How Federal Lobbying Works

What Is Lobbying?

Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by government officials — most commonly legislators and members of regulatory agencies. In the United States, lobbying is a constitutionally protected activity under the First Amendment's right to "petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

In practice, federal lobbying involves paid professionals (lobbyists) who contact members of Congress, their staff, and executive branch officials on behalf of clients — corporations, trade associations, nonprofits, foreign governments, and other organizations.

The Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA)

The Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 (amended in 2007 by the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act) requires lobbyists to register with the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House if they meet certain thresholds:

• They make more than one lobbying contact
• They spend at least 20% of their time on lobbying activities for a particular client
• The client spends more than $14,000 on lobbying in a quarter (if using outside firms) or $14,000 on in-house lobbying activities

Registered lobbyists must file quarterly reports (LD-2 forms) disclosing their clients, the issues they lobbied on, the government entities they contacted, and how much they were paid. This is the data that powers OpenLobby — we've analyzed over 726,000 of these filings from 2018 to 2025.

How Lobbying Actually Happens

Lobbying takes many forms:

• Direct lobbying: Meeting with members of Congress or their staff, testifying at hearings, providing policy expertise
• Grassroots lobbying: Organizing constituent campaigns, email drives, and public pressure
• Coalition building: Forming alliances with other organizations around shared policy goals
• Issue advertising: Running ads to shape public opinion on policy issues

The Revolving Door

One of the most consequential aspects of the lobbying industry is the "revolving door" — the movement of individuals between government positions and lobbying jobs. Our data shows that over 5,000 former government officials are currently registered as federal lobbyists.

These ex-government lobbyists command a significant premium. Our analysis found that lobbying firms with former government officials charge 369% more than firms without them — a clear market signal of the value of insider connections.

Quarterly Reporting

Lobbying firms and in-house lobbyists must file LD-2 reports every quarter with the Senate Office of Public Records. These reports include:

• Client name and description
• Income received (or expenses for in-house lobbyists)
• Specific lobbying issues (using 79 standardized issue codes like HCR for healthcare, DEF for defense)
• Names of lobbyists who worked on the matter
• Government entities contacted (Senate, House, specific agencies)
• Specific bills lobbied on

Who Spends the Most?

The biggest lobbying spenders are typically large corporations, industry trade associations, and major advocacy groups. The top lobbying issues by total spending include:

• Budget/Appropriations (BUD): $2.6 billion — the single largest issue, as organizations fight for federal funding
• Healthcare (HCR): $2.3 billion — driven by pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, and insurers
• Defense (DEF): Billions in defense contractor lobbying, with some firms seeing 49,536:1 ROI on their lobbying investment

Why Lobbying Transparency Matters

In a democracy, citizens have a right to know who is trying to influence their government and how much they're spending. While lobbying is legal and often serves important functions — providing expertise to lawmakers, representing diverse interests — the scale and opacity of the industry raises serious concerns about whose voices are heard in Washington.

That's why we built OpenLobby: to make this public data truly accessible, analyzable, and understandable. Every filing shown on this site is a public record, required by law. We just made it searchable.