The Government Accountability Office this week issued its sixth annual report summarizing the results of its audit of approximately one hundred federal Lobbying Disclosure Act registrants.  As we previously explained when the audits began, federal law requires the GAO to select LDA registrants on a “random” basis for an audit to assess their compliance with the Act.  The result of the audit is this week’s report.  As is typical, the report does not single out individual firms, but focuses largely on providing aggregate data regarding registrants’ compliance with the Act.

This year’s report is significant, however, because it highlights a developing trend: a slow but steady increase in enforcement actions brought against lobbying registrants by the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.  Between the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act’s passage in 2007 and 2010, the U.S. Attorney’s Office did not bring any enforcement actions against lobbying registrants.  In 2011, the U.S. Attorney’s Office settled its first post-HLOGA case against a lobbying firm for $45,000.  According to this year’s report, in 2012, that number of enforcement cases doubled, with one settling for $50,000 and another for $30,000.  The report further notes that, already in 2013, the Office is preparing to seek civil or criminal penalties against two additional registrants.

Registrants should expect the number of enforcement cases to continue to climb.  The U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. faces a significant backlog of hundreds of instances of potential non-compliance that have been referred to it by the Secretary of the Senate and Clerk of the House.  According to the report, the Office has not even started sending out non-compliance letters for 2012 because it is still working through the many referrals from prior years.  As the Office wades through these referrals, it will likely find new targets for potential litigation.

Photo of Zachary G. Parks Zachary G. Parks

Zachary Parks advises corporations, trade associations, campaigns, and high-net worth individuals on their most important and challenging political law problems.

Chambers USA describes Zachary as “highly regarded by his clients in the political law arena,” noting that clients praised him as their “go-to outside…

Zachary Parks advises corporations, trade associations, campaigns, and high-net worth individuals on their most important and challenging political law problems.

Chambers USA describes Zachary as “highly regarded by his clients in the political law arena,” noting that clients praised him as their “go-to outside attorney for election law, campaign finance, pay-to-play and PAC issues.” Zachary is also a leading lawyer in the emerging corporate political disclosure field, regularly advising corporations on these issues.

Zachary’s expertise includes the Federal Election Campaign Act, the Lobbying Disclosure Act, the Ethics in Government Act, the Foreign Agents Registration Act, and the Securities and Exchange Commission’s pay-to-play rules. He has also helped clients comply with the election and political laws of all 50 states. Zachary also frequently leads political law due diligence for investment firms and corporations during mergers and acquisitions.

He routinely advises corporations and corporate executives on instituting political law compliance programs and conducts compliance training for senior corporate executives and lobbyists. He also has extensive experience conducting corporate internal investigations concerning campaign finance and lobbying law compliance and has defended his political law clients in investigations by the Federal Election Commission, the U.S. Department of Justice, Congressional committees, and in litigation.

Zachary is also the founder and chair of the J. Reuben Clark Law Society’s Political and Election Law Section.

Zachary also has extensive complex litigation experience, having litigated major environmental claims, class actions, and multi-district proceedings for financial institutions, corporations, and public entities.

From 2005 to 2006, Zachary was a law clerk for Judge Thomas B. Griffith on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

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