Illustration by Tom Twigg/GristThis is an actual thing: Larry Craig, former punchline of Idaho, has opened a Washington consulting firm to work as an energy lobbyist.
New West Strategies LLC offers “strategic advice, guidance, and advocacy” from Craig, the senator was arrested in 2007 in a sting operation against men cruising for sex at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. He’s assisted by former chief of staff Michael O. Ware, a guy who obviously knows how to hitch a ride on a rising star.
The firm touts its affiliation with National Environmental Strategies, a lobbying firm whose clients include the American Gas Association and American Petroleum Institute (API), trade groups for the natural gas and oil industries. API’s members include ExxonMobil, which continues to fund climate change denial projects, despite a public promise to do otherwise.
So which is the real rock bottom — serving as a pawn of energy interests in the U.S. Senate, or jumping over the fence to become one of the special interest lobbyists who tell the pawns which way to move?
