With David Beavers and Daniel Lippman
HOW CORONAVIRUS COULD IMPACT K STREET: Bruce Mehlman, a co-founder of Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas, sent a memo to clients on Monday outlining what to expect as Washington confronts the coronavirus. Congress is drafting an emergency supplemental appropriations bill now, but billions of dollars in additional spending is likely to come later. “Just as the 9/11 attacks begat the TSA, future assessments of how this disease spread may lead to new policy proposals impacting border controls, airlines, cruise ships and large events (e.g. NCAA tournament) among other vectors,” he writes.
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— The health care industry, meanwhile, “wants the federal government to pay for mandatory quarantines of patients who may be carrying coronavirus but don’t need hospital care — a potentially high-dollar request for the emergency funding bill now under negotiation in Congress,” POLITICO’s Susannah Luthi and Jennifer Scholtes report. The American Hospital Association and the American Nurses Association asked for the funding last week, but there’s no word yet whether it will be included.
TIKTOK ADDS TWO LOBBYING FIRMS: ByteDance, the Chinese company behind the popular social media app TikTok, has added two more Washington lobbying firms: American Continental Group and Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas. Dave Urban, who helped President Donald Trump win Pennsylvania in 2016 and is involved in his reelection campaign, is among the American Continental Group lobbyists who will represent the company, according to a disclosure filing.
— ByteDance had no Washington lobbyists a year ago, but the company has staffed up quickly as the Trump administration has moved to crack down on the TikTok. The company recently hired Michael Beckerman, the Internet Association’s president and chief executive, to run its Washington office. ByteDance also retains K&L Gates and Monument Advocacy.
Good afternoon, and welcome to PI. Happy Super Tuesday, especially to the many Democratic readers of this newsletter who vote in Virginia. Who are you backing? It’s none of my business, but feel free to let me know: tmeyer@politico.com. You can also follow me on Twitter: @theodoricmeyer.
SCOTT URGES INVESTIGATION OF LAWYER REPRESENTING MADURO REGIME: Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) is urging the Trump administration to investigate whether Robert Amsterdam of Amsterdam & Partners has violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act in his work for Nicolás Maduro’s government in Venezuela. Amsterdam agreed last month to do legal work for Maduro’s government after Scott successfully pressured the law and lobbying firm Foley & Lardner to scrap its contract with the regime. While Foley & Lardner registered under FARA for its work, Amsterdam hasn’t done so.
— “I ask that you investigate the nature of the contractual agreement between Amsterdam & Partners LLP and Reinaldo Muñoz Pedroza, including the services to be performed and the source of the monies to be paid, to determine if such representation violates the sanctions imposed against the Maduro regime and implicates the disclosure requirements of FARA,” Scott wrote in a letter to Attorney General William Barr and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin today, referring to the Venezuelan official who serves as Maduro’s attorney general.
— In an interview, Amsterdam said he hadn’t registered as a foreign agent because he isn't lobbying on behalf of Maduro's government. He's only doing legal work, which is generally exempt from FARA registration. “This is just an intimidation tactic with absolutely no substance,” he said. Amsterdam plans to notify the International Commission of Jurists of Scott’s attempts to dissuade Amsterdam from representing Maduro, which he compared to the behavior of Russian President Vladimir Putin. “We won’t let this go unanswered,” he said.
SPEAKING OF FOREIGN LOBBYING LAW: The law firm Perkins Coie is out with a memo on how law firms can avoid violating FARA in the aftermath of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom’s $4.6 million settlement with the Justice Department last year for failing to register under the law. “While many law firms have relied on the ‘legal exemption’ from FARA registration, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has highlighted this exemption’s limited scope in several recent advisory opinions, and we have seen a corresponding uptick in law firm registrations,” Perkins Coie’s Kate Sawyer Keane and Jordan Movinski write in the memo.
— The exemption allows lawyers to represent foreign governments, political parties and other foreign clients for which they’d otherwise register under FARA. But the “exemption does not apply when lawyers engage in informal agency interactions that are not required—by statute or regulation—to be conducted on the record,” Keane and Movinski write. “Recent DOJ advisory opinions have emphasized this fact. In one case, DOJ found that the legal exemption did not apply when a law firm sought to bolster its client’s chances of obtaining transaction approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) by contacting members of Congress. Because the contacts constituted ‘political activity’ and fell outside the scope of any formal agency proceeding, the legal exemption did not apply.”
— “If a law firm interacts with a U.S. government agency on behalf of a client and the agency has not formally opened a proceeding or investigation, the legal exemption might still be available, but only if the interactions with the agency are required to be conducted on the record.”
FLYING IN: Advocates with the group Food Allergy Research & Education will be on the Hill Wednesday to advocate for passage of the Food Allergy Safety, Treatment, Education & Research Act, H.R. 2117 (116), which would require the federal government gather nationwide data on food allergies and update food labeling laws. They’ll meet with Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), David Price (D-N.C.), Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) and Jim Himes (D-Conn.), among others.
Jobs Report
— Rosa Mendoza has joined Global Strategy Group’s politics team as a director. She was previously chief analytics officer for Sen. Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign and before that worked for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
— The American Exploration & Production Council has hired Troy Lyons as vice president of government affairs. Lyons most recently was a partner at Massie Partners and previously headed the EPA’s Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations.
— Michael Mullinix has joined CTIA — The Wireless Association as director of regulatory affairs, POLITICO’s Morning Tech reports. He previously was a spectrum policy adviser at the FCC.
— Tony Cotto has joined the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies as director of auto and underwriting policy. He previously worked as a regulatory and legislative counsel for the Kentucky state cabinet.
— Edelman has hired Kate Meissner as senior vice president of new business. She previously was senior vice president for operations and business development at ICX Media and is a POLITICO alum.
— SKDKnickerbocker has hired Daniel Barash as vice president in the company’s political division, Liza Acevedo as director in the firm’s public affairs department, James Conway as senior associate and Julia Sherman as political writer, Playbook reports. Barash previously was Sen. Michael Bennet’s (D-Colo.) presidential campaign manager. Acevedo previously was deputy national press secretary for Julián Castro’s presidential campaign. Conway was campaign manager for Virginia state Del. Joshua Cole. And Sherman previously worked on Sen. Cory Booker’s (D-N.J.) presidential campaign in Iowa.
New Joint Fundraisers
None
New PACs
None
New Lobbying Registrations
None
New Lobbying Terminations
Avenue Strategies Global, LLC: PV Group Limited
Bousum Consulting LLC: Borsight
Government Solutions LLC: Isaca
Jodie Moxley: Mongolia Tomorrow Coalition
Pelaez Prada, PLLC: Axon Holdings Group, LLC
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How coronavirus could impact K Street - Politico
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