Private Lobbyist Firms

Private Lobbyist Firms
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Lobbying is an act whereby the decisions made by the legislators, government officials or regulatory agencies members, are influenced. Numerous distinguished organized groups and people, as well as persons in corporations, private sector, advocacy groups, fellow government officials or legislators perform the lobbying practice. The people, who are lobbyists professionally, are the kind whose business attempts to impact legislation in place of an individual or a group, which wires them. The nonprofit organizations and individuals may as well lobby by means of volunteering or as a portion of their usual job. In many occasions, governments regulate and define lobbying of the organized group that has emerged as quite influential. The private lobbyist firms bear the duty of convincing the members of congress to either defeat or pass legislation. The lobbyist work for labor unions, agencies of executive branch, business corporations, public or private interest groups, foreign government among others (Benette, 2013). The private lobbyist firms work around the clock in the corridors and the lobbies that surround the Senate chamber and the House, intercepting members as well as arguing the case of their client. Moreover, the private lobbyists work with various government officials such as senators, state assembly members and administrators.
Lobbyists therefore, are often lawyers who mediate between the lawmakers and client organizations. Their duty is to explain to legislators the requirements of their organizations, as well as the obstacles faced by the elected officials to their clients. In short, the lobbyists perform a duty of persuading the legislators to approve legislation that will assist the employer of the lobbyist. Most private lobbyist retain clients from outside the lobbying, while others work for trade associations, advocacy groups, local governments, state and companies. In some cases lobbyists may be retired governors, Senators or other government official who offer their services privately rather than stay idle. They combine diverse coalitions of people and organizations, sometimes entailing corporations and lawmakers, thus the entire process being considered a lobby. There has been numerous numbers of upcoming lobbyists especially in Washington where a past record showed that the registered lobbyist were around twelve thousand. However, an issue hindered the new lobbyists from establishing themselves. It is said that Washington bears great barriers to entry because the firms wishing to enter into lobbying business since they are required to be established in a long time and be familiar to the halls of congress (Harris & Fleisher, 2005).
Lobbyists are known to be knowledgeable about the whole process of legislation and are aware of the decision makers in relation to congressional Members and staff of Congress. They as well offer a hand in presentation and preparation of information, prepare testimonies for hearings of the congress, put in order, and are present at the congressional staff meetings. The lobbyists work hand in hand with the almost all government categories officials in distinguished departments and issues. This is meant to cause a positive influence on decision makers in order to affect the process. Private lobbyists in numerous cases serve as a congressional office staff extension. Considering the amendments of hundreds of bills that are introduced in each legislative session, it is not possible for the legislators to weigh the potential effects, which may bear on affected individuals or groups. They work with or for government officials and help staff by communicating the most complicated issues and they bear the knowledge of how to break a certain issue into simple and relatively small parts. Their motive in doing this is to make the learning process simple for the congressional staff individual or Member, as they offer them timely and accurate information. Thus, the private lobbyists carry a very crucial task of valuable service to both the client and Members of Congress.
In addition, the success of the lobbyists depends on their ability to offer competent services by maintaining a perfect credibility and reputation. The lobbyists who attempt to give false information of bad advice to congress are noted quickly and are not easily forgotten. This could cause them damage, as they are not likely to get jobs since an individual receives a single chance to make an error and when that happens, they loose the credibility of necessary success. The lobbyists help the government officials to stretch out or make known their needs and petitions to the Member of congress. Since they are perfect in what they do, the private lobbyists ensure that their assignment is clean and that their arguments contain basis. They work around the clock to ensure that the government officials such as the Senators need stay high on the agenda. This happens as they provide solid and unquestionable arguments that they already prepared prior to the congress meeting.
The competent lobbyists mostly manage to convince the congress about their clients’ needs without much strain and there is always a positive outcome. It’s always advisable for the sake of credibility for the lobbyists to have representation, without which the client may be left with serious disadvantage. The services of lobbyists are a great necessity due to time constraints, the competitors’ work, the complexity of issues and the workload in a particular congressional office. The lobbyist makes sure that the others in their representations do not outsmart them. The clients, who could be the members of national assembly, Senators, administrators among others present the impressive applications to federal group. In order to ensure that the application receives proper attention, it is good to ask for the letter of support from the Members of Congress. The lobbyists make drafts letters termed as letters of support and present them to the staff or Member. They afterwards ask the Member or the staff to send the letter to the particular agency. In addition, the congressional offices go through important demands on their own time. This would mean that if they get more help from outside, they are likely to have better chances of getting the response they need. This is called assistance in support letter preparation and is an effective method.
Alternatively, clients may look for a direct federal appropriation that funds a specific requirement or need. The private lobbyists frequently offer assistance to congressional offices that have information that must be presented to the rightful federal agency that is responsible for funding approval, or the congressional committee. When individuals have office in states like Washington, it enables the congressional staff to access locally available contacts. The lobbyists do the walking on behalf of the congressional staff that cannot be able to do it because of lack of adequate time....