Congress

K Street rakes in hundreds of millions off of Trump upheaval

Published

8 months ago

October 22, 2025

Some of Washington’s biggest lobbying firms raked in unprecedented amounts of cash last quarter. But it’s the upstart firms with ties to President Donald Trump or his administration that have been drowning in lobbying fees, lapping their more established rivals on K Street as Trump’s second term continues to scramble the hierarchy of the influence industry.

Ballard Partners led the charge with more than $25 million in lobbying revenues in the third quarter, shattering the firm’s previous record of $20.7 million the previous quarter. Clients flocked to the firm that once counted White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and Attorney General Pam Bondi as employees.

Ballard’s phenomenal growth — the firm is set to add 5,000 square feet of new office space in the coming weeks, despite previously having moved into larger offices in the last few years — is another indicator of a transformation of lobbying in Trump’s second term. The biggest winners aren’t the massive law and lobbying firms that have pulled together deep benches of bipartisan lobbyists with extensive policy expertise and ties to Blue Light News and party establishment.

Those carefully curated rosters, aimed at insulating firms from the whiplash of transitions in political power, are being supplanted in value by the consolidation of federal authority within the West Wing — and the select group of firms that might be able to get a foot in the door.

“The industry is in an adjustment year as lobbying needs have changed under the Trump administration in a way not normal for a ‘new’ President,” John Raffaelli, a longtime Democratic lobbyist and founder of the lobbying firm Capitol Counsel, wrote in an email.

Ballard is perhaps the biggest winner of all. The firm signed roughly three dozen new clients during the third quarter, including one of Brazil’s top business lobbies, the Swiss watchmaker Breitling, the city of Miami and the Port of Long Beach. It collected six-figure payments from over 80 clients, according to a Blue Light News analysis of disclosures and reported holding three of the most lucrative lobbying contracts on K Street last quarter.

The runner-up last quarter was a decades-old mainstay of the D.C. lobbying world, but one that touts its own ties to the White House.

BGR Group, which employs Trump adviser David Urban and previously employed Transportation Secretary (and acting NASA Chief) Sean Duffy, reported $19.2 million in lobbying revenues in Q3 — up from $17.7 million in Q2 and $11.4 million a year ago.

“Every one of our policy practice areas has got something big going on,” said Loren Monroe, a principal at BGR. He pointed to the firm’s leading health care practice, whose clients include marquee drug lobbies, health systems, pharmaceutical companies, pharmacies, patient groups and providers.

The firm also represents top targets of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again movement, including pesticide companies and giant food conglomerates. It has signed up elite universities whose federal funding has been frozen, crypto firms looking for a light regulatory touch and defense companies seeking business.

BGR leapfrogged two of K Street’s more recent leaders, Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck and Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, which respectively took in $18.9 million and $16.3 million in lobbying revenue last quarter.

Another firm with close ties to the White House, Miller Strategies, jumped into the top five with $14.1 million last quarter, up from $2.9 million a year ago. Miller Strategies is led by Jeff Miller, a top GOP fundraiser who served as one of the finance chairs for Trump’s second inauguration.

When it comes to Trump’s impact on the lobbying industry, the rising tide has lifted most boats.

Brownstein’s third quarter earnings were still a firm record, and while Akin’s numbers were down slightly from the previous quarter, the firm had its best third quarter ever.

Across the top 20 firms by revenue, 14 shops saw their revenue rise by double digit percentages or more, according to the Blue Light News analysis and numbers provided by the firms.

Of the top 20, only Forbes Tate Partners and Capitol Counsel saw their lobbying income decline compared to the same time a year ago — and those decreases were minuscule, coming in at 0.3 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively.

“I think for a traditional bipartisan shop we have managed this well,” said Raffaelli, whose firm reported a 2.3 percent increase in revenues compared to the second quarter.

Another Trump-linked firm that has capitalized is Continental Strategy, which was started in 2021 by former Trump administration official Carlos Trujillo. The firm’s lobbyists include former Trump campaign aides and former top aides to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Continental reported $8.3 million in lobbying fees in Q3, compared to nearly $400,000 during the same period last year.

A person familiar with the firm’s thinking said that Continental hasn’t needed to do much outbound client prospecting to fuel its boom in business. New business has been driven more by referrals from existing clients, according to the person, who was granted anonymity to discuss business dynamics.

“Our growth isn’t driven by any specific policies or issues — it’s clients seeking us out for our reputation and the talent we have assembled,” Trujillo said in a statement.

Other firms that saw big increases are Checkmate Government Relations, which is led by Trump family friend Ches McDowell; Mercury Public Affairs, a bipartisan shop that’s been in D.C. for over two decades, but which was Wiles’ most recent K Street home before going into the administration; and Michael Best Strategies, which is led by Trump’s first White House chief of staff Reince Priebus.

(For the full third-quarter rankings of lobbying firms, read (and sign up for) POLITICO Influence, our newsletter on all things K Street.)

A tariff lobbying bonanza

The gold rush on K Street comes despite the fact that Trump signed the year’s shining legislative achievement — the reconciliation package permanently extending prized tax cuts, gutting clean energy incentives, slashing funding for safety net programs and unlocking billions of dollars for an immigration enforcement — just four days into the quarter.

The third quarter tends to be sleepier for lobbyists because the city clears out for the August recess. But any concerns about an end-of-summer slump did not come to pass.

“I said to someone the other day that if your lobbyist is telling you that nothing is happening in Washington because of the shutdown or because of gridlock or because of August recess … you are missing the forest for the trees,” Monroe quipped.

Efforts to shape how the megabill is implemented are now underway at the agency level. Beyond that, lobbyists repeatedly cited the frenetic pace of activity in the executive branch — on trade in particular — as one of the top drivers of business last quarter.

Brian Pomper, a partner at Akin, said that Trump’s trade policy “has prompted clients from virtually every industry to seek counsel” from the firm’s roster of trade lobbyists, which includes a top trade official from Trump’s first term along with former House Ways and Means Chair Kevin Brady.

The firm has signed more than two dozen new clients this year to work on trade or tariff issues, disclosures show. They include steel giant Alcoa, Volvo North America, retailers Ralph Lauren and Tiffany & Co., Kimberly-Clark Corporation and Driscoll’s.

Tariffs were mentioned as a specific area of focus in 350 lobbying disclosures last quarter — triple the number of disclosures that listed tariff policy during the third quarter of 2024.

Even though the chaos that marked the initial rollout of Trump’s so-called reciprocal tariffs in the spring has died down somewhat, K Street will be glued to next month’s Supreme Court proceedings to determine whether Trump’s broad tariffs are illegal.

One lobbyist even went so far as to suggest that anxiety surrounding the tariff litigation has exceeded the uncertainty leading up to Trump’s unveiling of the tariffs, dubbed “Liberation Day” by the president.

Not even a government shutdown has managed to dampen lobbying activity.

Though it has snarled efforts to set up meetings for clients across the government, lobbyists are now working to tweak their game plans for convincing lawmakers to use their dwindling floor time to prioritize their clients’ top issues. There’s a whole host of issues vying for that time: appropriations, a defense reauthorization, tax extenders, technical corrections to the reconciliation bill, crypto regulations, health reforms, AI, permitting or another issue entirely.

“We need to look past the shutdown,” said Will Moschella, who co-leads Brownstein’s lobbying practice. “Because that ultimately is going to resolve itself.”

Congress

Johnson-backed plan to combine Pentagon and election bills advances to floor

Published

21 minutes ago

June 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The House Rules Committee advanced a procedural measure aimed at breaking an intra-Republican deadlock Monday night. But GOP leaders are still facing a major battle Tuesday to regain control of the House floor.

The panel approved on party lines a measure to set up Republicans’ $1.1 trillion defense policy bill, a government funding bill and other GOP bills for floor debate. It would then combine the Pentagon bill, once passed, with the contentious elections overhaul known as the SAVE America Act and send it to the Senate as one piece of legislation.

That maneuver, telegraphed by Speaker Mike Johnson earlier Monday, is aimed at appeasing House GOP hard-liners who have blockaded the floor, demanding the Senate pass the elections bill that has languished there for months.

However, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, the Republican leading the blockade, said in an interview Monday before the Rules Committee acted that Johnson’s plan is not sufficient — raising the possibility she and allies could vote down the measure on the floor. Other House GOP hard-liners say there are other outstanding issues to battle over Tuesday.

Rep. James McGovern of Massachusetts, the top Rules Democrat, called the merger move “a big waste of time.” The panel voted down a motion by McGovern to remove the provision to combine the two bills in a party-line vote.

The Senate is set to debate its own version of the defense bill next month, and it is likely that the elections overhaul will be removed in negotiations between the two chambers — as McGovern acknowledged Monday and House GOP leaders privately concede.

“The Senate will just strip the SAVE Act out,” he said at the meeting. “There is a zero percent chance SAVE ends up in the [Pentagon bill] because of this rule today.”

The defense bill faces a tight vote if Republicans can pass the procedural measure. Most Democrats are expected to oppose the measure over its massive price tag, which they contend is wasteful.

The panel is set up debate on 312 amendments to the bill. The slate includes GOP measures to codify a Trump executive order to block transgender people from serving in the military, prohibit coverage of gender-affirming care, block aid to arm Ukraine and strip Democratic-backed protections for collective bargaining for Pentagon civilian workers.

The committee also voted down Democratic proposals to slash $150 billion from the bill’s topline and limit the war against Iran.

Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.

Congress

Pentagon and elections bills could be combined in bid to unfreeze House floor

Published

3 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Speaker Mike Johnson said Monday he plans to deploy an unusual procedural maneuver in a bid to unfreeze the House floor this week, seeking to send the annual Pentagon policy bill and the GOP elections bill known as the SAVE America Act to the Senate in a single package.

That is likely a recipe for a continued standoff between the two chambers over the SAVE America Act, which has stalled in the Senate for months due to internal GOP divides. Under Johnson’s plan, the annual defense policy bill, which typically passes every year with large bipartisan majorities, could become a collateral victim of the impasse.

Asked in brief interview if he had talked to Senate Majority Leader John Thune about his plans, Johnson replied, “I have to do my job in the House, and they’ve got to do their job in the Senate, so we’ll see what happens.”

Johnson is seeking to placate House conservative hard-liners, led by Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, who have threatened to oppose the procedural measures that give Republicans control of the floor unless they agree to tougher tactics meant to force the Senate into passing the elections bill.

House GOP leaders discussed the plan to merge the two bills over the weekend as Luna pushed to amend the defense bill directly.

She did not say in an interview Monday whether Johnson’s gambit would suffice: “We want it baked together, not able to be stripped out,” she said.

But the Senate is free to work its own will, and members of that chamber are likely to reject any defense bill that has the partisan elections bill attached. That would set the stage for GOP leaders to strip it out when the House and Senate hash out the differences between their competing Pentagon bills later this year.

Johnson, meanwhile, is pushing a separate plan to pass a slimmed-down version of the SAVE America Act through the party-line budget reconciliation process — an option hard-liners have all but rejected.

“I don’t think that that can be done,” Luna told reporters Monday.

He’s also facing another complication: The version of the SAVE America Act he is proposing to attach to the Pentagon bill doesn’t include the latest demands for the bill from President Donald Trump — including a near-total ban on mail voting that is opposed by many Republicans.

Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.

Congress

Top Trump officials face bipartisan questions in first all-member Iran briefings

Published

4 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Lawmakers of both parties questioned Secretary of State Marco Rubio and top Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff Monday in the first broad congressional briefings on President Donald Trump’s Iran deal.

While Democrats asked some of the sharpest questions, participants in an afternoon conference call with House members said, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) at one point pressed the administration officials on the fate of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium.

According to two people granted anonymity to disclose the private remarks, Witkoff and Rubio repeated assurances the administration has privately made to select lawmakers in prior briefings — that the goal is to negotiate a final deal that would prohibit Iran from keeping its highly enriched uranium.

The memorandum of understanding Trump signed earlier this month, they said, was meant to launch those negotiations. Witkoff, the people said, added that the technical team involved in that part of the talks was traveling from Switzerland to Qatar, where talks between the U.S. and Iran are set to happen Tuesday.

Democrats, meanwhile, pushed the administration for more details on what financial benefits Iran could reap under the memorandum — including proceeds from previously sanctioned oil sales.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) went back and forth with Rubio and Witkoff over the lifting of the oil sanctions, two other people granted anonymity on the House call said. The officials eventually cut off the conversation and ended the call.

At another point, Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) raised concerns about Witkoff’s business interests in the Middle East as he’s negotiating with Iran, prompting a sharp defense from Rubio, those people said.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer asked Rubio and Witkoff about the oil sanctions during a separate all-senators call Monday, saying in a statement afterward that they “confirmed to me that Iran will reap billions in oil revenue while retaining dangerous leverage over the Strait of Hormuz.”

“If this is the administration’s defense behind closed doors, Secretary Rubio should make it under oath, in public, before the Foreign Relations Committee,” Schumer added, calling the briefing “delayed, deficient, and devoid of details.”

An administration official granted anonymity to speak candidly countered on Schumer’s characterization, noting that he had previously gotten a briefing of the deal as part of a group of top leaders engaged on national security matters. Schumer, the official said, had the opportunity to ask multiple follow-up questions on the Senate call.

A separate group of White House officials briefed top congressional leaders and key committee chairs in a classified briefing in the Capitol later Monday.

The administration has faced bipartisan skepticism over multiple provisions of the memorandum of understanding — particularly the lifting of oil sanctions and a $300 billion reconstruction fund that many Senate Republicans fear will help fuel Iran’s military and regional proxies.

Rubio and Witkoff sought to ease concerns about the slow reopening of the Strait of Hormuz — the critical trade route whose closure has sparked higher fuel and fertilizer costs. Both officials said more mine removal is required, and Witkoff indicated that Iran broke the terms of the Trump-signed deal by launching a drone attack on a passing ship over the weekend.

They also sought to assure lawmakers that Iran has received no money under the memorandum — especially not directly from American sources. Administration officials have previously pledged in smaller briefings that the reconstruction fund won’t include U.S. funds.

Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) called the Senate briefing a “productive conversation” but said “much of what I heard today is similar to what I heard last week” during a dinner at Vice President JD Vance’s residence.