The Influence Industry: Lobbyist’s clients, Perry donors overlap by $5.5 million

[Dennis Donovan]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-influence-industry-donors-to-perry-close-ally-overlap-by-55-million/2011/09/19/gIQA0dAxlK_story.html?tid=sm_twitter_washingtonpost

The Influence Industry: Lobbyist’s clients, Perry donors overlap by $5.5 million

The recent flap over Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s attempt to require a new vaccine for schoolgirls highlighted his relationship with a former chief of staff, Mike Toomey, who lobbied on behalf of the company that makes the drug.

But the ties between Toomey’s lobbying business and the Republican governor go far deeper than the vaccine case, according to new data compiled by a Texas watchdog group.

Toomey’s lobbying clients have given more than $5.5 million to Perry’s gubernatorial campaigns over the past decade, either through their political action committees or as donations from executives, according to data from Texans for Public Justice.

During that same period, Toomey earned as much as $17.4 million from his lobbying practice, which is focused on influencing the policies of the state government in Austin, records show.

The political careers of the two men have been closely entwined since they first roomed together as young state legislators in the mid-1980s. Toomey helped arrange a lucrative land deal for Perry in the 1990s that has frequently come under scrutiny, and he later worked as Perry’s chief of staff at the governor’s mansion.
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