Obama Transition Team Limits Lobbyists

clipped from www.politico.com President-elect Barack Obama did not employ lobbyists on his campaign, but they can assist with his transition as long as they de-register as lobbyists and their activities do not cross into policy areas they have tried to influence. Carrying over the anti-lobbying tenets that defined the campaign, Obama transition chief John Podesta announced Tuesday that the president-elect would enforce what he called “the strictest, the most far-reaching ethics rules of any transition team in history.” There is no blanket ban on lobbyists, but they will not be able to do transition work in their area of expertise if they lobbied in the past 12 months, nor can they lobby the administration for 12 months afterward on matters on which they worked during the transition.

The specifics, from Change.gov:

• Federal Lobbyists cannot contribute financially to the transition.
  
• Federal lobbyists are prohibited from any lobbying during their work with the transition.
  
• If someone has lobbied in the last 12 months, they are prohibited from working in the fields of policy on which they lobbied.
  
• If someone becomes a lobbyist after working on the Transition, they are prohibited from lobbying the Administration for 12 months on matters on which they worked.
  
• A gift ban that is aggressive in reducing the influence of special interests.