Individuals with federal contracts should be allowed to make political contributions to federal candidates or political parties, a lawsuit filed yesterday by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) argues.

The suit, Wagner v. Federal Election Commission, filed in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, challenges the constitutionality of section 441c of Title 2 of the U.S. Code, which prohibits any vendors with contracts with the federal government from making such contributions.

According to its press release, the ACLU is asking the Court, on behalf of the three named plaintiffs, to declare the law unconstitutional as applied to individuals who have personal services contracts with federal agencies. Because federal workers who are not contractors may make federal political contributions, while contractors performing the same work may not, the suit argues section 441c violates both the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution and the First Amendment.

Photo of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia courtesy of the Court’s website.

A proposed federal regulation would require mandatory privacy training for certain contractors.

Under a new rule put forward by the Department of Defense, the General Services Administration, and NASA, contractors would be required to identify employees designing, operating or having access to government systems of records, or handling personally identifiable information.

This training would be required upon the award of a contract and at least annually thereafter. Vendors would be required to maintain records of employee training for request by the government.

This rule does not apply to commercial items. The Regulatory Secretariat is accepting comments until December 13.

Federal:

How One Criminal Case Hit K Street

Hybrid PACs: Super PACs and Traditional PACs Can Merge

Lobbyists In On ‘Super’ Secrets

OMB Finalizes Details on White House Lobbying Reform Rules

From the States and Municipalities:

Alabama

Commission’s Opinions Further Define 2010 Ethics Law

Delaware

Colbert Takes Satirical Swipe at Abuse of Delaware Spending Disclosure Laws

Minnesota

Disclosure Rules Apply, Campaign Finance Board Says

New Jersey

N.J. Ethics Reform Efforts Bogged Down for Year

New Mexico

New Mexico Governor Signs Bill to Close Loopholes in State Contract Bidding

New York

NYC Mayor Cross-Examined at Ex-Operative’s Trial

Texas

Recall Case Likely to Extend Beyond El Paso

Utah

Lobbyists Want Keys to the Gym and Valet Parking at Capitol

Virginia

Trackers an Evolving but Undeniable Political Force

State and Federal Communications produces a weekly summary of national news, offering more than 80 articles per week focused on ethics, lobbying, and campaign finance.

News You Can Use is a news service provided at no charge only to clients of our online Executive Source Guides, or ALERTS™ consulting clients.

Jim Sedor is editor of News You Can Use.

Executive Sourcebook on Lobbying Laws:

1. We are separating the penalties so you will see what they are for registration, reporting, and gift violations.

2. Does the jurisdiction have a document retention policy?

3. Is gift splitting allowed?

4. We are also separating the gift restrictions for lobbyists and non-lobbyists.

Executive’s Sourcebook on Political Contributions:

1. What is the jurisdiction’s document retention policy?

2. What restrictions are there on fundraising, as applied both to corporations attending a political event and as applied to corporations holding its own fundraiser?

Executive’s Sourcebook on Procurement Lobbying:

1. Restrictions on pre-RFP communications between a bidder and the procurement department?

2. Are there any post-RFP “cone of silence” restrictions?

3. Difference between “bidder” and “contractor.”

It continues to be our goal to be your #1 online resource for lobbying, political contributions, and procurement lobbying.

Until next month, let your fingers do the walking at www.stateandfed.com and see the amount of information available to you and your organization.

Elizabeth Z. Bartz
President and CEO

The special session of the New Mexico Legislature adjourned on September 24, 2011.

The Legislature failed to reach a compromise on congressional redistricting, but passed a bill strengthening the preference given to New Mexico businesses bidding on state government contracts.

Today the Indianapolis Office of Finance and Management begins implementation of its new Enterprise Resource Planning software, which will cause a temporary halt on generating request for bids or quotes, and vendor payments.

The new system will allow informal quotes to be e-mailed as long as the Office has a vendor’s current contact information and a valid e-mail address. Invitations to bid will be formatted differently but contain the same information. The vendor notification of this change can be found here and the Purchasing Division home page can be found here.

The conversion is expected to be complete by October 3.

Today the New Jersey State Comptroller A. Matthew Boxer and the Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC) Executive Director Jeff Brindle called for a simpler pay-to-play system, tighter contracting rules, and more complete disclosure of contractor contributions.

Comptroller Boxer issued a report finding the state’s pay-to-play laws contain “a series of fatal flaws [that] have essentially rendered New Jersey’s Pay-to-Play law meaningless in the effort to prevent local governments from steering contracts to politically favored vendors.” Director Brindle stated, “Unfortunately, New Jersey’s political history is littered with examples of private contractors securing lucrative public contracts through targeted contributions.”

The comptroller’s report suggests several changes, such as eliminating the fair-and-open exception which has different regulatory systems at the state and local levels, strengthening fair-and-open guidelines to require more competitive contracting, and reforming New Jersey’s contract laws to allow a more competitive vendor-selection process.

Drawing on earlier recommendations from ELEC, Director Brindle also made calls for changes, including for one state pay-to-play law to apply “across the board” for all jurisdictions, emphasizing “the current maze of local and state laws is terribly confusing.” Additionally, ELEC proposes that any public contractor receiving a contract over $17,500 file an annual report with the agency, listing the contractor’s contributions and public contracts. The current disclosure threshold is $50,000. Director Brindle also stated the contribution limits for contractors should be raised to help address fundraising concerns and not discourage participation in the political process.

“Combined with competitive bidding reform as suggested by the Comptroller, together these changes would, I believe, constitute the strongest pay-to-play law in the nation,” Director Brindle said.

Comptroller Boxer’s press release is here. Director Brindle’s press release is here.

 Federal:

Bipartisan Bill Would Require Transparency of Super Committee

Facing Voter Discontent, Lawmakers Skip Town Halls

Lobbying Groups Take a Stand

Members of Debt Panel Have Ties to Lobbyists

From the States and Municipalities:

California

Campaign Accountant Held in Theft of Funds

Connecticut

Watchdog Agencies Spared as Malloy Nails Down Budget Cuts

Georgia

Ethics Chief Arrives Amid Makeover

Rhode Island

R.I. Rep. Leo Medina Is Charged with a Felony

Washington

Seattle City Employee to Be Fined for Driving City Car to Casino

Wisconsin

Attorney: New Wisconsin ad rules too broad

State and Federal Communications produces a weekly summary of national news, offering more than 80 articles per week focused on ethics, lobbying, and campaign finance.

News You Can Use is a news service provided at no charge only to clients of our online Executive Source Guides, or ALERTS™ consulting clients.

Jim Sedor is editor of News You Can Use.

Elliot Volkman has written a piece, “Contractors Use Webinars, Social Media To Extend Their Voices,” on GovWin.com’s blog. He discusses the benefits and limitations government contractors may face when using social media for their communications strategies.

Aside from discussing how to make the most out of using Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, Volkman also gives advice on hosting webinars and how they can fit in with the use of social media.

State and Federal Communications  is the most trusted source in the nation for comprehensive, accurate, and timely compliance information lobbying laws, political contributions, procurement lobbying, and Canadian Compliance for U.S. Companies.

Our Executive Source Guides cover every important jurisdiction – federal, all 50 states, and more than 200 municipalities. We cover Canada too!

We now provide information on lobbying, political contributions, and procurement lobbying for:

Chandler, Arizona

Fort Collins, Colorado

New Haven, Connecticut

Stamford, Connecticut

Chesapeake, Virginia

We now provide information on lobbying, political contributions, and procurement lobbying for:

Hampton, Virginia

Hollywood, Florida

We now provide information on lobbying, political contributions, and procurement lobbying for:

Elizabeth, New Jersey

Eugene, Oregon

Lakewood, Colorado

U.S. Representative Anna G. Eshoo has sent a letter to President Obama in support of a proposed executive order requiring federal contractors to disclose their political expenditures. The letter was signed by more than sixty members of the House.

In part the letter reads, “[D]isclosure will not politicize the procurement process–it will improve it. Political expenditures are already well-known to those that make them and to the officials who benefit. With disclosure, the public will have access to this information as well, allowing them to judge whether contracts were awarded based on merit.”

The proposed executive order has received both support and opposition since its leak in the spring, and even sparked a house committee hearing in May.

For previous articles on Lobby Comply by George Ticoras on this topic, you can read posts from June 1, May 20, May 12, and May 10.