Government Politico: White House Mtg. With Lobbyists at Off-Site Locations to Avoid Detection
Politico says it has uncovered a stubborn little detail about the Obama administration’s practices regarding meeting with lobbyists. Sources, including actual lobbyists, tell the news outlet the administration regularly meets with them outside the White House — in a nearby complex — in order to hide the meetings from visitor logs and the public.
Caught between their boss’ anti-lobbyist rhetoric and the reality of governing, President Barack Obama’s aides often steer meetings with lobbyists to a complex just off the White House grounds — and several of the lobbyists involved say they believe the choice of venue is no accident.
It allows the Obama administration to keep these lobbyist meetings shielded from public view — and out of Secret Service logs kept on visitors to the White House and later released to the public.
“When they need us, they call us. When they don’t, we’re evil,” another lobbyist told the news outlet, who has also been to Jackson Place meetings.
“My understanding was they were holding the meeting there because it included several high-level business and trade association lobbyists,” a senior business lobbyist who attended a meeting about immigration reform last year recalled. “This was an effort to not have to go through the security protocols at the White House which could lead to the visitor logs at some point being released to the public and embarrass the president.”
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