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Editorial: Bondi too cozy with lobbyists

 
Published Nov. 21, 2014

Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi remains unrepentant and unbowed about her membership in a partisan national attorneys general group whose members are wined and dined by corporate interests seeking to influence the work of her public office. After an easy re-election win against an underfunded opponent, she arrogantly raised the stakes by becoming chair of the Republican Attorneys General Association. She owes her constituents more than just rehearsed lines that she can be trusted with Floridians' best interests as she supports the causes of special interests nationwide.

Approached by reporters days after the election, Bondi said repeatedly, "No access to me or my staff will ever affect what we do." She claimed her office's record confirms that statement. It demonstrates nothing of the sort, and her automated answers suggest she is more comfortable being candid with well-connected law firms in private than with her constituents in public. Rather than being humbled by the voters' show of confidence, she has become more dismissive.

Just how cozy is Bondi with corporate lobbyists? Beyond the multiple weekends she has spent at RAGA conferences, where lobbyists contribute big cash to get an invitation, the New York Times reported that Bondi, en route to an RAGA conference aboard a chartered jet, insisted that lobbyist Lori Kalani seek treatment in Tampa for an injured foot. Bondi also invited the lobbyist to stay in her South Tampa home to recuperate. Kalani works for Dickstein Shapiro, a Washington-based law firm that has been among the most assertive in exploiting its donations to the RAGA to gain unfettered access to state attorneys general at weekend conferences.

Bondi's defenders note her personal empathy is nothing new. She did, after all, wage a lawsuit over her adoption of a dog that survived Hurricane Katrina because she felt the owners had neglected it after the storm. And her passion for helping the victims of human trafficking is clearly sincere. But serving as the top law enforcement officer of Florida requires honoring boundaries that Bondi clearly doesn't recognize.

The New York Times found that lobbyists at Dickstein such as Kalani — none of whom have registered to lobby in Florida — have contacted Bondi's office for several clients, including pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, online Travelocity, for-profit Bridgepoint Education and nutritional supplement maker Herbalife. And at least four times, contacts from the firm came before her office's decision to take no action, including Bondi's decision to drop her predecessor's plan to sue online travel companies such as Travelocity for failing to collect and remit bed taxes on hotel stays. Seventeen Florida counties continue to pursue that action.

Bondi's office denies that special interest lobbying played a role in its decisions. And in her election victory speech, she struck a defiant tone, having easily defeated a little-known and underfunded Democrat. But the optics are not good, particularly considering that Bondi has accepted $25,000 in free travel expenses from the RAGA during her first term and collected $750,000 from its super PAC for her re-election. Imagine the junkets and freebies she can collect as the new chair of the organization. And the RAGA is at the center of Bondi's nearly dozen decisions to participate in out-of-state actions that have little to do with Florida.

The state attorney general just won a second four-year term. Yet it remains unclear whether her loyalties lie with Floridians or the special interests who could pave the way for her next career when she leaves Tallahassee.