to go ahead with the executive order? Or is there another way to accomplish it?

MR. CARNEY: I can’t -- there’s an executive order in the draft process. I can’t give you any specifics on it because the specifics could change. That's the nature of the process.

Q Jay, on a trip like this that combines presidential events with campaign events, can you talk about how it’s funded? For example, there are no presidential events in Los Angeles. Is that entire part of the trip funded through the campaign?

MR. CARNEY: Ari, you know the -- when there is travel like this that involves official travel and also political travel, this administration very diligently follows all the same rules that the Bush administration did. And as far as the specifics on how that breaks down, I’ll have to get back to you. I don't have that. But we’re very careful about making sure that all those rules are followed.

“Diligently [following] all the same rules that the Bush administration did” and breaking substantial new ground all at the same time. That’s a pretty impressive two-step.

One immediate challenge comes to mind: if all federal contractors and bidders are required to disclose their contributions to groups of any kind that engage in political or issue advocacy, how does one prevent federal contract officers from demonstrating bias against bidders supporting unpopular views or the party out of power? This is a decent enough effort at transparency that strikes me as having the potential to trod all over our constitutional rights to free expression and freedom of association. To quote David Wenhold, immediate past president of the American League of Lobbyists, “Sunlight is good, but sometimes too much sunshine can cause cancer.”

This is definitely one to stay tuned to.

The differences in perspectives tend, in large part, toward the tension between what we aspire to achieve and what can realistically be drafted, enforced, and complied with in a real world where enforcement and corporate compliance resources are limited, free speech is respected, and basic human interactions occur between those somehow associated with vendors and those on a public payroll.

The universal and noble goal of pay-to-play laws everywhere is to prevent corruption that can occur at the intersection of private sector benefits (in the form of gifts and contributions) on the one hand, and the award of government contracts on the other, in an environment in which existing laws to prevent such corruption are deemed unworkable because of the difficulty in proving the quid pro quo connection between the two required to make a criminal case. Jurisdictions adopting pay-to-play laws do so upon reaching the conclusion that such laws are necessary to prevent any potential or perceived linkage that can not be proven but that we all know exists to some degree.

Some such solutions, such as those offered by CityEthics.org, overreach to ban even the most fundamental freedoms of speech and association as a means of ensuring that such linkage not occur (“many jurisdictions require contractors to disclose what they do, and yet contractors keep giving large contributions anyway” and “[t]he same people who oppose restrictions on contractors making campaign contributions also oppose giving money to publicly funded candidates running against wealthy candidates”). Even if we were to conclude that such solutions were the most effective and narrowly tailored available to the problem of unprovable quid pro quo corruption, such laws can become impossible to enforce in the real world. As many jurisdictions have already learned, once one embarks down the path of prohibiting contributions by corporations and their “agents”, one has placed one’s hind-quarters squarely on the proverbial slippery slope. To prevent circumvention of a law by those few bad actors determined to gain an advantage, one must legislate prohibitions against otherwise lawful conduct by a vast array of potential agents (directors, directors’ spouses, relatives, domestic partners, etc). As states such as Colorado have learned, to cast a net wide enough to prevent circumvention one often does so at the expense of the constitutional rights of innocent parties and always at the expense of lawful businesses who simply want to follow the law.

My personal belief is that it is not realistic to conclude, as CityEthics.org does, that corporations “already have excellent compliance programs to deal with these matters” or that those smaller companies which do not “would, in this sense, be at a disadvantage but, luckily, they have many fewer individuals to keep track of.” If this premise is wrong, and our experience working with the private sector tells me it is, a less draconian impediment to legal, but arguably unseemly conduct, than loss of one’s ability to do business with government, is likely appropriate.

With this in mind, we thought it might be helpful to categorize a few representative jurisdictions to highlight some recent trends. This listing is not comprehensive but rather is designed to be illustrative. Moreover, these laws are always in a state of flux so be sure to check your local jurisdiction for recent updates before relying on what you read on the internet:

Jurisdictions that Impose Significant Restrictions on Contracting with a Potential Penalty of Debarment. The most aggressive jurisdictions ban entities from engaging in government contracting when they, or their agents (however defined), have made political contributions. Those doing business in such jurisdictions need to be especially watchful of their compliance systems and internal data gathering. The stakes are simply too high. With more and more jurisdictions employing online contribution databases, one can easily see how such laws will present a new realm of a “gotcha” bid protest for disgruntled losing bidders. We haven’t seen much of this tactic yet, but one can easily see how step one after being notified that one has lost a competitive bid will be to go online and see if the winner’s board, executives, spouses, family members or domestic partners have inadvertently made a contribution to a relevant government procurement officer’s campaign.

Examples of laws falling in this category include: California, Hawaii, Ohio, New Jersey, Virginia and West Virginia.

Jurisdictions that Mandate Disclosure of Pay-to-Play Contributions. Many jurisdictions do not prohibit entities from procuring government contracts if they, or their agents, have made political contributions. These jurisdictions simply require disclosure of those contributions with the relevant government agency. While such laws certainly lessen the stakes (and cases of “night sweats” so common with in-house compliance personnel), they do not obviate the often unpleasant task of reaching out to your Chairman’s spouse every quarter to inquire about contributions the spouse might have made.

Examples of laws falling in this category include: Connecticut, Illinois, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island.

Jurisdictions that have limited Pay-to-Play Restrictions to Specific Municipal or Contracting Subsets. Examples of such jurisdictions include Indiana, in which contractors with the State Lottery Commission, and the contractor’s directors, officers and political action committees, are prohibited from making contributions to candidates for state, state legislative or local office, and to a candidate’s committee, a regular party committee or a state legislative caucus committee, while the contract is in effect and during the three years following expiration or termination of the contract.

Likewise, in Louisiana, persons entering into contracts, subcontracts or transactions to provide goods or services related to hurricane rebuilding efforts, which are not publicly or competitively bid, are prohibited from making a contribution to an elected official if such contract or transaction is under the jurisdiction or supervision of the elected official’s agency. In New York, while no expansive regulations have been enacted to date, the State Comptroller has issued an Executive Order which sets forth robust “pay-to-play” regulations relating to entities who do business, or seek to do business, with the New York State Common Retirement Fund.

Jurisdictions that are Designing, but have not yet Implemented, Pay-to-Play Laws. Candidly, this category captures just about every other jurisdiction. It is simply too easy for a legislator, county commissioner, city council or school board to adopt such laws - or talk about adopting such laws - when one of their own has been caught with her hands in the cookie jar.

Examples of laws falling in this category include: Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin.

The SEC report was issued in connection with an Enforcement Division inquiry into whether JP Morgan Securities Inc. (JPMSI) violated MSRB Rule G-37. JPMSI underwrote municipal bonds issued by the state of California within two years after the Vice Chairman of JPMSI’s parent bank holding company, JP Morgan Chase & Co., Inc. (JP Morgan Chase), who also led JP Morgan Chase’s investment banking business, gave a $1,000 contribution to the Treasurer of the State of California. As quoted from the report: “On September 10, 2002, the Vice Chairman forwarded an invitation for the California Treasurer’s New York fundraising event to JP Morgan Chase’s executive committee and to its Vice President for Government Relations with a handwritten note stating that the California Treasurer is an important client and soliciting their help in raising $10,000 for the event.” Although the Vice Chairman of JP Morgan Chase was not a director, officer or employee of JPMSI, the Commission found he nevertheless was an MFP associated with JPMSI because he functionally supervised JPMSI and served on the executive committee that oversaw JPMSI.

One commentator observed of the JPMSI investigation: “That is exactly the sort of behavior that the SEC wants to prohibit with MSRB Rule G-37 and its proposed pay to play rule.” The SEC merely said its report should serve as a “warning” about mixing political donations and state banking business.

The SEC report serves to remind the financial community that placing an executive who supervises the activities of a broker, dealer or municipal securities dealer outside of the corporate governance structure of such broker, dealer or municipal securities dealer does not prevent the application of MSRB Rule G-37 to that individual’s conduct. “Firms cannot rely solely upon…organizational charts in determining whether a person is subject to those rules,” said Robert Khuzami, Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement. The SEC will look to the activities, not merely the title, of an associated person in determining whether the person is subject to the pay-to-play restrictions. A key takeaway from this report is that pay-to-play remains a key focus of the SEC and the SEC is continuing to increase its involvement with respect to pay-to-play issues.