As more and more corporations adopt rules governing their political activity, large trade associations engaged in Washington lobbying are pushing back.
Since 2013, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the Business Roundtable have been engaged in an effort to discredit activist investors’ attempts to force shareholder votes on political spending and disclosure policies.
The three trade associations have also targeted the Center for Political Accountability and its annual CPA-Zicklin Index. The center works with investors to encourage corporations to adopt political spending and transparency policies, including the disclosure of campaign contributions and donations to politically active nonprofits and trade associations. Its annual index ranks corporations on their adoption of such policies.
On Oct, 8, the Center for Political Accountability released its annual index and for the first time included all companies listed in the S&P 500.
Predictably, the three corporate trade groups responded with their own pushback in the form of an email from U.S. Chamber of Commerce Institute of Legal Reform President Lisa Rickard to an inside Washington corporate group known as the Carlton Club. The Carlton Club, an 80-member nonprofit organization, is made up of the heads of the Washington offices of major U.S. corporations and corporate trade associations.