Top Lobbyists 2014: Corporate

Call them the influencers.

From corner offices all over town, the members of The Hill’s Top Lobbyists list are the advocates, lobbyists and professional agitators who shape the policy decisions made in the nation’s capital.

While some fit the mold of a traditional lobbyist, others have made public relations, grassroots advocacy and even data-crunching the tools of their trade.

The broad sweep of The Hill’s list means that only a portion of the people listed are officially registered to lobby the government, but that doesn’t diminish their clout.

From “hired guns” who run into battle for clients, to association heads who wield the power of industries, to union leaders who exert might through membership, the names are all players to know in the competitive world of Washington advocacy.

Cory Alexander and Peter Jacoby, UnitedHealth Group Inc. 
The nation’s largest private health insurer is adapting to rapid change with the help of these Capitol Hill veterans. 

Bryan Anderson, Southern Co. 
Lobbying for one of the nation’s largest electric utilities, Anderson has his hands full as the government moves to cut carbon emissions from power plants.

Sid Ashworth, Northrop Grumman Corp. 
Ashworth has had over 25 years of Washington experience and steered Northrop’s successful effort to expand the Air Force’s RQ-4 Global Hawk drones. 

Bill Barloon,Sprint Corp.
Despite a setback when regulatory opposition forced Sprint to drop its plans to buy T-Mobile, the No. 3 wireless company is known for having a strong presence in Washington.

Wayne Berman,
Blackstone Group LP.
Berman is a household name in Republican circles as a well-connected donor who wields influence in the presidential process.  

Abigail Blunt,
Kraft Foods Group Inc.
Blunt is maintaining strong ties for Kraft in Washington as the company reduces its products’ calorie and sodium content. 

Stephen Brown,Tesoro Corp.
Brown brings a background in politics, policy and law to his job representing the fuel refiner on pollution rules, ethanol and pushing to end the ban on crude oil exports.

Will Carty,Twitter Inc.
The company ramped up its lobbying over the past year and has emerged as a vocal critic of federal surveillance.

Pablo Chavez, LinkedIn Corp.
Chavez was lured away from Google at the beginning of the year to lead LinkedIn’s Washington push.

Jim Cicconi and Tim McKone,
AT&T Inc.
AT&T’s planned $48 billion purchase of DirecTV has drawn significantly less opposition than Comcast’s planned merger with Time Warner Cable, the other major media merger of the year. 

Maria Cino, Hewlett-Packard Co.
Cino came to HP after a career path that went from Pfizer to the Transportation Department to a stint as CEO of the 2008 Republican National Convention. 

Peter Cleveland, Intel Corp.
The former chief aide to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) has been working hard to spur action on patent reform and trade deals with the United States. 

Ken Cole,Pfizer Inc.
With the Obama administration weighing further action on inversion deals, Cole is a key advocate for Pfizer as the company eyes a deal overseas.

Gregory Dahlberg,
Lockheed Martin Corp.
Dahlberg — who has experience at the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill — leads the in-house team that aims to protect the company’s programs, including the Joint Strike Fighter and the Littoral Combat Ship. 

Peter Davidson, Verizon Communications Inc. 
The nation’s top wireless company successfully challenged the Federal Communications Commission’s net neutrality regulations in court and is making its voice heard in the debate over next year’s airwave auction 

Nancy Dorn,General Electric Co.
Dorn, former deputy director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, seamlessly manages the giant company’s policy initiatives. 

Theresa Fariello,Exxon Mobil Corp. Fariello, a former Democratic congressional aide and Clinton-era Energy Department official, keeps the oil and gas giant ahead of the curve.

Bob Filippone,Merck & Co. Inc.
After nearly a decade with the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, Filippone went corporate, landing at a pharmaceutical giant with a strong record of developing new treatments. 

Tucker Foote, MasterCard Inc.
Foote is on the front lines of the effort to keep consumers safe from hackers seeking to swipe personal information.

Nate Gatten,
JPMorgan Chase and Co.
The former Fannie Mae lobbyist turned bank lobbyist is a force on the regulatory landscape.

Matt Gelman and Fred Humphries,Microsoft Corp.
Microsoft relies on an all-star team with deep connections to Capitol Hill when engaging in battles over data storage and the National Security Agency.

Rich Glick,Iberdrola.
Glick is the main man in Washington for the second-largest producer of wind power in the United States.

Rick Graber, Honeywell International Inc.
The former U.S. ambassador to the Czech Republic helped negotiate two treaties between the two countries, and now leverages that expertise at the multi-national conglomerate.  

Bob Helm,General Dynamics Corp. Helm uses his executive and congressional know-how to steer the company’s many successful programs, including in information systems, submarines and space. 

Guy Hicks, Airbus Group. 
Hicks is a longtime defense aerospace industry player, representing Europe’s top defense and space company and its vast contracting portfolio.

Ed Hill, Bank of America Corp.
Hill has fought for Bank of America on everything from Dodd-Frank implementation to transportation-related issues to financial regulations.

Robert Hoffman,
Motorola Solutions Inc. 
Hoffman brought his talents to Motorola early this year after stints at the Information Technology Industry Council and on Capitol Hill.   

Joel Kaplan,Facebook Inc. 
Kaplan, a former aide to President George W. Bush, was given a promotion to the social networking giant’s head of global policy in October after leading its U.S. team.

Tim Keating, Boeing Co. 
Keating, a former aide to President Clinton, was at the controls as Boeing navigated through the turbulent debate over the Export-Import Bank.

Kent Knutson,The Home Depot Inc. 
Knutson has spent more than a decade lobbying for Home Depot and has become one of the most dynamic movers-and-shakers for the retail industry.

Bill Lane, Caterpillar Inc. 
Lane is an instrumental player in the push to approve new international trade deals and represents the equipment giant with vigor.

Melissa Lavinson,PG&E Corp. 
Lavinson is out front for the utility company as it seeks to shape public policy on energy generation, transmission, natural gas and more.

Melissa Maxfield, Comcast Corp.
Maxfield and Comcast are hard at work convincing regulators to approve a proposed $45 billion merger with Time Warner Cable. 

Susan Molinari, Google Inc. 
The former congresswoman is leading the way as Google broadens its policy focus to include everything from self-driving cars to surveillance reform to wind power. 

Ziad Ojakli,Ford Motor Co. 
Ojakli’s tight-knit lobbying team can turn on a dime for the Fortune 500 company.

Michael Paese, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. 
Paese’s experience on the House Financial Services Committee and later the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association is an asset for the investment giant.

Dean Pappas, Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co.
Pappas, who made the switch to Nationwide from Allstate, is deeply involved in Dodd-Frank insurance regulations, terrorism risk insurance, patent reform, flood insurance and tax treatment for life insurance and retirement plans.

Joe Seidel,
Credit Suisse Group. AG. 
Seidel has been a fixture at Credit Suisse for more than a decade and heads the bank’s public policy strategy for the Americas.

Matthew Stanton, Beam Suntory Inc. 
Beam is lobbying to increase both energy and water efficiency, and Stanton is key to efforts to promote responsible drinking.

Sarah Thorn, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. 
Thorn focuses on international policy and trade issues at the world’s largest corporation, and emphasizes empowering women-owned businesses within Wal-Mart’s global supply chain.

Gregg Ward,
United Technologies Corp.
Ward runs one of the largest in-house government affairs shops in town for UTC, which owns aerospace companies Goodrich and Pratt & Whitney, and helicopter manufacturer Sikorsky.  

Jonathan Weisgall, 
Berkshire Hathaway Energy Co. 
Weisgall boasts substantial energy chops, having dabbled in efficiency, renewables, geothermal and law. 

Read more from The Hill: 

 

Top Lobbyists 2014: Grassroots

Top Lobbyists 2014: Associations

Top Lobbyists 2014: Hired Guns