Cannery worker/Teamsters
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Former Keystone Pipeline Lobbyist Hired by Obama Campaign
President Obama’s reelection campaign has hired a former lobbyist for the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline as a top adviser.
The campaign said that Broderick Johnson, founder and former principal of the communications firm the Collins Johnson Group, would serve as a senior adviser for the campaign. Before founding the firm this spring, he worked for the powerhouse lobbying firm, Bryan Cave LLP, where his clients included Microsoft, Comcast and TransCanada, the company planning to build the $7-billion pipeline to carry crude from Alberta’s oil sands to the Texas Gulf Coast.
Johnson’s federal lobbyist filings indicate that TransCanada paid Bryan Cave at least $240,000 late last year and early this year for Johnson to work on supporting the “submission for a presidential permit for Keystone XL Pipeline.” He lobbied members of Congress, the filings show, as well as the administration and the State Department.
TransCanada spokesman Terry Cunha denied that Johnson lobbied on behalf of the Keystone project.
An Obama campaign official said that in his new role Johnson would “serve as a national surrogate for the campaign and our representative in meetings with key leaders, communities and organizations. Broderick will be an ear to the ground for the campaign’s political and constituency operations, helping to ensure that there is constant, open communication between the campaign and our supporters around the country.”
JR: This is a tone-deaf, bone-headed move that Bill McKibben slammed on behalf of the increasingly disenfranchised 99%:
In an emailed statement, climate change activist and Keystone XL critic Bill McKibben complained: “I don’t think you could conceive a more elaborate way to disrespect not just the environmental community but also Occupy Wall Street, because this is simply a reminder of the way that corporate lobbyists dominate our politics… Forget ‘Hope and Change’ — it’s like they want their new slogan to be ‘Business as Usual.’
http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/10/25/352370/obama-campaign-hires-former-keystone-pipeline-lobbyist-mckibben-slams-move/ |
