From Palm Beach to Wall Street, Bernard L. Madoff’s wealth and reputation permeated high society.
The man allegedly behind a $50 billion Ponzi scheme also had a considerable presence in Washington, contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars to politicians and lobbying firms.
The Center for Responsive Politics has found that Mr. Madoff and his wife, Ruth, have given $238,200 to federal candidates, parties and committees since 1991, with Democrats getting 88 percent of that. “Madoff made a fortune, and he played politics with some of that money,” the nonpartisan interest group said on its Web site, OpenSecrets.org.
Mr. Madoff gave extensively to some of his favorite politicians, including Charles E. Schumer, the Democratic Senator from New York; and Ron Wyden, the Democratic Senator from Oregon. Both lawmakers are members of the powerful Senate Finance Commmitee.
Overall, Mr. Madoff and other individuals at his company, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, gave $372,100 in campaign contributions since 1991, with 89 percent to Democrats.
But that’s not all: The firm also spent $590,000 on lobbying in the last 11 years, all but $10,000 of it with the lobbying firm of Lent, Scrivner & Roth.
DealBook took a look at the lobbying records, which showed that Mr. Madoff had his K-Street crew lobby the Securities and Exchange Commission and members of both houses of Congress.
The lobbying issues included public ownership of equity markets, securities transaction fees and stock exchange mergers — topics that appear to relate to his firm’s market-making business, which is separate from its asset-management unit. (He also paid to lobby the National Park Service in relation to funding for the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in New York City.)
The latest filing shows that Mr. Madoff’s lobbying interests include market regulation, and specifically, the consolidation of certain regulatory functions. |
