Direct Lobbying and Government Advocacy

Examples of direct lobbying activities

Direct lobbying is about more than just asking an elected official to vote a certain way on a bill or giving campaign contributions to candidates sympathetic to your cause. There are several ways that successful lobbyists can leverage their deep expertise and unique perspective during the complex legislative process and become a key strategic partner to lawmakers.

Meeting with key legislators and policymakers

To be effective, direct lobbyists need to identify the right people to meet with about a certain bill or issue. Using congressional directories – including biographies, bill sponsorship and voting records, and committee assignments – lobbyists can narrow their focus to those decision-makers who can have the most impact, such as the bill sponsors and committee members.

Building these long-term relationships with elected officials is made even more challenging by the short House terms and high turnover rates. For example, the start of the 118^th Congress welcomed seven new senators and 74 new House members. Lobbyists can play a critical role in helping new members gain important institutional knowledge about the inner workings of Congress, as well as a greater breadth and depth of understanding of the issues of the day.

Elected officials are more likely to listen to a lobbyist’s perspective if they can make the issue relevant to the official’s home district and constituents. By demonstrating how a certain piece of legislation or policy position accommodates the member’s own legislative agenda or campaign promises, lobbyists can gain new, and sometimes unlikely, allies.

To do this effectively, lobbyists need to continually track activity and status changes on relevant bills. Visual data representations such as heatmaps can help track legislation across states, as well as help identify opportunities and threats to policy initiatives.

Providing educational briefings and other resources

Lobbyists organize briefings, seminars, and workshops to educate policy makers and their staff on specific issues and provide in-depth information. These sessions help lawmakers understand complex topics and make informed policy decisions.

To maximize effectiveness, these meetings should stay focused on one or two priority topics and maintain a collaborative tone. Send a one-page memo ahead of time that can be used as a discussion guide, and provide supporting position papers, policy reports, and research studies. Providing data-backed evidence strengthens a lobbyist’s credibility and helps sway policy makers in their favor.

Drafting legislative proposals and policy briefs

While influencing legislators is a vital part of the job, government affairs professionals also spend considerable time presenting their own policy briefs and legislative proposals. By detailing current and proposed policies and specific recommendations, policy briefs inform legislators of complex issues that may go beyond their areas of expertise and can be a helpful starting point for them when writing legislation. Lobbyists also work closely with policy makers to draft new bills, find cosponsors, and propose amendments to existing bills that align with their interests.

This policy making expertise is essential in a crowded arena where most bills falter. For example, while thousands of bills were introduced in the 117^th Congress, fewer than 400 became law. This reality highlights the need for lobbyists to be able to anticipate how a bill may do once introduced and which bills are likely to become law so they can maximize their time, money, and resources.

Testifying at committee hearings

The bulk of legislative drafting work is done in committee. This is where elected officials first consider, debate, and rewrite legislation before deciding whether to put it before the full body for a vote. Lobbyists often work with congressional offices to plan committee hearings, including identifying witnesses and drafting questions for committee members to ask.

Through public testimony at committee hearings, government affairs professionals can provide information and context to help lawmakers make informed decisions about the language of a bill and determine how they’ll vote. Proposed legislation increasingly requires bipartisan support to pass, and lobbyists play an integral role in building alliances among political factions. Lobbyists who can articulate the most persuasive argument to the widest constituency base make the most persuasive witnesses at hearings and committee sessions.

Direct lobbying regulations and disclosure requirements

Direct lobbying activities are subject to varying restrictions and requirements depending on the jurisdiction, industry, and the type of government official or agency involved. For instance, the federal Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 (LDA) mandates registration and reporting requirements for lobbying firms and other organizations that directly lobby the federal government.

Before engaging directly with a policy maker, it’s important to know whether your outreach strategy is considered direct lobbying under applicable law and understand the exemptions and limits placed on those activities, including registration requirements, reporting obligations, or restrictions on gifts or contributions.

Registration requirements for direct lobbyists

The LDA requires lobbying firms that are hired on behalf of a client to file a separate registration for each client if their total income from lobbying activities on behalf of that client exceeds $3,000 in a quarter.

Organizations that employ their own in-house lobbyist must register with the secretary of the Senate and the House clerk within 45 days if they meet each of the following criteria:

1. An employee intends to make more than one lobbying contact on behalf of the organization.
2. An employee devotes more than 20% of their time in a three-month period to direct lobbying efforts.
3. The organization will spend more than $14,000 on direct lobbying activities in a quarter.

Reporting obligations for lobbying expenditures

Registered organizations are required to track and report lobbying expenditures, defined as any amount paid or incurred by the organization to influence legislation. Records should detail both grassroots and direct lobbying expenditures in categories such as communication, staff salaries, and any payments made to others for lobbying activities. These expenditures are then detailed on Schedule C of Form 990.

Under the LDA, registered organizations must file quarterly reports with Congress that provide a good-faith estimate, rounded to the nearest $10,000, of how much they spent on lobbying efforts and materials. Registered lobbying firms working on behalf of clients must also report all lobbying-related income.

Additionally, 501(c)(3) public charities are required to report lobbying expenditures to the IRS. To maintain their tax-exempt status, these organizations must keep lobbying activities and spending below a certain threshold. The IRS provides two options for calculating the lobbying limit:

• Insubstantial part test
• 501(h) expenditure test

Organizations often elect to use the expenditure test due to its comparatively clearer guidelines.

Expenditure test

If an organization takes the 501(h) election, the allowable lobbying expenditure is calculated as a percentage of the amount the organization spends on total “exempt purpose expenditures.” The calculation uses a sliding scale based on the organization’s size. For example, if the amount of exempt purpose expenditures is more than $17 million, as is the case with the largest organizations, the lobbying nontaxable amount is capped at $1 million. Beyond this cap, an organization can’t spend more than 25% of its permitted lobbying total on grassroots lobbying.

Section 15 of the LDA allows the use of the 501(h) expenditure test formula to assess time and expenditure thresholds.

Contribution and gift restrictions

Both the U.S. House and Senate have strict rules that cap the value of gifts that lobbyists can give government officials. Senate Rule 35 and Houe Rule 25 state that even if a gift is of nominal value – less than $10 – it can’t be any of the following:

• Cash or its equivalent, like a gift card
• Food or drink in a one-on-one meeting
• A frequent occurrence

Federal and state campaign finance laws, like the Federal Election Campaign Act, limit the amount of money that an individual or organization can contribute to a single political campaign or political action committee. Due to the recent significant rise in inflation, the Federal Election Commission increased federal contribution limits for the 2024 election cycle. Several states have similarly increased their contribution limits for state elections.