State Sen. Susan Rubio has a strong place in Sacramento. As chair of the Insurance coverage Committee, the Baldwin Park Democrat can assist move or kill any laws affecting that trade.
As a consequence of a regulation meant to forestall corruption, Rubio can’t settle for marketing campaign donations from insurance coverage lobbyists — or every other lobbyists — as she raises cash for her 2026 reelection to the Legislature. State regulation forbids California lobbyists from donating to the campaigns of state lawmakers.
However there are not any such restrictions on lobbyists donating to campaigns for federal workplace, even when the candidate is a state lawmaker. In order Rubio runs for Congress this 12 months, she will take donations for her federal marketing campaign from lobbyists who could search to affect her votes in Sacramento.
And she or he is.
Rubio has obtained practically $43,300 in contributions from registered state lobbyists in her campaign to replace retiring Rep. Grace F. Napolitano in California’s thirty first Congressional District. It’s a sliver of her general fundraising as of Feb. 14, however essentially the most lobbyist cash of any California lawmaker who’s working for federal workplace. Lots of these who donated to Rubio’s congressional marketing campaign symbolize firms that foyer payments which can be heard earlier than committees she sits on as a state legislator, together with the Insurance coverage Committee and people that oversee coverage associated to healthcare, alcohol laws and power and utilities.
Eight state legislators are working for Congress this 12 months. Six have obtained lobbyist donations, in quantities that modify extensively, including as much as $96,090.
The donations are authorized and make up a small portion of the candidates’ general fundraising. Nonetheless, some watchdogs say they need to be prohibited due to the chance that lobbyists’ cash may form lawmakers’ selections within the work they’re doing on the state degree.
“It doesn’t imply they’ll vote of their favor, however the chance that might occur exists,” mentioned Sean McMorris, a program supervisor on the authorities watchdog group Frequent Trigger.
His group was a part of the coalition that fifty years in the past introduced California’s Political Reform Act, the regulation that bans lobbyist donations to state lawmakers.
Bob Stern, co-author of the regulation, mentioned the state prohibition was put in place as a result of “legislators had been receiving enormous quantities from individuals who had been lobbying them, and we thought there ought to be a disconnect between lobbying and marketing campaign contributions.”
In follow, Stern mentioned, the prohibition’s impacts had been restricted, for the reason that firms hiring lobbyists may nonetheless give on to candidates, as can affiliated political motion committees. However there was “symbolism” to the separation, he mentioned.
Rubio’s marketing campaign supervisor, Giovanni Ruiz, mentioned all contributions she had obtained from people had been “solely based mostly on mutually respectful relationships,” and she has opposed points that donors lobbied for prior to now.
Ruiz additionally famous that Rubio was being massively outspent by her opponent Gil Cisneros, who has put $4 million of his personal cash into his marketing campaign.
Silicon Valley congressional candidate Assemblymember Evan Low (D-Campbell) obtained $21,650 from lobbyists, making up 2% of his fundraising. He joined the late-breaking race to exchange retiring Rep. Anna G. Eshoo in early December, simply months earlier than the March main.
State Sen. Dave Min (D-Irvine), who is running to replace Rep. Katie Porter in an Orange County seat, obtained about $16,500 in lobbyist donations, accounting for 1% of complete fundraising since he launched his marketing campaign at the beginning of 2023.
Assemblymember Laura Friedman (D-Glendale), who’s vying to replace Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Los Angeles), obtained $4,000, and her opponent state Sen. Anthony Portantino (D-Burbank) obtained $6,500 from lobbyists. These totals account for lower than 1% of every of their fundraising.
Portantino and Friedman have both been running for the Los Angeles congressional seat for greater than a 12 months.
Central Valley congressional candidate State Sen. Melissa Hurtado (D-Sanger) obtained about $4,000 from lobbyists — a sum that accounted for six.1% of her fundraising since she launched her campaign in August 2023.
Hurtado instructed The Instances that lawmakers ought to be capable to obtain these donations however acknowledged that “cash has the power to deprave individuals, it’s plain and easy.”
Since August, Hurtado has raised lower than $100,000; she mentioned she is in debt from placing her personal cash into the race. The one cash she doesn’t settle for is from the hashish trade, she instructed The Instances.
Friedman went additional, saying she sees the potential points and would help a regulation that stops federal campaigns from accepting cash from state lobbyists.
Friedman famous that her marketing campaign was turning down all company PAC cash and described that as a much more salient situation in races like hers. She characterised the lobbyist contributions she and her colleagues had obtained as small in contrast with the “avalanche of cash on the market” from purchasers of the lobbyists.
Portantino, Low and Min didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Two state legislators working for Congress haven’t obtained any lobbyist donations: Sen. Bob Archuleta (D-Pico Rivera), who can also be working for Napolitano’s San Gabriel Valley seat and launched his marketing campaign last summer, and Assemblymember Vince Fong (R-Bakersfield), who’s working for former Home Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s vacant Bakersfield seat. Fong launched his marketing campaign in December.
Due to the restricted disclosures required by the state, lobbyists aren’t required to publicly report which lawmakers they’ve tried to affect on numerous payments, making it troublesome to attract direct strains between their lobbying efforts and their donations. However marketing campaign finance and lobbying data present that a number of of the candidates have obtained donations from lobbyists who work with firms searching for to affect coverage within the areas through which they’ve energy, based mostly on committee positions.
Sen. Susan Rubio (D-Baldwin Park) is one in every of a number of state lawmakers working for Congress.
(Robert Gourley / Los Angeles Instances)
Sacramento lobbyist Mandy Lee gave $3,300, the utmost allowable donation, to Rubio. Her agency represents the American Property Casualty Insurance coverage Assn., a major trade group for home, auto and business insurers. The association lobbied on bills heard in the Rubio-chaired Senate Insurance Committee. Lee also donated $500 to Min.
Rubio’s spokesperson noted that the senator’s relationship with Lee long predated her election to the Legislature.
Rubio also received $2,000 from lobbyist Paul Gladfelty, whose firm represents the Travelers insurance company.
“It is not uncommon for state lobbyists to make personal contributions to congressional candidates we know and believe in, which state law allows. Prior to the Senator running for Legislative office, I had the opportunity to establish a personal friendship,” Gladfelty said by text message, adding that his friendship with Rubio “exists regardless of her committee assignments.”
Lobbyists Soyla Fernández and Kirk Kimmelshue, owners of Fernández Jensen Kimmelshue Government Affairs, both donated to the campaigns of Min and Rubio. Their firm’s client list includes the Regional Water Authority and Northern California Water Assn., which both lobbied on bills that were heard in the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Water that Min chairs.
Their firm also represents Southern California Edison, which routinely lobbies on bills in the Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee that Min and Rubio both sit on; the Anheuser-Busch beer company, which lobbies the committee that regulates alcohol, of which Rubio is a member; and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, which lobbies the health committee that Rubio sits on.
Lobbyist RJ Cervantes, whose clients include trade associations for cryptocurrency and electronic payment companies, gave $3,300 to Low, who serves as co-chair of the Legislative Technology & Innovation Caucus, a group of lawmakers who want to foster a tech-friendly climate in California.
Cervantes, Kimmelshue, Fernández and Lee did not respond to requests for comment.
Jessica Levinson, an election law professor at Loyola Law School and former president of the Los Angeles Ethics Commission, sees the situation as less clear-cut than Common Cause’s McMorris does. She said she doesn’t think it is unethical for state lawmakers to accept lobbyist donations to their congressional campaigns, since there is “a very real opening in the law” that allows them.
“It’s up to the voters to determine if this is something that bothers them,” Levinson said. “My guess is that for most voters, it’s pretty far down on the list.”
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