Destini Hampton –
Have you ever wondered what’s going on behind the scenes? Who are the masterminds secretly pulling the strings of the government?
The Lobbyists!
Lobbyists are the movers and shakers of the political world. They use their power and influence to mold and guide individual bills. It is their job to ensure that a bill gets passed, defeated, or amended depending on their clients’ interests. Lobbyists achieve this by providing information, giving speeches in committees, and researching for legislators to help them understand the pros and cons of legislation. Lobbyists are so important to the voting process that they are considered the “lifeline” for Senators and Representatives.
I had a chance to talk with the head honcho, Mark Cole (MC), to get an inside look into their committee.
DH: Please state your name, grade, school, and position.
MC: Hi, I’m Mark Cole. I am a junior at Hume Fogg, and I am the Head Lobbyist this year.
DH: Can you please explain what a Lobbyist is and specifically your position as Head Lobbyist?
MC: Sure. Actually I am really glad to do this because a lot of people seem to not know. What Lobbyists do is – we write pro/con speeches for bills all over every chamber, every House and Senate, and we also exchange information between House and Senate, trying to get certain bills passed and certain bills failed depending on what we think is the most useful and least useful. As Head Lobbyist, I lead the charge. I help first-year Lobbyists get information and I help the other Lobbyists make new connections and network better. Also I work very closely with the Gov Cab and with Sidd, the Governor, to help her get her dynamic legislation passed and to help them get their budget and things like that passed.
DH: What did you wish to accomplish when you first started?
MC: Two of my major goals – one, I wanted to do a lot of networking here because I feel like one of the main jobs as a Lobbyist is to know people, know a lot of people in a bunch of areas to get things done. But more specifically to what type of goals I wanted to do, I wanted to increase public transportation, that’s one of my main ones. [Which] I would say was successful in some ways and unsuccessful in others but, overall, I think it’s been a success.
DH: What do you enjoy about working with your fellow Lobbyists?
MC: I think that the Lobbyist component is the most fun component because we can go wherever we want to get things done and it’s a lot more free; I can be a lot more casual with them, it doesn’t have to be as formal because we’re all working on the same side.
DH: So, yesterday there was some sort of controversy and uprising against the Lobbyists. Could you possibly give an explanation on what happened and give your perspective on it?
MC: Well, I’m not super familiar with what you’re talking about, but what I think that comes from is that Lobbyists don’t just do pro-speeches for bills, we also do con-speeches for bills we think that may not be useful. We think that sometimes people may take it personally when we do a con-speech. We want them to know that it’s not about you, it’s about we don’t think your bill would be as good as others. So, I just feel like it’s a miscommunication, if that makes sense.
DH: Yes. Well, thank you so much for your time, have a good day!
MC: You too.
Department of Public Information 