Politico: “As Trump prepared to sign his administration’s ethics pledge in 2017, he joked that ‘most of the people standing behind me will not be able to go to work’ on K Street. Yet one of the people standing behind him — then-White House chief of staff Reince Priebus — is now the chairman of a lobbying firm that’s hired several other former White House aides, two of whom have registered as lobbyists.”

“Rick Dearborn, who served as a White House deputy chief of staff, is now a lobbyist for clients such as MetLife and Verizon. Chiefs of staff from Vice President Mike Pence’s office, the State Department, the Treasury Department, the Health and Human Services Department, the Transportation Department, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, and the Environmental Protection Agency have all been absorbed by the influence industry, though not all of them have registered as lobbyists.”

“Forty lobbyists with ties to President Trump helped clients secure more than $10 billion in federal coronavirus aid, among them five former administration officials whose work potentially violates Trump’s own ethics policy,” the AP reports.

“The lobbyists identified Monday by the watchdog group Public Citizen either worked in the Trump executive branch, served on his campaign, were part of the committee that raised money for inaugural festivities or were part of his presidential transition. Many are donors to Trump’s campaigns, and some are prolific fundraisers for his reelection.”

“Jack Abramoff, the onetime Washington insider who went to prison in a lobbying scandal, was charged with a criminal conspiracy related to crypto currency and lobbying disclosure,” Bloomberg reports.

“Abramoff has agreed to plead guilty and faces as long as five years in prison.”

Washington Post: “As lobbyists blitz Washington for a piece of the massive federal response to the global pandemic, a group of former Trump administration officials and campaign alumni are in the center of the action, helping private interests tap into coveted financial and regulatory relief programs.”

“An Associated Press analysis of federal lobbying filings shows the number of companies and organizations hiring lobbyists shot up dramatically across the months of February, March and early April. Of the more than 700 registrations filed since the beginning of the year, at least 70 specifically mention the new virus, COVID-19 or a global health crisis. Dozens of other lobbyists and firms who were previously retained list the virus or the stimulus legislation in recent quarterly lobbying reports.”

“And there has also been a stark increase in medical groups, drug makers and others connected to the medical industry who have hired lobbyists, even if the virus was not specifically given as a reason in the disclosures.”

New York Times: “The prospect of a bailout of a scale without precedent has set off a rush to the fiscal trough, with businesses enduring undeniable dislocation jostling with more opportunistic interests to ensure they get a share.”

“While the halls of the Capitol are eerily quiet, lobbyists are burning up the phone lines and flooding email inboxes trying to capitalize on the stimulus bills moving quickly through Congress.”

Washington Post: “FBI agents investigating a lobbyist who has claimed to have close ties to President Trump and his family searched the man’s Northern Virginia home and D.C. office early Thursday looking for evidence of possible fraud.”

“Lobbyists either helped draft or made extensive revisions to opinion columns published by three state lawmakers in a way that warned against the dangers of Medicare-for-all and other government involvement in health care,” according to the Washington Post.

“Montana state Rep. Kathy Kelker (D) and Sen. Jen Gross (D) acknowledged in interviews that editorials they published separately about the single-payer health proposal included language provided by John MacDonald, a lobbyist and consultant in the state who disclosed in private emails that he worked for an unnamed client.”

President Trump distanced himself from “a man named Michael Esposito” in a series of tweets this morning.

The Washington Post notes Esposito’s soaring rise as a lobbyist is due to his claims to be “close to centers of power in the Trump administration.”

Contract bids says Esposito has “an open line of communication to the President of the United States” and is in “regular” contact with the president. The same proposals say Esposito worked with the president’s son Eric Trump and son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner on real estate deals. And the firm’s website calls Esposito “an integral part of the senior-most leadership” of the Republican National Committee.

Former White House counsel Greg Craig was acquitted by a federal jury on Wednesday on a felony false-statement charge, a major vindication for one of the most prominent lawyers in Washington, the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The acquittal lifts a pall over Mr. Craig’s otherwise distinguished career at the upper echelons of law and politics, and represents a major setback for the Justice Department, which sought to make an example of Mr. Craig as it ramped up its enforcement of the laws governing work on behalf of foreign governments.”