Perdue has D.C. fundraiser

State lobbyists barred, but federal counterparts turn out

RALEIGH -- In North Carolina, the lobbyists for Rent-A-Center, Time Warner Cable and other companies are prohibited by law from contributing to campaigns, such as Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue's expected bid for governor.

Friday night, at a Washington, D.C., lobbying firm, lobbyists who represent some of those same companies at the federal level held a fundraiser for Perdue.

The donations and libations affair is an example of what some reformers think are continued efforts to get around last year's sweeping reform legislation. At a minimum, they say, the episode highlights the law's limits.

"Clearly, taking money from state lobbyists during the [General Assembly] session is wrong," said Chris Heagarty, executive director of the nonpartisan N.C. Center for Voter Education. "Taking money from federal lobbyists for the same clients may be legal but certainly raises questions, and may even appear shady, to a public already very cynical about money and special interest groups in politics."

Heagarty's group supports publicly financed campaigns.

Louisa Warren, director of the N.C. Coalition for Lobbying and Government Reform, was less troubled, saying she did not see the Washington fundraiser as "directly skirting around the law."

"I don't know how you would regulate it," Warren said.

No one at the Washington lobbying firm that held the event, Oldaker, Biden & Belair, returned phone calls.

A Perdue spokesman said the fundraiser, expected to bring in $20,000, was one of several meetings she is holding while in D.C.

"Our campaign has raised almost every one of our dollars from inside North Carolina," said Peter Reichard, Perdue's finance director, "and it is well within the rules for us to have a fundraiser at a major Washington law firm."

Reichard noted that Womble, Carlyle, Sandridge & Rice, a Raleigh law firm with extensive lobbying operations, held a fund-raiser for Perdue's chief rival for the Democratic nomination, State Treasurer Richard Moore. Reichard also highlighted that the hosts at a Moore fundraiser last month in Raleigh included a registered state lobbyist and three spouses of lobbyists.

Jay Reiff, Moore's campaign manager, said the Womble Carlyle luncheon took place in November, before the ban on lobbyist contributions took effect Jan. 1

The lobbyist listed on the invitation for the May 10 event, Mack Paul, registered as a lobbyist for Oak Island and Ocean Isle in April, after the invitations were printed, and did not give money to the campaign, Reiff said. The three spouses of lobbyists included Lucy Bode, Moore's cousin, and Alisa Wicker, wife of former Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker and a longtime family friend, Reiff said. He was not aware that Linda Edmisten, wife of lobbyist and former secretary of state Rufus Edmisten, was listed as a host.

Julie White, a Moore campaign adviser, defended the spouses' participation, saying women have as much right as men to participate in politics.