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"Political Law Reminder: Jan 1, 2008 - New Federal Lobbying Law Reporting Periods Begin"
January 04, 2008
by Mike B. Wittenwyler

Friends/Colleagues:

As you begin 2008, keep in mind that the new federal lobbying registration and reporting requirements take effect on January 1. Under the amended law, registration as a federal lobbyist will be required during a quarterly reporting period when:

- an individual makes more than one lobbying contact;
- an individual spends more than 20% of his/her time that quarter working for an organization on lobbying activities; and,
- either the organization itself has expenses of more than $10,000 on lobbying activities within the quarter or the organization paid an outside lobbyist or a lobbying firm is paid more than $2,500 for lobbying activities during the quarter.

The first quarterly report will be due on April 21 and the new six-month lobbyist/lobbying organization certification/report will be due on July 30. (All federal lobbyists and lobbying organizations will need to certify on July 30, 2008 that they are "familiar with" and have "complied with" the new Congressional gift and travel rules.)

For additional information, an overview of the new law is available at: resources/documents/658.pdf

Earlier this month, the Secretary of Senate also posted additional guidance on its website: http://www.senate.gov/legislative/resources/pdf/S1guidance.pdf

As we have discussed with many of you, any organization that employs or contracts with a federal lobbyist should be considering what procedures and practices it will be implementing in 2008 to ensure compliance with the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act. Given the new certification requirements as well as the compliance audits to be conducted by the Government Accountability Office, it will be important to educate all of those people in your organization involved in federal lobbying activities.

If you have questions or need any additional information, please let us know.