Special-interest money helped pay for lawmakers' portraits - USATODAY.com

Special-interest money helped pay for lawmakers' portraits - USATODAY.com

WASHINGTON — At a ceremony this month, an official painting of California Rep. Jerry Lewis will be installed in the room where the Republican once presided over the House Appropriations Committee.

Nearly three-quarters of the money raised for the portrait came from special-interest groups with business before Congress, federal records show.



The portrait is another example of how lobbyists and the groups that employ them spent money in ways that help burnish the image of lawmakers in Washington and at home, a USA TODAY analysis reveals.

Lobbyists, corporations and trade groups gave $27,250 last year to pay for the official portraits of Lewis and two others, Reps. Vernon Ehlers, R-Mich., and Don Manzullo, R-Ill. All the money goes to the non-profit U.S. Capitol Historical Society. The portraits will hang in committee rooms where the lawmakers served as chairmen.

Most of the lobbyists' contributions went for a portrait for Lewis, who ran the committee in 2005 and 2006 and remains its top-ranking Republican.

Nine groups gave $21,500, including Van Scoyoc and Associates, which gave $2,500. Stewart Van Scoyoc founded the lobbying firm to "focus on congressional appropriations and taxation," its website says.

Lewis did not solicit donations for his portrait, spokesman Jim Specht says. A total of $30,000 was raised, he says.

"No one who has met with Congressman Lewis with business before Congress or the appropriations committee has mentioned the portrait or any donations that have been made," Specht said in an e-mail. "He believes his responsibility is to represent his constituents and the American taxpayers, and these donations play no part in that."

The donors said their contributions were not aimed at influencing Lewis. "I've long supported the society's work to preserve and enhance the Capitol," Van Scoyoc said in a statement. "The contribution to the fund for the portrait was in recognition of Mr. Lewis' service as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee."

In Minnesota, transportation groups are among the donors to a law school professorship named for Rep. Jim Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House transportation committee.

Overall, about 20 transportation companies and industry groups are helping to underwrite the James L. Oberstar Professorship of Law and Public Policy, according to a release by the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. Oberstar is an alumnus.

Law school spokesman Chato Hazelbaker said more than $475,000 had been raised but would not release a donor list.

The reports show several transportation companies donated last year. Among them: Oldcastle Materials, which makes gravel and concrete and builds roads and bridges, gave $10,000 to the law school in October. Oberstar "is a long-serving member of Congress and has advanced public policy in areas such as the economy, transportation and public works," company spokeswoman Joyce Watson says. "It was a good match for us."

John Schadl, Oberstar's spokesman, says the fundraising has been approved by the House ethics committee and has not influenced his policy actions. Oberstar has not solicited contributions, Schadl says.

The congressman did attend a reception organized by the university last October at the Canadian Embassy in Washington where the scholarship was announced, Schadl says. "There were obviously donors there," Schadl says, "but he really didn't know who they were."