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Begin New Search Topic Foreign Influence Political Geography United States of America

1. Foreign influence in US politics

Author:
Marco Grotteria, Max Miller, and S. Lakshmi Naaraayanan
Publication Date:
06-2024
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Nottingham Interdisciplinary Centre for Economic and Political Research (NICEP)
Abstract:
This paper documents that foreign lobbying influences US government spending. We introduce a comprehensive dataset of over 230,000 date-stamped, in-person meetings between agents representing foreign governments and individual US legislators, state governors, and employees of US executive agencies from 2000 to 2018. The data suggest that foreign agents meet disproportionately with individuals important for foreign aid and corporate subsidies, like legislators sitting on powerful congressional committees. Foreign agents also maintain connections with legislators even after they depart powerful committees, providing evidence that meetings do not just reflect short-term quid-pro-quo arrangements. Around meetings, foreign countries receive greater amounts of financial aid. Foreign firms whose governments lobby more often also receive larger corporate subsidies from areas the legislators and governors that they meet with represent. Finally, legislators who meet more often with foreign agents receive both monetary and electoral benefits, while we do not find changes in the political contributions they receive or in their probability of re-election, suggesting that legislators are not punished by their constituents for meeting with representatives of foreign countries.
Topic:
Domestic Politics, Lobbying, and Foreign Influence
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

2. The Lobbying Battle for Nagorno-Karabakh

Author:
Ben Freeman and Artin DerSimonian
Publication Date:
12-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
Long before Azerbaijani forces took the Nagorno-Karabakh region by force in September — displacing 100,000 Karabakh Armenians in an act that’s been described as ethnic cleansing — Azerbaijan and Armenia were waging a furious lobbying and influence battle in Washington. A closer examination of the countries’ respective attempts to influence U.S. policymakers before the Second and Third Nagorno-Karabakh Wars provides critical context for understanding Washington’s muted reaction to Azerbaijan’s recent aggression, seemingly at odds with the strong moral position U.S. officials have taken over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Azerbaijan has spent years pursuing a course of “caviar diplomacy” in our nation’s capital: using the authoritarian petrostates’ wealth to court officials, journalists, and scholars. Since 2015, the government of Azerbaijan has spent just over $7 million on lobbying and public relations firms registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). Azerbaijan’s agents — like BGR Government Affairs — have conducted vigorous advocacy for Baku’s interests, including continued military assistance to Azerbaijan following the Second Nagorno-Karabakh war in 2020. Azerbaijan’s influence in the U.S. has also been aided considerably by Israel; Baku boasts powerful American-Israeli advocates like Ezra Friedlander as registered lobbyists for its interests. And this only constitutes what’s publicly known which, given Azerbaijan’s history, is likely just the tip of the iceberg. As the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) has painstakingly documented, the Azerbaijan government has a history of laundering its influence in Europe and the U.S. Azerbaijan’s extensive influence efforts in the U.S. stand in stark contrast to those of the Armenian interests which, until earlier this year, had not had a FARA registered lobbying or public relations firm on their payroll since 2020. Armenia has traditionally relied on its extensive diaspora to garner influence in the West, with repeated successes including a boycott of lobbying and PR firms working for Azerbaijan and President Biden’s recognition of the Armenian genocide. But as the negligible U.S. response to Azerbaijan’s use of military force in Nagorno-Karabakh shows, Washington’s perceived strategic interests continue to trump Armenians’ concerns. As the negligible U.S. response to Azerbaijan’s use of military force in Nagorno-Karabakh shows, Washington’s perceived strategic interests continue to trump Armenians’ concerns. U.S. officials’ overly-cautious and restrained reaction to the lightning offensive against Nagorno-Karabakh and the resulting mass exodus of Armenians from the region seems to reflect a stalemate in the lobbying and influence battle the two countries have been waging in the U.S; it may also be a product of the selective approach to human rights within U.S. foreign policy. No matter how one weighs the precise causes, the effect remains the same: a country used military might to reclaim its territory during a negotiating process, faced little consequences from the U.S., and seems emboldened to continue its aggression in an already volatile region. Time will tell the dangers of that decision.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Territorial Disputes, Lobbying, and Foreign Influence
Political Geography:
Armenia, Azerbaijan, United States of America, and Nagorno-Karabakh