Monsanto’s Money Buys Influence in DC

On the flip side, envi­ron­men­tal­ists and organic food fans main­tain there are too many unknowns and poten­tial dan­gers involved with genetic mod­i­fi­ca­tion. Monsanto, which last year had rev­enues of $11.8 bil­lion, has become their bogeyman.

But such efforts as grass­roots peti­tions and pro­posed leg­is­la­tion to require at least the label­ing of genet­i­cally mod­i­fied food have thus far with­ered on the vine next to Monsanto’s deeply rooted Washington pres­ence, which has proved resis­tant to most lines of attack.

According to OpenSecrets.org data, in the first three months of this year, Monsanto spent $1.4 mil­lion lob­by­ing Washington—and spent about $6.3 mil­lion total last year, more than any other agribusi­ness firm except the tobacco com­pany Altria.Monsanto’s inter­ests in Washington are diverse. It lob­bied bills rang­ing from the American Research and Competitiveness Act of 2011, which would extend tax cred­its for com­pa­nies doing research, to sev­eral bills that would change the way the Department of Homeland Security han­dles secu­rity at chem­i­cal facilities—chemicals being a big part of Monsanto’s prod­uct portfolio.

And just as impor­tant as Monsanto’s leg­isla­tive agenda for 2011 and 2012 is its reg­u­la­tory one: the company’s lob­by­ing reports list the depart­ments and agen­cies it vis­ited to talk to fed­eral bureau­crats and appointees as they wrote rules to imple­ment and enforce Congress’ hand­i­work. That explains why Monsanto reports hav­ing lob­bied the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency and many other exec­u­tive branch offices. 

The FDA cur­rently is the tar­get of a peti­tion signed by more than 1 mil­lion peo­ple, accord­ing to a spon­sor known as Just Label It, ask­ing the agency to require that genet­i­cally engi­neered food be labeled as such. The peti­tion, spon­sored by a coali­tion of envi­ron­men­tal and food groups, is an attempt by activists to make an end-run around Monsanto’s Washington operation—a neces­sity because their lob­by­ing dol­lars pale in com­par­i­son to the cash spent by Monsanto and oth­ers in the indus­try. For instance, one of the coali­tion mem­bers, the Environmental Working Group, has spent just $82,000 on lob­by­ing this year—or about 5 per­cent of Monsanto’s total.

“The power of Monsanto, whether in the halls of Washington, or in farm coun­try, should not be ignored,” said Environmental Working Group spokesman Alex Formuzis. “Monsanto comes armed with some of the deep­est pock­ets and a bench of influ­en­tial lob­by­ists, which makes the coalition’s efforts over GMO label­ing on behalf of con­sumers a very tough fight indeed.”

Another upcom­ing mat­ter of great inter­est to Monsanto: the new farm bill, an omnibus piece of leg­is­la­tion that sets the nation’s agri­cul­tural pol­icy and deals with nearly every aspect of the country’s farm­ing and food indus­tries. The cur­rent bill expires in 2013; when it went through Congress, Monsanto filed more lob­by­ing reports on it than any other orga­ni­za­tion. The process of piec­ing together a new pro­posal is already well under way. 

The company’s access to mem­bers of Congress who are likely to be key in shap­ing the final leg­is­la­tion may be eased by the con­tri­bu­tions of its very active PAC, the Monsanto Citizenship Fund. Already this cycle it has spent $383,000. The biggest recip­i­ent of that money so far is Rep. Frank D. Lucas (R-Okla.) who has received $20,000 from Monsanto’s PAC—$10,000 for his cam­paign com­mit­tee and $10,000 for his lead­er­ship PAC. Lucas hap­pens to be the chair­man of the House Agriculture Committee—no farm-related leg­is­la­tion is passed with­out his say-so.

Monsanto has hedged its invest­ment with the agri­cul­ture com­mit­tee, though—it also gave $13,500 to Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), the top-ranking Democrat on the com­mit­tee. So far this elec­tion cycle, Monsanto’s PAC has given $77,500 to 17 mem­bers of the House agri­cul­ture com­mit­tee, or their lead­er­ship PACs.

Republished with per­mis­sion from OpenSecrets.org.