Politics

Dem-leaning WestExec Advisors lost big-name clients since the election

Published

2 years ago

March 18, 2025

WestExec Advisors has long operated as an exclusive Washington consulting firm known for its meteoric rise and lineup of heavy-hitter Democrats and former national security officials.

But its business is something of a black box. Because it technically doesn’t directly advocate on behalf of clients — i.e., lobby — WestExec doesn’t have to disclose who is paying them and for what.

Blue Light News, however, has gotten a peek at some clients that previously worked with WestExec in recent years before departing. They include software giant Palantir Technologies, Japanese investment company SoftBank Group, semiconductor manufacturer GlobalFoundries and South Korean conglomerate Samsung, according to six people directly familiar with the matter.

Each company had worked with WestExec for at least a few years, according to the people, who were granted anonymity to discuss sensitive information. All of the clients have ended their contracts since November.

Several of the companies that previously worked with WestExec have signed on with lobbying firms touting their supposed access to President Donald Trump — a reflection of anxiety within Washington’s power landscape over how to navigate an administration not particularly amenable to the ordinary ways of D.C.’s influence business.

While WestExec emphasizes that it is nonpartisan, its founders all worked in the Obama administration. Michèle Flournoy, Sergio Aguirre and Nitin Chadda are all co-founders who remain with the firm as managing partners. Former CIA director John Brennan is a principal and former Obama senior State department official Richard Stengel and former Bill Clinton Middle East envoy Amb. Dennis Ross are also senior advisers.

Biden also plucked several WestExec bigwigs — including co-founder Antony Blinken, Avril Haines and Jen Psaki — for posts in his administration. Those moves drew scrutiny at the time over potential conflicts of interest involving its unrevealed clients. POLITICO noted in 2020 that many of the administration picks were not bound by the Biden transition’s restrictions on hiring people who had lobbied in the past year.

Some of the clients that recently left WestExec said that they were specifically seeking connections with firms that have a more direct line to the Trump administration. One said it had a desire to “put our resources elsewhere.” Palantir and SoftBank have in recent months signed contracts with Miller Strategies, the lobbying firm headed up by top Trump fundraiser Jeff Miller. Samsung, meanwhile, is “actively seeking experts with strong ties to Trump,” according to the Korea Herald.

A WestExec spokesperson, who asked not to be named, said that because it’s not a lobbying shop, its business isn’t at the whim of which party controls Washington. The spokesperson said that WestExec provides analysis and strategic advice for companies trying to navigate a complicated geopolitical and policy landscape.

“WestExec remains one of the world’s leading strategic advisory firms — growing every year since our founding [in 2017] regardless of who occupies the White House. We are not a lobbying firm. Our dozens of principals and senior advisors — largely comprised of former senior government officials from both parties as well as military and industry leaders — provide insightful analysis and strategic counsel for companies trying to navigate a dynamic geopolitical, regulatory and policy landscape,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

“Of course, our substantial client roster evolves as corporate challenges are solved and needs change, but we had a record year in 2024 and are on pace for similar growth in 2025, having signed several new clients since the new year. That’s because good business advice isn’t partisan.”

A person familiar with the firm said Samsung and GlobalFoundries had a change in priorities that led those clients to leave, and that Palantir’s departure was a mutual decision. A person familiar with SoftBank’s decision said the company changed consultants to align with the new administration.

While WestExec officials insist their business doesn’t depend on Democrats being in power, they have been fielding calls from Republican-linked lobbying firms inquiring about forging a partnership, according to the person familiar with the firm.

A spokesperson for Palantir declined to comment, and spokespeople for GlobalFoundries, Samsung and SoftBank didn’t respond to requests for comment.

It isn’t a shock that companies would part ways with a traditionally Democratic-leaning firm in favor of doing business with Republican-aligned outfits. A handful of lobbying firms linked to former President Joe Biden have lost significant business since the election, as POLITICO Influence has previously reported. But the confidentiality surrounding the clients of WestExec and other strategic advisory firms makes the revelation of departed clients notable.

Politics

How SNAP could crunch the midterms

Published

4 hours ago

October 10, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Under the political radar, the country’s food stamps program is undergoing a slow-motion transformation. The ramifications could bubble up into the midterms.

Changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program from Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill Act are rolling out in phases, from tougher work requirements to restrictions on non-citizens. Food stamp rolls already shrank by more than 5 million people nationwide as of this summer, as the hardest-hit state, Arizona, saw an outright majority of its food stamp recipients lose benefits.

The latest alteration clicked into place Oct. 1, when the share of administrative costs states and counties have to pay rose to 75% from 50%. An even bigger financial shift looms in a year, when states with high payment error rates will have to assume some benefit costs for the first time, a scenario that’s already rippling through state and local budget planning.

It all adds up to a new era in federal-state relations — and in the size and nature of the welfare state.

In a year when affordability worries top voters’ priority lists and grocery prices strain their wallets, Democrats think the SNAP shift gives them an opening to make Republicans pay politically after the GOP used social safety net cuts to food aid and Medicaid to help pay for last year’s tax cuts.

“People are getting kicked off these programs at the very moment they’re going to the polls to vote,” House Agriculture ranking member Angie Craig (D-Minn.) said. “I sure wouldn’t want to be a Republican headed into the November ballot.”

But Republicans think they have a compelling story to tell voters, trying to right-size a program that spends millions of dollars on erroneous payments. The SNAP changes align with the Trump administration’s broader push to crack down on fraud and make the government smaller or more efficient. Implementing stricter work requirements for welfare often polls well, and trying to move people toward work gets at the root causes of poverty, they argue.

“The premise is simple: Let’s make sure that this program is preserved for those truly in need, and that we aren’t squandering taxpayer dollars,” a senior USDA official told Playbook in an interview. “And let’s make sure that if folks are able-bodied, they are work training or volunteering for 20 hours per week.”

That doesn’t mean Republicans in competitive races are putting SNAP and Medicaid cuts front and center on the campaign trail. When they tout last year’s megalaw, new tax breaks typically lead the messaging. And 10 frontline GOP House campaigns didn’t respond to requests for interviews about how they can win on SNAP.

At the state and county level, some governments are scrambling to prepare for a massive cost shift, hitting at the same time as significant Medicaid changes. The resulting bureaucratic jumble has contributed to some of the SNAP losses this year, as recipients struggled to get through overtaxed call centers, some states cut staff, and others tightened their processes.

“It really sets up a change in the federal responsibility, and I view it as a slippery slope,” warned Barbara Guinn, New York’s commissioner of the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance. Her state is staring down a possible $1 billion added burden next year, though they’re advocating for a repeal of the benefits change. “Once they implement any kind of cost shift, I think it will be easier for them to take similar actions in the future.”

Whether to delay next year’s cost shift has already generated tensions over the farm bill in the Senate, where Democrats are demanding a longer postponement than Republicans’ offer of one year. Some Minnesota counties are considering significant property tax increases to pay for the extra costs, Craig said: “We’re going to be pushing hard for a two-year delay — at the request of, frankly, many of my Republican county commissioners, not just Democrats.”

Conservatives see the new calculus as a long overdue change to improve efficiency and incentivize program integrity. Improper payment rates are high in many states (though they comprise both over-payments and under-payments, and error rates are different from fraud). Those that reduce errors enough won’t have to take on paying the benefits. And even opponents of the changes think lower error rates are a worthy goal. SNAP rolls often ebb and flow with the economy, and the recent drop could reflect the job market pulling people out of need — or the removal of people who shouldn’t have been getting food stamps in the first place.

“There needs to be some level of accountability,” the USDA official said. States with high error rates “need to start to have skin in the game.”

But at a time when many households are already squeezed by inflation, the SNAP changes have correlated with higher numbers of Americans turning to charities to ward off hunger. The surge in people losing food aid came more quickly than expected. The unemployment rate hasn’t meaningfully changed. And the vast majority of large food banks in a recent NBC survey said they were grappling with higher demand, in part due to food stamp changes. Another rule kicking in the day after the midterms could lead to many retailers being bumped out of SNAP as places where low-income people can use their benefits.

For state governments, a set of sweeping operational changes are now underway to conform to new policy demands, often requiring more money or staffing at already under-resourced offices. And the budgetary stakes to get error rates lower are sky-high.

“It’s a really complicated, nuanced and confusing time for states who are trying to administer SNAP,” said Lauren Kallins, a senior legislative director at the nonpartisan National Conference of State Legislatures, which has advocated for a delay in the benefits costs shift.

Politics

David Plouffe warns Dems: Don’t take North Carolina for granted

Published

5 hours ago

October 10, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

National Democrats are increasingly shifting their attention away from North Carolina’s Senate race as polls show former Gov. Roy Cooper ahead, eyeing once long-shot races as possible pickups. But a veteran Democratic strategist who helped deliver the party’s last presidential victory in the state is urging donors not to take a win for granted.

David Plouffe, who managed behind Barack Obama’s narrow 2008 victory in North Carolina, urged Democratic donors and supporters not to grow complacent in the final weeks of Roy Cooper’s Senate campaign, according to audio obtained by Blue Light News.

“I think that this race … has I think been the best run race in the country,” Plouffe said on the call. “But that doesn’t mean that we can rest easy.”

He warned about North Carolina’s relatively fixed partisan makeup as a purple state, making it difficult for a candidate to dramatically expand their base of support.

“There’s certain states that elections happen within a bound, and this one will be that way as well,” he said.

In public polling, Cooper leads Republican Michael Whatley, who has struggled to boost his name recognition against the much better-known former governor. And as Democrats grow increasingly bullish on their candidate’s chances of flipping the seat — one of four pickups they need to take control of the Senate — national groups have begun shifting their money and attention to other contests, including most recently to Kansas.

But Plouffe said North Carolina needs to remain a priority.

“We have to win the ones we have to win,” he said on the call to Cooper’s finance committee.

Just days before Plouffe’s remarks, Senate Democrats’ top super PAC pulled back some of its spending in North Carolina, following a much bigger retreat by Republicans’ top super PAC in the state.

Plouffe cautioned that North Carolina has historically been a tough state for Democrats at the federal level, especially in recent years. The party hasn’t won a Senate race there since 2008, when Obama became the last Democratic presidential candidate to carry the state, winning by fewer than 15,000 votes. He lost the state in 2012.

“Even though we carried the electoral votes back then, we only did so by I think 14,000 votes. So it was our narrowest victory,” Plouffe said. “And in 2012, we tried to win North Carolina again with the help of so many people on this phone, and we just couldn’t get it done. And that tells you how difficult the state is.”

Plouffe also cast the stakes of Cooper’s race as extending beyond November, arguing that a Cooper victory could provide a blueprint for the party’s eventual 2028 presidential nominee.

“Democrats need to compete and win in North Carolina in 28,” he said. “And it’s one thing to look how a governor can win a state. The best route, the best scout that you receive, is how someone in a federal race won in a tough state, and that can show you the way.”