Republicans called it the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, and many of the staffers working on the bill hoped it would jumpstart their own careers.
Now, as expected, high-powered congressional aides are cashing out on the tax cuts — taking their own “bonuses” by moving to the private sector.
A new report from the Hill details the procession from Capitol Hill to K Street for at least half-a-dozen GOP aides who leveraged their legislative experience into plush lobbying jobs.
They are leaving the offices of Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Pat Toomey, R-Pa., for gigs at firms like Akin Gump and Squire Patton Boggs. And the migration is easily explainable. Because death and taxes are the only two inevitable things in life, corporations place a premium on knowledge of that tax law.
“Having a background in making tax policy is a very wanted skill set on K Street,” said Ivan Adler, a principal at The McCormick Group.
“The deal is this: It’s when organizations are looking to hire congressional staffers, there’s always a risk and reward thing on whether it’s going to work out, but this is the ‘Jerry Maguire’ thing,” Adler explained. “They’re like popcorn kernels in the pan — some pop, some don’t. But, in general, there has been low risk in hiring tax policy experts to go to K Street.”
Like death and taxes, the revolving door is also inevitable. D.C. Republican aides are doing after tax reform what Democrat aides did after Obamacare. The architects of that law became its well-paid curators and defenders after its passage. Thirty aides cashed out almost immediately after passage, a number, which as the Hill notes, has probably grown exponentially.
None of this should be surprising. Underpaid staffers work in Congress, rent overpriced apartments on Capitol Hill, and live off of idealism for a time. At some point, some realize the value of complexity and their intricate understanding of the legislative process. And so, those underpaid staffers go to K Street, move into nicer Capitol Hill apartments, and make a living off of their political pragmatism.
Conservatives are fond of saying that government doesn’t make jobs. But on Capitol Hill, it clearly does.
