Lie Lie Lie...

Marco Rubio Says Kock World Doesn't Want Anything From Washington. Really?

Its members sure lobby a lot.

By Russ Choma

At the January meeting of the Kock brothers' donor network, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) scoffed at the idea that the deep-pocketed contributors he had come to court for his presidential bid want anything in return for all the money they pump into politics. "I don't know a single person in this room has ever been to my office," he told ABC News' Jonathan Karl, who was moderating a panel that included Rubio.

Maybe.

The attendees at that event were not publicly identified, but a number of major donors to the Kock network and participants in earlier conferences organized by the billionaire brothers spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying Washington last year. And a number of lobbyists employed by organizations represented at Kock confabs have donated to Rubio—and hosted fundraisers for him.

It's possible that the donors Rubio was hoping to impress at the January conference—organized by the Kock brothers as part of their effort to raise as much as $890 million to sway the 2016 elections—are writing checks to candidates for purely altruistic reasons. But that's not likely. In Washington, money spent on hiring lobbyists often goes hand-in-hand with money spent on candidates, and according to a new report, many Kock network donors are playing the influence-peddling game.

Liberal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has released a study listing at least 22 companies in the Kock network that hired a registered lobbyist in 2014. Some of these companies spent significant sums on lobbying. Kock Industries, the conglomerate overseen by Charles and David Kock personally, spent $13.8 million on lobbying in 2014 and Occidental Petroleum—its CEO Stephen Chazen donated $125,000 to the Kocks' super PAC—spent more than $9.1 million on lobbying.

CREW calculates that these 22 companies spent at least $35 million on lobbying in 2014—a sign that they probably do want something from Rubio and other GOP candidates. The full report, including methodology, can be found here.

Moreover, if Rubio's remark is taken literally, no one will ever know if he was telling the truth about not meeting donors or their lobbyists in his office. But Rubio is familiar with some of the key players in the Kock network. For example, there's Wayne Berman, the chief lobbyist for private investment firm, the Blackstone Group. (Its CEO and chairman, Stephen Schwarzman, lives in the same Manhattan apartment building as David Kock and attended a Kock Brothers conference in 2010 in Aspen.) Just 13 days before Rubio denied that any one in the audience had ever come to his office looking for a favor, Berman hosted a fundraising lunch for Rubio at Patroon, a New York City restaurant where a burger costs $24. Several months later, on April 15, another Blackstone lobbyist, Justin Daly, and a lobbyist for Kock Industries, Sam Geduldig, co-hosted a fundraiser for Rubio at a townhouse on Capitol Hill.

The Kock network is loaded with firms that spend big bucks on lobbyists who seek preferential treatment from lawmakers. So is Rubio clueless or unwilling to acknowledge this basic fact of Washington life?