FARA FRIDAY: India’s government has added Ferox Strategies to the ranks of its Washington lobbying firms. Ferox will provide “strategic counsel, tactical planning and government relations assistance before the U.S. Government, the U.S. Congress, and select state governments, as well as academic institutions and think-tanks,” according to a copy of the contract, which runs through June 30.
— India is the third foreign government that the firm, which the former Podesta Group lobbyist Cristina Antelo started in 2018, has signed in recent months. Ferox registered in February to represent Argentina’s government and Ecuador’s Ministry of Production, Foreign Trade, Investments and Fisheries, working for both clients as a subcontractor to Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer.
— Here’s another Foreign Agents Registration Act filing that caught our eye. Rory Murphy, a lobbyist at Squire Patton Boggs who represents Angola’s government, sent an email to an aide to Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) on Monday asking if Phillips might be willing to ask a question on the lobbyist’s behalf at a hearing on climate change that the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Africa, global health and global human rights subcommittee was set to hold the next day.
— The question was about an American company, Sun Africa, that “recently broke ground in Angola on what will be the largest solar facility in Sub-Saharan Africa,” as Murphy wrote in the email. He suggested Phillips describe the project as “a good example of how smart US policy can be good for the climate, good for US jobs, and good for countries like Angola.” The suggested question: “As the world takes on the challenge posed by climate change, what more can the United States do to support critical projects in Sub-Saharan Africa?”
— Robert Kapla, a Squire Patton Boggs lobbyist heading up the firm’s work for Angola, said the suggested question was part of a broader effort to communicate to lawmakers the reforms Angola is making to its economy. Angolan President João Lourenço is “very pro-American and very eager to attract American investment,” he said in an interview. Unfortunately for the lobbyists, it appears Phillips didn’t ask the question since he didn’t end up going to the hearing, which was held virtually.
FOR THOSE WITH FARA QUESTIONS: Insider’s Dave Levinthal (a PI alum) and C. Ryan Barber have a helpful primer as Rudy Giuliani faces questions about whether he violated the law. “FARA is definitely having its moment in the spotlight now,” Robert Kelner of Covington & Burling told Insider.
Good afternoon and welcome to PI. I’m filling in for Caitlin, who’s off today. She’ll be back at the helm on Monday. Here’s Wallace Stevens to send you into the weekend. Tips: [email protected] and [email protected]. You can also follow us both on Twitter: @theodoricmeyer and @caitlinoprysko.
POUR ONE OUT FOR TURNBERRY: Turnberry Solutions is no more. The lobbying firm — started in 2017 by two veterans of Avenue Strategies, the lobbying shop that Corey Lewandowski co-founded after President Donald Trump’s election — deregistered its last 11 lobbying clients on Thursday. Jason Osborne, one of Turnberry’s co-founders, registered eight of them with a new firm, Connect Strategy, on the same day, according to disclosure filings. (For those keeping score, Avenue also closed up shop recently.)
— “After the results of the election, with a new Congress coming in, Corey and I made the decision that he was going to focus more on political work, and I am continuing to focus on lobbying, which is what I’ve done for 25 years,” Osborne told Mother Jones. (Turnberry was run out of the Capitol Hill rowhouse where Lewandowski stayed while he was in Washington; Lewandowski formally joined the firm as a senior adviser in 2019.) Osborne confirmed to PI that Turnberry would shut down.
WHAT MEHLMAN’S CLIENTS ARE READING: Bruce Mehlman of Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas sent this memo to his firm’s clients advising them on what to expect in President Joe Biden’s next hundred days. There’s a useful chart showing the cost of the New Deal, President Barack Obama’s stimulus bill and Biden’s American Rescue Plan, American Jobs Plan and American Family Plan, among other major legislation, by percentage of GDP.
IF YOU MISSED IT THIS MORNING: An internal Google email leaked to POLITICO’s Emily Birnbaum provides more insight into the ties between Adam Kovacevich, a former Google policy executive who now runs the new tech company-funded group Chamber of Progress, and his former employer. David Lopez, a strategic outreach manager with Google’s government affairs team, emailed Google employees on Thursday urging them to tell their friends that Chamber of Progress is hiring for new positions.
— “P.S.,” Lopez wrote at the end of the email. “While I know many of you have an existing relationship with Adam on all sorts of priority issues, please feel free to let me know if there is ever something I can put on his radar. … We maintain a regular line of communication and I’d be happy to help facilitate.”
— It’s not unusual, of course, for industry groups to communicate with the corporations that fund them. “Of course we have discussions with groups we are a part of, like coalitions — sometimes we agree with their positions and sometimes we don’t,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda told POLITICO.
Claudia Tenney for Congress Victory Fund (Rep. Claudia Tenney, Tenacious PAC, NY Republican Federal Campaign Committee, NRCC)
A Better Portland (PAC)
I Am Human (Leadership PAC: David Russ)
Lose Cruz PAC (Super PAC)
Patriotic Utah (PAC)
Proudly We Hail (PAC)
Tabacalera USA Inc. Political Action Committee (PAC)
Ample, Inc: Ample Inc
Bold Strategies, LLC: University Of New Orleans Research And Technology Foundation
Calfee Strategic Solutions: Chamberlin & Associates
Calfee Strategic Solutions: GBX Group LLC
Cassidy & Associates, Inc.: Bradley University
Cassidy & Associates, Inc.: Donlin Gold
Cassidy & Associates, Inc.: Lunar Energy
Cassidy & Associates, Inc.: Neogenomics Laboratories
Cassidy & Associates, Inc.: Perpetua Resources
Cogent Strategies LLC: First Solar Inc.
Connect Strategy LLC: Big Cat Rescue
Connect Strategy LLC: Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
Connect Strategy LLC: Garner Environmental Services
Connect Strategy LLC: Harvey Gulf International Marine
Connect Strategy LLC: Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of San Francisco Bay Area
Connect Strategy LLC: Northern Marianas Business Alliance
Connect Strategy LLC: Redhorse Corporation
Connect Strategy LLC: Turn Therapeutics
Forza DC Strategies, LLC: National Veterans Memorial and Museum
Freeport-McMoRan Inc.: Freeport-McMoRan Inc.
Holland & Knight LLP: Aya Healthcare
Holland & Knight LLP: Business Valuation Resources, LLC
Holland & Knight LLP: Essence Consulting, Inc. D/B/A Essence Patient Solutions
Holland & Knight LLP: Reforma Strategies, LLC (on behalf of Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco)
James W Segel LLC: Surtreat Solutions
Jim Dornan Strategies: Kurdish Defense Forces/YPG SDF
Lewis-Burke Associates, LLC: Education Reform Now Advocay [sic]
Mercury Strategies, LLC: Intelsat US LLC F/K/A Intelsat Corporation
MLJ Strategies: Ankura Consulting Group, LLC on behalf of Vita Inclinata Technologies, Inc.
Monument Advocacy: iHeartMedia, Inc.
Potomac Partners DC: Galveston Wharves
Potomac Partners DC: Town of Longboat Key
The Burnham Group LLC: Epicentre Alliance
Venable LLP: Standard Industries
Mr. Dan Perrin: American Bankers Association
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Big Cat Rescue
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Elevate Textiles
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Garner Environmental Services
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Kazi Investment Group
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of San Francisco Bay Area
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Northern Mariana Business Alliance
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Redhorse Corporation
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: T-Mobile USA, Inc.
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Transit Labs
Turnberry Solutions, LLC: Turn Therapeutics
