Washington lobbyist Christine Varney is poised to take her third pass through the revolving door of lobbying and government with her nomination by President Barack Obama to be his administration’s top antitrust enforcer.
Also, on Thursday, Obama nominated Derek Douglas, a former lobbyist for the firm of O’Melveny & Myers and Center for American Progress, as special assistant on urban affairs.
As with most of the at least 14 former lobbyists nominated or hired by Obama, Varney and Douglas appear to be not covered by his executive order restricting the official activities of former lobbyists.
Obama’s first executive order forbade appointees who have served as registered lobbyists to “participate in any particular matter on which [they] lobbied within the two years before the date of my appointment” or “participate in the specific issue area in which that particular matter falls.”
Varney is not covered by the executive order, it appears, because she last appears on federal lobbying filings in 2006. Varney joined the firm Hogan & Hartson out of law school, where she worked on Netscape’s behalf, asking the Clinton administration to prosecute Microsoft for antitrust violations. She then joined the Clinton administration in various jobs before rejoining Hogan & Hartson where she lobbied on behalf of the Online Privacy Alliance. In the fourth quarter of 2008, Hogan & Hartson had more than 125 lobbying clients, including Ford and General Motors. (Hogan and Hartson also lobbies on behalf of the Anschutz Corporation, a parent corporation of The Examiner.)
Urban affairs hire Derek Douglas worked at O’Melveny & Myers, lobbying Congress and federal agencies on behalf of a private client before moving to the George Soros-funded Center for American Progress where he served as a lobbyist until late 2006. His lobbying work, therefore, lies outside the two-year window covered by Obama’s executive order.
The executive order allows the president to waive this rule if “it is in the public interest to grant the waiver.”
So far, according to the White House press office, the president has issued only one waiver — for former Raytheon lobbyist William J. Lynn, now deputy secretary of defense.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack was a lobbyist last year for the National Education Association, but he did not lobby on agriculture or nutrition issues, according to federal lobbying filings.
