ALEC

Berry and Wilcox (pp. 36, 65) mention the American Legislative Exchange Council, which received a good deal of Scaife money.

Lee Fang and Nick Surgey at The Intercept:

THE AMERICAN LEGISLATIVE EXCHANGE COUNCIL is holding a conference in Washington, D.C., this week, providing a venue for lobbyists to meet behind closed doors with newly elected state legislators.

The group, which is celebrating its 45th year, has long shaped state law, designing bills that imposed three-strikes mandatory sentencing, restricting the minimum wage, curbing municipal broadband, and other shared goals in areas of interest to corporate America and the GOP. Earlier this year, the group put on a corporate-sponsored anniversary celebration at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, which featured White House adviser Kellyanne Conway and other administration officials.

Many of the major donors to the conservative bill-writing organization, however, have decided to quit their membership, expressing fear that the group has become too associated with the toxic politics of the far right.

The latest companies to discontinue financial support for ALEC include AT&T, Dow Chemical, and Honeywell, spokespersons for the companies told The Intercept.
The news comes on the heels of an announcement two months ago that Verizon, another major donor, decided to leave ALEC.

The group has been roiled by negative stories over several years. Verizon announced it was ending its support following a hate-fueled speech by anti-Muslim activist David Horowitz at ALEC’s annual meeting in August. Horowitz, who is well known for taking extremist views on a range of topics, used the platform at ALEC to attack marriage equality and suggested that the Constitution’s three-fifths compromise was not about black people.

Senators Rebuke Trump with Yemen Vote

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46376807?fbclid=IwAR3MDqAgPycAINGwWbQgNkSJdBgGMMfU48Yen9OjRl6cL0hrBYb67tTZEBM

Guns and Poses

Common Cause

A nonprofit

Climate Change

• Lobbying
• Public Opinion
• Recent report
• POTUS response

About the Second Amendment

A dissert from Spitzer's argument

1871  Union veterans found NRA because they are disappointed by the lack of marksmanship by their troops. The goal of the group was to “promote and encourage rifle shooting on a scientific basis,” one of the veterans wrote in a magazine editorial, according to the NRA.




US v. Cruikshank (1876) -- limits reach of Second Amendment

A bit of history that gun advocates like to point out:

1927 — Congress passes the “Nonmailable Firearms Act of 1927, making it illegal to use the U.S. mail to ship “pistols, revolvers, and other firearms capable of being concealed on the person.”

1934 — The National Firearms Act, the first comprehensive federal gun control legislation, is enacted, aimed at cracking down on the bloody gangland era of Al Capone, John Dillinger and others. The law imposed a $200 tax, which was considered prohibitive at the time, on machine guns and shotguns and rifles with barrels shorter than 18 inches. It also required the federal registration of these types of firearms.

>
1
938 — The Federal Firearms Act of 1938 takes effect, requiring firearms licenses for gun dealers, manufacturers and importers.

1939 — The U.S. Supreme Court, in U.S. v. Miller, rules that a short-barrel shotgun is not a weapon protected under the Second Amendment.

1968 — The assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, the Rev. Martin Luther King and Sen. Robert Kennedy lead to the Gun Control Act of 1968. It created new categories of firearms crimes, banned the sale of firearms and ammunition to felons and other prohibited groups of people, and imposed federal jurisdiction over “destructive devices,” including bombs and grenades, according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

1986 — The Firearm Owners’ Protection Act amends the 1968 law, relaxing some gun control measures.

1993 — The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 requires federal background checks before a firearm can be purchased from a federally licensed dealer, manufacturer or importer. The National Instant Criminal Background Check System, which is maintained by the FBI, conducts the checks. The law is named after James Brady, who was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981 when he was serving as White House press secretary. Reagan and two others also were shot. Brady died in 2014.

1994 — Congress passes a 10-year ban on the manufacture, transfer and possession of new semi-automatic assault weapons. The measure applied only to weapons manufactured after the ban was enacted, and it expired in 2004. Numerous efforts to renew it have failed.

2003 — The Tiahrt Amendment, proposed by Todd Tiahrt, a Kansas Republican, bars the ATF from publicly releasing information about where criminals bought their firearms.

2005 — President George W. Bush signs the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, prohibiting gun manufacturers and dealers from being named in civil lawsuits in federal and state courts when crimes are committed involving their firearms.

2008 — In the District of Columbia v. Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court rules that Americans have a constitutional right to keep handguns and commonly used firearms in their homes for self-defense.

Last Assignment

Pick one of the items below.

• Write an update to chapter 10 of the DiSalvo book.  Explain developments since its 2015 publication that bear on its analysis and conclusions.
• Pick an organization that plays a big role in the debate over firearms.  What top priorities should it pursue in 2019?  Explain what strategies and tactics it should employ. (Your answer may involve legislation, regulation, litigation, or public relations.)
• Berry and Wilcox (p. 239) write that government "should ensure that disadvantaged sectors of society that are inadequately represented by interest groups receive support to improve their representation in the political process."  Identify an example (not including campaign finance) of a program to do so. (See here for ideas. Also see here and here.)   Appraise and explain how it fared.
• Pick any topic related to the course readings, subject to my approval.

Instructions:

• Document your claims. Do not write from the top of your head. 
• Essays should be typed (12-point), double-spaced, and no more than four pages long. I will not read past the fourth page. Please submit papers as Word documents, not pdfs. 
• Cite your sources with endnotes in Chicago/Turabian style. Endnote pages do not count against the page limit. 
• Watch your spelling, grammar, diction, and punctuation. Errors will count against you. 
• Turn in essays to the class Sakai dropbox by 11:59 PM, Friday, December 14. I reserve the right to dock late essays a gradepoint for one day’s lateness, a full letter grade after that. 

Welcome to Capitol Hill, Where the Revolving Door Never Stops

Lobbyists are greeting the new House majority. Theodoric Meyer and Marianne Levine at Politico:

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has yet to officially secure the speaker’s gavel, and it’s still unclear which newly elected members of Congress will land key committee slots or other positions of power in next year’s Democratic House. But after a midterm campaign in which prominent progressives refused to take corporate donations — and with Democrats weighing new ethics and lobbying rules in 2019 — lobbyists are trying to get a jump-start on buddying up to members of the new majority.

Amazon announced Wednesday that it had hired two former chiefs of staff to members of the Congressional Black Caucus, Reps. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.) and Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.).

Samsung, Lyft, Spotify and Diageo, the liquor company that makes Captain Morgan rum and Smirnoff vodka, hosted a mixer the week after Election Day that drew half a dozen newly elected Democrats, according to a person who attended. Pelosi and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who was elected House majority leader on Wednesday, and congressional staffers showed up, too. 

...
Oscar Ramirez, a Democratic lobbyist who started his own firm with two partners earlier this year, said he and his partners had helped at least half a dozen House candidates who were elected this month. He’s now offering advice to them on which staffers to hire and which committees to try to join.

“We’ve had relationships with some of these new members now for over a year,” Ramirez said. “We were helping them get elected.”

 Lobbyists are closely tracking who Democrats are hiring to staff their offices and committees: “Who’s going to be the staff director? Who’s going to be the deputy staff director?” as one lobbyist put it.

...

There were 19 former Pelosi staffers who were active registered lobbyists in 2018, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, representing corporate clients including American Airlines, Facebook, General Electric, Nike and Wells Fargo.

While the number of Pelosi alumni who lobby remains relatively small, considering her decades in Washington, it has grown since she relinquished the speaker’s gavel in 2011. They include Nadeam Elshami, a former Pelosi chief of staff who’s a lobbyist at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck; Dean Aguillen, a former director of member services for Pelosi who’s now a lobbyist at Ogilvy Government Relations; Arshi Siddiqui, a former senior policy adviser to Pelosi now at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld; Catlin O’Neill, who now works in Facebook’s Washington office; Anne MacMillan at Invariant; Alexandra Veitch, who’s a lobbyist for Tesla; Mike Sheehy, a lobbyist at Signal Group; and Tom Manatos, who lobbies for Spotify.

No More Liquor Pushcarts on the Hill

Bradford Fitch at Roll Call:

As the freshman members who will be part of the 116th Congress orient to Capitol Hill this month, there are things that have changed about the job, and things that have not. (For more on the current requirements, the Congressional Management Foundation has published a new “Job Description for a Member of Congress.”)

In the “What’s Changed?” department, the resources that help members do their jobs have simultaneously gotten better and worse.

Total support staff in the institution has been cut significantly, with some estimates at 20 percent fewer staffers. The Congressional Research Service, committee staff and technical resources (such as the Office of Technology Assessment) have been reduced. A CMF survey of senior congressional staff suggests there is a great need to improve Congress’ access to nonpartisan policy experts, technological infrastructure, and general capacity to perform its functions.
...
Members will also find fewer perks than their predecessors enjoyed. The public and the media still report on Capitol Hill like it was the 1970s, suggesting lavish trips, fancy gifts and opulent meals are the norm. One former chief of staff from that era described a Christmastime ritual of lobbyists pushing carts through congressional office buildings, passing out top-shelf liquor to senior staff office by office. “I used to fill up my liquor cabinet for a year from those visits,” he said.

Now, if a lobbyist takes a staff assistant to lunch or dinner, it could mean five years in jail and a $250,000 fine.

In the “What Hasn’t Changed?” department, the size of personal office staffs has remained the same since 1979 (which is ensconced by law at 18 full-time staffers and four part-time staff in the House).

NRA Revenue

Lorraine Woellert at Politico:

Revenue at the National Rifle Association fell by $54 million in 2017, a 15 percent decline that coincided with a record number of mass shootings in the U.S. and a rise in spending by gun-control groups.

The gun-rights group posted an even steeper drop in membership dues, which fell 22 percent, or $35 million, to a five-year low, according to documents the NRA filed with the Internal Revenue Service this month.

The group directed $27 million to its political arm, the Institute for Legislative Action, down from 2016, a presidential election year in which the institute spent more than $76 million.

Advocacy groups frequently post lower receipts in non-election years and revenue totals can fluctuate wildly from year to year, and NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam called the 2017 tax document a dated snapshot of the group’s activity.

As evidence of the group’s political clout, he pointed to this year’s jump in NRA magazine subscribers, nearly all of them dues-paying members.

“The NRA has approximately 5.5 million dues paying members today — the highest level ever in the history of our Association,” Arulanandam said in a written statement. “The historical fact is nobody has fought for and produced results in defending Second Amendment rights and American values like the NRA.” 

While gun-control groups continue to lag behind the NRA’s behemoth budget and grassroots organization, they’ve redoubled their political and fundraising efforts after a spike in the number of mass shootings and are on track to outspend gun-rights advocates in the 2018 midterm elections, according to an analysis from the Center for Responsive

“This is the first election cycle in history that gun-control groups outspent gun-rights groups,” said Anna Massoglia, a researcher with the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonprofit watchdog group. “It’s not really clear what it means yet.”

Interest Group Items, Autism, and Guns

Intro:  Actual Toy Gun Commercials




Interest Group Items

• Amnesty International v. Trump Policy on Asylum
• Public Citizen v. "Bougie Perks"
• Greenpeace v. Oreo Cookies

--------------------

Changes in Perceived Scope of Problem Triggers Attention, Which in Turn Triggers Higher Numbers

News Story This Week

Children 3 to 21 years old with autism served under Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Part B (numbers in thousands)  Source: Digest of Education Statistics, various years.

Autistic children aged 3 to 21 receiving services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (in thousands)

Problem Definition and Issue Emergence
Anthony Downs, "The Issue-Attention Cycle"




Guns and the politics of language

Gun culture




How Oswald got his rifle:

Gun Control Groups Eclipse N.R.A in Election Spending

I found this New York Times article interesting as it connects a lot of what we have been talking about thus far in the semester. During the 2018 elections, gun control groups outspent the N.R.A. Two groups in particular (Giffords and Everytown for Gun Safety) contributed $37 million at the state and federal level opposed to the N.R.A's $20 million. It will be interesting to see the aftermath as the N.R.A. has dominated spending in the past elections.

The Black Panthers and Gun Control

I remembered listening to a Podcast about this a while back and thought I would share what I found when I looked into it again. In the 1960s the gun control debate began in California when politicians wanted to curb the influence of the Black Panthers. The Mulford Act, signed by then governor Ronald Reagan, was the stricter gun control law in California when it was passed and spurred more gun control legislation across the United States.



History.com

Pentagon's Revolving Door Still Spins

Despite President Trump's repeated pledge to "drain the swamp" in Washington, a steady stream of retired generals, admirals, and government procurement officers are still accepting lucrative positions with companies that do business with the military. Boeing has framed these hires as showing their commitment to hiring veterans. The advocacy group Project on Government Oversight (POGO) has identified 19 retired high-level military officials who have been hired by Boeing. POGO highlighted an interesting case of a "reverse revolving door," in which senior vice president at Boeing Patrick Shanahan was appointed to be Deputy Defense Secretary. He was confirmed by a 92-7 vote.

Interest Groups Ditch the Noose Lady

At The Hill, Avery Anapol reports that Major League Baseball (MLB) is asking Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Mississippi) to give back a contribution.

The league said in a statement that the $5,000 contribution was made “in connection with an event that MLB lobbyists were asked to attend,” according to MLB Network reporter Jon Heyman.

The office of the MLB commissioner made the maximum donation to Hyde-Smith on Nov. 23, according to reports, and has also donated to her in the past.

Hyde-Smith, who was tapped to replace retired Sen. Thad Cochran R), is taking on Democrat Mike Espy in a runoff election on Tuesday to finish out Cochran’s term.

MLB is the latest group to pull financial support for Hyde-Smith amid backlash over her recent comment that she'd be in the "front row" of a "public hanging" if invited.

The remark, which was caught on video, has sparked controversy due to Mississippi’s history of lynching.

Walmart, Pfizer, AT&T, Union Pacific and Boston Scientific all ended support and requested the return of donations to Hyde-Smith following the remarks.

More on Facebook's Oppo

Yesterday, Facebook's outgoing Head of Communications and Policy Elliot Schrage shared more detail  about their work with Definers:

What did we ask them to do and what did they do?

While we’re continuing to review our relationship with Definers, we know the following: We asked Definers to do what public relations firms typically do to support a company — sending us press clippings, conducting research, writing messaging documents, and reaching out to reporters.

Some of this work is being characterized as opposition research, but I believe it would be irresponsible and unprofessional for us not to understand the backgrounds and potential conflicts of interest of our critics. This work can be used internally to inform our messaging and where appropriate it can be shared with reporters. This work is also useful to help respond to unfair claims where Facebook has been singled out for criticism, and to positively distinguish us from competitors.

As the pressure on Facebook built throughout the year, the Communications team used Definers more and more. At Sheryl’s request, we’re going through all the work they did, but we have learned that as the engagement expanded, more people worked with them on more projects and the relationship was less centrally managed.

Did we ask them to do work on George Soros?

Yes. In January 2018, investor and philanthropist George Soros attacked Facebook in a speech at Davos, calling us a “menace to society.” We had not heard such criticism from him before and wanted to determine if he had any financial motivation. Definers researched this using public information.

Later, when the “Freedom from Facebook” campaign emerged as a so-called grassroots coalition, the team asked Definers to help understand the groups behind them. They learned that George Soros was funding several of the coalition members. They prepared documents and distributed these to the press to show that this was not simply a spontaneous grassroots movement.

 Did we ask them to do work on our competitors?

Yes. As I indicated above, Definers helped us respond to unfair claims where Facebook was been singled out for criticism. They also helped positively distinguish us from competitors.

Did we ask them to distribute or create fake news?

No

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg issued a statement thanking Schrage and suggesting that she had not known anything about Definers. Mike Allen at Axios:

A CNN on-screen headline captures the read-between-the-lines we heard from both coasts: "Could be interpreted as a way of saving COO Sheryl Sandberg."

• Why this blew up, via The Guardian: "The work on Soros is sensitive because of the peculiar role that the Hungarian-born investor and philanthropist plays in rightwing conspiracy theories and among antisemites."
• Why the kerfuffle is arguably overblown, via Wall Street Journal editorial board member Allysia Finley: "Em­ploy­ing PR firms to shape me­dia nar­ra­tives and chal­lenge the cred­i­bil­ity of op­po­nents ... is a stan­dard busi­ness prac­tice."

Be smart: Facebook seems to be adding a new realism to its founding idealism.

• Mark Zuckerberg, who has lost $19 billion in net worth this year (down 27% to $54 billion, according to Bloomberg), said on CNN on Tuesday: "[T]hese are complex issues that you can't fix. You manage them on an ongoing basis."

Networks, Coalitions, Factions

Lobby topics that you mentioned on your 3x5 cards:

Axios on PhRMA: "Tens of millions in grants were funneled to patient advocacy groups that often stay silent about rising drug prices. Some of the largest PhRMA-funded patient groups were the Addiction Policy Forum, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and the AIDS Institute."

Why they call it "the revolving door."

• Former staffers and officials in the lobbying world
• Former lobbyists in government

From POGO:

In July 2017, [Agriculture Secretary Sonny] Perdue named Maggie Lyons, a former lobbyist for the National Grocers Association, as chief of staff to the acting deputy undersecretary of Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services; and Kailee Tkacz, most recently food policy director at the Corn Refiners Association and previously a lobbyist for the Snack Food Association and National Grocers Association, as a policy advisor. (Perdue also tapped Brandon Lipps, a former counsel at the House Agricultural Committee under Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK), as acting deputy undersecretary of Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services.)

...
In September 2017, lobbyists from the Corn Refiners Association and the Sugar Association secured a meeting with Lyons and Lipps to discuss both the dietary guidelines and a potential Dietary Reference Intake for carbohydrates, such as fiber and sugar. A Dietary Reference Intake is a standard established by an expert committee convened by the National Academy of Medicine and sponsored by public agencies including USDA. The standards the committee establishes then inform other recommendations, such as nutrition labeling requirements and the dietary guidelines. The meeting demonstrates the degree to which these top USDA appointees were willing to meet with industry groups—one of which had recently employed their colleague, Tkacz.

CNN and POGO on Food lobbying: 

The National Grocers Association provides talking points to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue: In his February speech to the association, Perdue echoes the talking points, telling the grocers that "your stores many times are the only stores available for food for miles around, and we don't acknowledge that very often, but I ... appreciate you sticking it out. I appreciate you sticking it out not because you are certainly getting rich in doing that, I understand that you're not ... there for the money, you're living there because you know it is supportive to the community ... you're not driven by Wall Street, certainly, you're driven by Main Street, and you are making a difference there where you serve."

Citing your own ghost-written letter: "On Tuesday, Mother Jones reported that a lobbyist for the Financial Services Institute, an industry trade group whose members stand to benefit from weaker investor protections, secretly wrote a letter signed by 32 progressive House Democrats aimed at scaling back new regulations the Department of Labor (DOL) wants to impose on retirement investment advisers. Now, in an only-in-Washington twist, FSI is citing the letter its lobbyist ghostwrote to bolster its case against these protections, including in a recent missive to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) urging a delay in implementing them." Note a cameo in the story.

==============

The complexity of giving to higher education (Callahan 241-242, 252-260) and Michael Bloomberg has just given us an example.

Networks and Coalitions

• From October 25:  The Democracy Alliance
• The Koch Network (Berry 210-212)

CASE STUDY: AUTISM

Autism illustrates three major points about interest group politics:

1. Changes in the perceived extent of a problem lead to changes in interest group activity.
2. Interest group activity on one issue may foster activity on related issues.  In this case, the civil rights movement spawned the disability rights movement, which spawned the autism rights movement.  
3. Interest group activity on any issue is often full of factionalism and conflict among groups.  In the case of autism, the conflict includes death threats.

 The "Early History" of Autism

• 1943:  American psychiatrist Leo Kanner publishes “Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact” (Nervous Child 2 (1943): 217-250), identifying autism as a childhood psychiatric disorder.
• 1948:  In another article, Kanner says that autistic children “were kept neatly in refrigerators which did not defrost.”  Time popularizes the idea in an article titled "Frosted Children."
• 1959:  Bruno Bettelheim publishes “Joey: A Mechanical Boy,” in Scientific American  200 (March 1959): 117-126.  A condensed version reaches a larger audience through Reader's Digest.  The article gains even more attention for the "refrigerator mother" theory.
• 1960:  Armstrong Circle Theater presents “The HiddenWorld,” a highly favorable dramatization of Bettelheim's work, with actor Peter von Zerneck portraying Bettelheim.
• 1964:  Bernard Rimland publishes Infantile Autism, a book summarizing current research and refuting the "refrigerator mother" theory.
• 1965: Psychologist Ole Ivar Lovaas develops the Applied Behavior Analysis.  The May 7 issue of Life gives it national publicity in “Screams, Slaps, and Love:  A Surprising,Shocking Treatment Helps Far-Gone Mental Cripples.”
• 1965:  Rimland and 60 others form the National Society for Autistic Children (NSAC), later the Autism Society of America.
• 1967:  Bettelheim publishes The Empty Fortress, a book expanding on his theory and criticizing Rimland.  Bettelheim is a celebrity who gets many more readers.

The Disability Rights Movement and the Law

• 1927:  The "civil libertarian" Oliver Wendell Holmes writes the majority opinion in Buck v. Bell, upholding involuntary sterilization of people with mental disabilities:  
• We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concerned, in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world if, instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes. Three generations of imbeciles are enough
• 1945-46:  Veterans come home, many with disabilities 
• 1973:  Congress passes the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (P.L. 93-112). Section 504 forbids discrimination against the handicapped "under any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.”  
• 1975: Congress passes the Education of All Handicapped Children Act (PL 94-142) requiring free, appropriate public education in the least restrictive setting.  The law later gets the more familiar name of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.  See Shapiro, pp. 165-166.
• 1975: The Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights Act (P.L. 94-103) creates a "bill of rights" for persons with developmental disabilities, funds services, and establishes protection and advocacy organizations in each state.  Because of lobbying by NSAC, it includes autism .
• 1975: In O'Connor v. Donaldson (422 U.S. 563), SCOTUS says: "A State cannot constitutionally confine, without more, a nondangerous individual who is capable of surviving safely in freedom by himself or with the help of willing and responsible family members or friends
• 1982: The Rowley case (458 U. S. 176) narrows the scope of EAHCA. See p. 189 of Fleischer and Zames. 
• 1987: Lovaas publishes a study reporting a 47 percent recovery rate with ABA. 
• 1988: Rain Man introduces autism to millions of moviegoers.
• 1990:  President George H.W. Bush signs the Americans with Disabilities Act (P.L. 101-336). mandates that local, state and federal governments and programs be accessible, that businesses with more than 15 employees make "reasonable accommodations" for disabled workers, that public accommodations  make "reasonable modifications.” See Shapiro, p. 181.
• 1990: The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Amendments (IDEA) (P.L. 101-476) renames the Education of the Handicapped Act and reauthorizes programs under the Act to improve support services. Autism becomes a separate category in IDEA for special education.
• 1994:  The fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-IV) expands the definition of autism.
• 1998:  Dr. Andrew Wakefield and others publish a fraudulent study in the Lancet about MMR vaccinated children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders.
• 2000:  President Clinton signs the Children's Health Act, founding an autism research coordinating committee.
• 2002: Wakefield tells the House Government Reform and Oversight committee that there is “compelling evidence” of a link between vaccines and autism, even though studies have already discredited his research.

Autism Takes Off

Children 3 to 21 years old with autism served under Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Part B (numbers in thousands)  Source: Digest of Education Statistics, various years.

Autistic children aged 3 to 21 receiving services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (in thousands)

The Interest Group Universe

Peak Associations

• Autism Speaks  -- advocacy page
• The Autism Society

Anti-Vaccine Activists

• SafeMinds
• Autism Research Institute
• Generation Rescue
• AMC Foundation

Pro-Science Groups

• Autism Science Foundation
• Association for Science in Autism Treatment

Self-Advocates

• Autistic Self-Advocacy Network -- 
• Public service announcement  
•  ASAN V. Autism Speaks
• Research Priorities
• GRASP

Professional Organizations

• Association of Behavior Analysts International
• National Association of Special Education Teachers
• Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates

Businesses

• A billion dollar industry
• Kirkman Labs
• International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists

Workaround

Kate Ackley at Roll Call:

Lobbyists for business interests say they’re implementing workarounds to get to know the 32 incoming freshman Democratic House members who have sworn off corporate political action committee dollars.

Those newbies, in town this week for member orientation, comprise the majority of what will be a total of 45 representatives and senators in the 116th Congress who have pledged to reject donations from business PACs.

Instead of PAC dollars, corporate interests plan to rely on individual personal donations from their executives, lobbyists and other consultants, instead of the collective contributions from corporate PACs. In addition, lobbyists will be sure to attend meet-and-greets happening over the coming days and weeks with the new members.

Some lobbyists said they also would rely on policy partnerships with think tanks, grassroots activist organizations and charities — as well as shopping op-eds focused on specific lawmakers — for entree to the newly-elected members of Congress.

...

CR Wooters, a lobbyist at Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas and a former Democratic congressional aide, says corporate clients and the incoming lawmakers will have much to discuss on policy issues, including proposals on paid leave or increasing the federal minimum wage — and PACs aren’t a necessary conduit to those talks.

“Those could be very productive conversations,” Wooters said, as lobbyists educate new members about issues they may never have encountered before. “Businesses can also spend a lot of time educating new members on trade and tariffs, or maybe you have no idea what cybersecurity is. Now you’re having to deal with giant issues like health care and education.”

“The old way of saying, ‘We’ll write them a check’ just feels lazy and dated to me,” Wooters said.

Franchise

In class we discussed the politics of franchisees.  I just received this email:

--------------------------

November 19, 2018

The Honorable Xavier Becerra

Attorney General

1300 “I” Street

Sacramento, CA 95814-2919

Dear Attorney General Becerra:

We, the undersigned, are writing to call your attention to predatory business practices by 7-Eleven Inc. (SEI) during its franchisee contract negotiations that will negatively impact thousands of California small business operators and may be in violation of California State Law. We urge you to investigate these oppressive business practices.

The new SEI-issued agreement would force franchisees into an unbalanced contract that would gouge store operators and eliminate a fair and cost-balanced equity in profits. If franchisees, including many who have several years remaining on their existing contracts, do not sign these contracts by December 31^st, they will receive contracts with even harsher terms.

The National Coalition of Associations of 7-Eleven Franchisees (NCASEF,) an independent trade association for 7-Eleven franchisees who work to improve business opportunities and practices for all members of Franchise Owner Associations (FOA) in each state, notes five primary abuses of California State Law in the new agreement that collectively render the agreement an unconscionable contract. Those include:

1. Imposing a new policy requiring all franchisee disputes to be brought before Texas courts rather than in the state where the franchisee is located in order to deprive California franchisees of important protections from the California Franchise Relations Act and Anti Waiver Law, Code 20010, Code 31512, Code 20040.5.  

2. Violating California Civil Jury Instruction 325 by incorporating the so-called business judgement rule and is designed to obliterate the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing.

3. Violating California Civil Code §1670.5 by forcing California franchisees to waive their rights to a covenant of good faith and fair dealing; thus deeming the agreement as “overly harsh,” “unduly oppressive,” and “unfairly one-sided.”

4. Requiring franchisees to sign a waiver for their rights under wage and hour litigation that is now pending at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

5. Reports of threats from many franchisees, including those whose contract will expire in several years, to sign the agreement before the end of the year in order to avoid penalties including a greater gross profit split in favor of SEI.

Local 7-Eleven franchisees are hard-working small business operators, many of whom became part of the 7-Eleven Inc. family to provide for their families and pursue the American Dream. That dream is now being jeopardized by 7-Eleven’s attempt to dramatically increase their profit margins on the backs of hard-working small business operators.

We, franchisee operators from the food service, delivery services, cosmetology, service station, and other industries, respectfully urge you to investigate this matter. We are concerned that, if left unchecked, the egregious contracting and predatory business practices employed by 7-Eleven Inc. as part of their contract negotiations could have far-reaching negative implications for the entire franchise business community.

Thank you for your consideration. Should you have questions, please feel free to contact Jaspreet Dhillon, NCASEF representative, at (310) 892-2106.

Sincerely,

Jaspreet Dhillon

Treasurer

National Coalition of Associations of 7-Eleven Franchisees (NCASEF)

Tad Mollnhauer

Executive Director

National TUPSSO Franchise Owners Association (TUPSSFOA)

Gary Robins

Vice-Chairman

Supercuts Franchisee Association (SFA)

Edwin Shanahan

Executive Director

Dunkin’ Donuts Independent Franchise Owners, Inc. (DDIFO) 

Keith Miller

Subway Franchisee Owner

Past Chairman, Coalition of Franchisee Associations (CFA)

Todd Messer

Executive Director

Independent Organization of Little Caesars Franchisees, Inc. (IOLCF)

Ali Mazarei

Vice President

Service Station Franchise Association, Inc. (SSFA)

John Motta

Chairman

Coalition of Franchisee Associations (CFA)

Coalition of Franchisee Associations, Inc. represents more than 41,000 franchise owners and brings together 17 of the largest and most reputable independent franchisee associations from across the country.  As the only trade association dedicated to franchisees, CFA is committed to protecting the integrity of franchising and preserving the value of franchised businesses.