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With Daniel Lippman

WATCH THIS SPACE: We still don’t know who will control the House next year (though Democrats’ odds are getting longer by the day) but lobbyists on K Street see a pair of important constituencies emerging from both congressional chambers’ slim majorities.

— The thin margins will certainly hand the ruling party’s more partisan wings great leverage to gum up the legislative process. But typically more business-friendly, centrist lawmakers on both sides of the aisle stand to play a major role in policy battles à la Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) over the past two years — potentially granting industry a reprieve.

— “On my side of the aisle, everyone wants to talk about the Freedom Caucus, your side of the aisle, everyone wants to talk about the Squad,” the Vogel Group’s Matt Keelen said during a post-election webinar with his colleague Brad Howard this morning, referring to the conservative and liberal House rabble rousers, respectively.

— “But I think the two groups that are really going to be important going forward in both caucuses are the more Main Street, moderate [Republicans] or Blue Dog Democrats,” Keelen said of the centrist GOP group the Main Street Caucus and its Democratic counterpart, the latter of which played a major role last year in pushing to break Democrats’ first social spending and climate bill apart from the bipartisan infrastructure bill.

— “I think there’s some groups like the Problem Solvers Caucus that might be able to bring the country together and talk about issues where we can all agree on,” he added of the bipartisan centrist coalition. Howard, who was most recently chief of staff to outgoing Blue Dogs leader Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), concurred, calling the Blue Dogs “the strongest they’ve ever been.”

— "The Republican Speaker's going to have to turn to moderate Democrats to get things done. At that point, the Blue Dogs have incredible leverage," he said, adding that dynamic could also boost President Joe Biden's possible reelection bid by showcasing his ability to govern.

— Meanwhile in his team’s latest slide deck dissecting the election results, Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas’ Bruce Mehlman warned that Republicans could hold the smallest House majority since the early 1930s, empowering factions within the party. Still, the firm is advising clients to remain engaged in Washington “because bipartisanship remains alive if not well,” Mehlman told PI, and to get to know new members “before they need their help.”

— Right on cue, Main Street Caucus co-Chair Don Bacon (R-Neb.) this afternoon pushed back on demands the Freedom Caucus is seeking in exchange for their votes for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s bid for House Speaker, POLITICO’s Olivia Beavers reports.

Good afternoon and welcome to PI. Keep your post-midterm takes coming: [email protected]. And be sure to follow me on Twitter: @caitlinoprysko.

GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN: Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a new cache of documents today detailing hundreds of thousands of dollars in spending by foreign governments at former President Donald Trump’s since-sold Washington hotel at times when the countries were seeking to influence Trump’s administration.

— The new documents, which were turned over to the committee by Trump’s former accounting firm, show “officials from six nations spent more than $750,000” at the hotel during just part of his presidency, “renting rooms for more than $10,000 per night,” The New York Times’ Luke Broadwater and Eric Lipton report.

— “The governments of Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and China spent more money than previously known at the Trump International Hotel at crucial times in 2017 and 2018 for those countries’ relations with the United States, according to the documents,” and once there, “the officials spent freely at the hotel, the records show.”

— “The Malaysian prime minister, for instance, hired a $1,500 personal trainer during his stay at the Trump hotel in 2017. The Saudi Ministry of Defense rented several suites, costing $10,500 each, with rooms reserved under the name ‘His Excellency.’ Qatari officials spent more than $300,000 there in the weeks leading up to a meeting with Mr. Trump in 2018.”

— “The documents build on the public record of how Mr. Trump’s hotel brought in millions during his presidency from foreign governments. The Oversight Committee has previously estimated that the hotel received more than $3.75 million from foreign governments from 2017 to 2020, raising concerns about possible violations of the Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause.”

APROPOS OF NOTHING: “U.S. intelligence officials have compiled a classified report detailing extensive efforts to manipulate the American political system by the United Arab Emirates, an influential, oil-rich nation in the Persian Gulf long considered a close and trusted partner,” The Washington Post’s John Hudson reports.

— “It reveals the UAE’s bid, spanning multiple U.S. administrations, to exploit the vulnerabilities in American governance, including its reliance on campaign contributions, susceptibility to powerful lobbying firms and lax enforcement of disclosure laws intended to guard against interference by foreign governments, these people said.”

— The National Intelligence Council document was “briefed to top U.S. policymakers in recent weeks to guide their decision-making related to the Middle East and the UAE, which enjoys outsize influence in Washington.” The UAE is, of course, “far from alone in using aggressive tactics to try to bend the U.S. political system to its liking. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Israel, Taiwan and scores of other governments run influence campaigns in the United States in an effort to impact U.S. policy.”

— “But the intelligence community’s scrutiny of the UAE indicates a heightened level of concern and a dramatic departure from the laudatory way the country is discussed in public by U.S. secretaries of state and defense and presidents, who routinely emphasize the ‘importance of further deepening the U.S.-UAE strategic relationship’” — as defense attorneys for Tom Barrack sought to highlight during his illegal foreign lobbying trial in New York.

MEIJER’S LEGISLATIVE DIRECTOR HEADS TO THE CHAMBER: Maggie Woodin is now manager of federal affairs for the Great Lakes Region at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. She was most recently legislative director for Rep. Peter Meijer (R-Mich.), who was defeated in a primary this year. Before that, she was an aide to Reps. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.).

ELECTION OBJECTORS RAKED IN CORPORATE CASH: “Corporate PACs and industry trade groups poured more than $61 million into the leadership PACs and campaigns of election objectors during the 2022 election cycle,” OpenSecrets’ Anna Massoglia and Keith Newell report.

— “In addition to more than $52 million campaign contributions, business PACs poured another $9 million into leadership PACs affiliated with those members of Congress who voted against the certification of 2020 election results amid the U.S. Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021.”

— “The business PACs that contributed most to election objectors were trade associations including the National Association of Realtors with $861,000 to 127 members of what critics have dubbed the ‘Sedition Caucus.’” The trade group told OpenSecrets its PAC suspended all federal political donations after the insurrection “but that the pause was lifted several months later ‘to ensure the association could engage in a nonpartisan way on behalf of members and consumers.’”

— “Other top business PAC funders of election objectors’ include the National Beer Wholesalers Association with $744,500 to 121 members and the American Bankers Association with $668,500 to 110 members. Corporate PACs affiliated with AT&T Inc. and Koch Industries also contributed more than $500,000 to election objectors’ campaigns during the 2022 cycle include.”

— Madeleine Westerhout is now executive director for operations at American Global Strategies. She most recently was executive assistant to the CEO of Starch Creative and is a Trump White House and RNC alum.

— Nick Buffie has joined the Progressive Policy Institute as a senior policy analyst for PPI’s Center for Funding America’s Future. He was previously a tax and budget policy analyst at the Center for American Progress and is a Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden campaign alum.

— Greg Portner has been promoted to senior vice president for global government affairs and policy at Amgen. He’ll succeed Victoria Blatter, who is retiring at the end of the year.

— Andrew Szente is joining Dell’s Washington office. He was most recently associate director for government affairs at Best Buy.

— Sarah Peck is joining GoFundMe as senior director of public affairs. She most recently was comms director and a deputy assistant secretary at DHS and is a Tim Kaine and Hillary Clinton 2016 campaign alum.

— Angela Chiappetta is now senior vice president for business development at Direct Impact/BCW Global. She previously was managing director for business development at Rational 360.

— Haley Scott will be chief of staff for Rep.-elect Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.). Scott was most recently a vice president at BerlinRosen.

None.

Boarder Security PAC (Super PAC)
Georgia Equality Project PAC (Hybrid PAC)
GEORGIA LIBERTY COALITION PAC (Super PAC)
H.R. McMaster for President (PAC)
Millennial Congress Committee AKA The Congress for a Millennial Society (Super PAC)
Move Any Mountain (PAC)
Neology Inc Employee Political Action Committee (NeoPAC) (PAC)
Relay (Super PAC)
Restore Roe PAC (Hybrid PAC)
SAVE CHICAGO (Leadership PAC: Juan Aguirre)
The Urban Option (PAC)
We Will Defend This PAC (PAC)

None.

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