Election 2008

Matthew J. Burbank, Ronald J. Hrebenar, and Robert C. Benedict Update for Parties, Interest Groups, and Political Campaigns (Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers).* The Election of 2008 The 2008 presidential election was one of the longest, most hard fought, and most expensive elections in history. It was also an important and historic election in a number of ways: Barack Obama’s general election victory marked the first time that an African American candidate was elected president; the Republican party nominated a women, Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, as its vice presidential candidate for the first time (and only the second woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket since the Democrats nominated Geraldine Ferraro in 1984); and Senator Hillary Clinton was nearly the first woman to be nominated as the candidate for president by one of the two major political parties. In the run up to the 2008 election, the national mood appeared to strongly favor the Democrats. Since President Bush’s reelection in 2004, the nation had seen a protracted conflict in Iraq become increasingly unpopular at home, a situation in Afghanistan that appeared to be getting worse, and little progress on Bush’s domestic policy priorities of reforming entitlement programs and dealing with illegal immigration. As a result, President Bush’s job approval ratings were extremely low and Republicans were saddled with an unpopular president and a series of Congressional scandals going into the 2006 midterm elections. Republicans lost control of both the House and Senate in the 2006 midterms. Even the election in 2007 of the first female Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi of California, was overshadowed by the anticipation of the 2008 elections. Republicans looked for ways to minimize the potential loss of seats in Congress and to keep control of the White House if at all possible, while Democrats anticipated capturing the presidency after eight long years and building on their new majorities in Congress. The Republican Primaries Despite the fact that any Republican nominee for president was likely to face a difficult challenge to win the general election, there was no shortage of candidates on the Republican side. Indeed, several candidates declared their candidates for the Republican presidential nomination but then dropped out before competing in any primary elections. This list included Senator Sam Brownback (Kansas), former Virginia governor Jim Gilmore, Representative Tom Tancredo (Colorado), and former Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson. Two other candidates, Representative Duncan Hunter (California) and Representative Ron Paul (Texas), declared their intention to run although both were regarded as long shots. Hunter dropped out quickly after raising little money and attracting little attention. Paul, however, did better than expected, especially with fundraising. Paul competed throughout the primary season by attracting a small but loyal group of supporters; Paul’s campaign raised more than $20 million before the first primary and even set a one-day record by raising $6 million in one day using the Internet (Mosk and Soloman 2008). Two prominent candidates who were expected to do well in the GOP primaries did not: Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City who had become a national figure in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, and Fred Thompson, a former senator from Tennessee and actor known for his role in the TV series Law and Order. The real contest for the Republican nomination was between three candidates: former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, and Senator John McCain. Huckabee, a Baptist preacher prior to getting into politics, drew much of his support from Christian conservatives, a group that has long been a force in Republican party politics and had become increasingly important in the party under George W. Bush. Huckabee had a surprise win in Iowa, the first caucus state, thanks in part to his ability to mobilize Christian conservatives. Huckabee generally did best in southern states such as Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and Louisiana or in states with an active religious right contingent such as Kansas. Mitt Romney, with his personal fortune, business background, and telegenic looks, was expected to be a strong competitor of the GOP nomination. In the end, however, Romney lost the early caucus in Iowa to Huckabee and the primary in New Hampshire to McCain and never generated much enthusiasm among voters. The eventual nominee, Senator John McCain of Arizona, was an unlikely presidential candidate for the Republican party. Although Senator McCain was well known nationally and had a strong conservative voting record during his years in the Senate, he was not popular with many Republican primary voters because he was seen as not being sufficiently loyal to conservative causes or to the Republican brand name on issues such as campaign finance reform and immigration. Senator McCain’s image as a “maverick” willing to challenge leaders in his own party played well with many independents and even some Democrats, but it did not endear him to many in the Bush coalition. Yet, given how bad the outlook appeared to be for Republicans going into the 2008 elections, for many Republicans the only real hope the party had was to nominate McCain and trust that his maverick image and status as a war hero would be sufficient to help him win the presidency. Senator McCain’s path to the GOP nomination was similarly unconventional. Early in the campaign season, well before any votes were actually cast, McCain had been dubbed by the media to be the “front runner” for the nomination based largely on his advantage in national polls. Despite this status, McCain’s campaign struggled to raise money and eventually suffered a major meltdown that forced McCain to get rid of many of his senior campaign staff and take other actions to reduce costs. McCain returned to running a small-scale campaign and focused much of his attention on New Hampshire, a state where McCain had done well in the past and a state with a primary that allowed independents to vote in the Republican contest. After Huckabee’s surprise win in the Iowa caucuses, McCain beat both Romney and Huckabee in New Hampshire to give his campaign a needed boost. McCain went on to win important early primaries in South Carolina and Florida, and largely cemented his status as the likely nominee by winning a number of states during the so-called “Super Tuesday” primaries including the delegaterich states of California, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, and Oklahoma. Romney dropped out of the contest shortly thereafter while Huckabee continued to compete with McCain for another month. By early March, it was evident that McCain would secure enough delegates to win the Republican nomination for president. The Democratic Primaries Like the Republican primaries, the Democratic contest started early and attracted an impressive list of candidates. The Democratic candidates included four sitting U.S. senators—Joe Biden (Delaware), Hillary Clinton (New York), Chris Dodd (Connecticut), and Barack Obama (Illinois)—as well as former senator and 2004 vice presidential candidate John Edwards (North Carolina), former senator Mike Gravel (Alaska), Representative Dennis Kucinich (Ohio), and Governor Bill Richardson (New Mexico). Among this star-studded cast, Senator Hillary Clinton was considered to be the overwhelming favorite because of her national name recognition as a senator from New York and former first lady, her ability to raise money, and strength of her support among Democratic activists who had dominated the party during the presidency of her husband, Bill Clinton. Despite her strength among Democratic activists, however, Hillary Clinton was still a polarizing figure nationally, both strongly liked and strongly disliked in national opinion polls. John Edwards was expected to be the candidate most likely to get the Democratic nomination if Senator Clinton’s campaign were to falter. Senator Barack Obama attracted a good deal of attention from the media because he was a new face on the national political scene and was an eloquent speaker, but he was widely regarded as too inexperienced in national politics to be a serious contender for the Democratic nomination. The Democratic candidates competed to raise money and were generally quite successful as many Democratic supporters were eager to contribute to their preferred candidate. The Democrats also participated in numerous public debates in the months leading up to the first primary elections in January 2008, with Senator Clinton as the front runner enduring a barrage of challenges from the other candidates. The first contest in Iowa, a caucus state, produced a surprisingly strong victory for Barack Obama who easily defeated Hillary Clinton and John Edwards. Obama’s win was a surprise because both Clinton and Edwards were believed to have established strong local organizations in Iowa; generally in a caucus state having a strong organization that will get supporters out to the caucus meetings is the key to victory. The Obama campaign, however, showed that it had an effective local organization and that it could successfully bring new participants into the Iowa caucuses. Obama’s showing in Iowa was also seen as a good indication that he had a strong appeal to white Midwestern voters, a demographic group Senator Obama would have to do well with to win the presidency. The next contest in the primary state of New Hampshire resulted in a close win for Senator Clinton, getting 39 percent of the popular vote to Obama’s 37 percent. The results in Iowa and New Hampshire reveal the pattern for what turned into a long and remarkable primary competition. Early on most of the other candidates had dropped out and the Democratic contest boiled down to Hillary Clinton versus Barack Obama. Clinton was the favorite of many Democratic activists and had a strong appeal for many voters as potentially the first woman to be the presidential nominee of a major party. As the contest went on, Senator Clinton played up her political experience, in contrast to Obama’s relative inexperience, and sought to build on her appeal to working class voters. Senator Obama, in contrast, attempted to capitalize on the excitement surrounding his candidacy and portrayed himself as the real agent of change to “politics as usual” in Washington while his campaign worked hard to attract new, and especially young, voters to his candidacy. February 5, 2008 was “Super Tuesday,” the day a large number of states scheduled primary elections because it was the earliest time that the Democratic party would allow most states to hold their contests. Officials in many states anticipated that only by holding an early primary election could they attract any attention to their state (for more on the “frontloading” of presidential primaries, see Chapter 4, p. 63). In all, 22 states held Democratic elections on Super Tuesday, with six states holding caucuses and 16 states holding primaries including the large states of California, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Georgia. Many Clinton supporters expected that Senator Clinton would be able to translate her name recognition, organization, and money into a commanding lead in delegates by winning a number of the Super Tuesday primaries. While Senator Clinton did well by winning nine of the primary states including California, New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, she was not able to deliver a knockout. Senator Obama held his own by winning seven primary states including Illinois, Georgia, Alabama, and Connecticut and taking all six of the caucus states. The pattern of results from the Super Tuesday elections confirmed that both candidates had strong appeal to voters and that neither candidate would be able to easily outdistance the other in the delegate count because of the proportional system that Democrats use to allocate delegates. Another pattern that emerged was that while Senator Clinton showed that she could win big states such as California and Massachusetts, the Obama campaign showed its superior organizational ability by winning nearly all the caucus states. These patterns continued through February and March as Obama won a string of victories in states like Louisiana, Washington, Virginia, and Maryland, and Clinton won the large states of Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Neither candidate, however, was able to build a big lead in the number of pledged delegates who would ultimately determine the nomination. Unlike any other primary election in contemporary American politics for either party, the Democratic contest continued until the final primaries in Montana and South Dakota in early June. During this close and hard-fought campaign, many in the Democratic party feared that the nomination would be decided at the convention by the votes of the so-called “superdelegates” (for more on superdelegates, see Chapter 4, pp. 61-63). Although the Democratic party had created votes for these unpledged delegates, who are party leaders and elected officials (PLEOs), for exactly such a circumstance, few superdelegates were eager to cast the deciding vote between these two historic candidates who had established such support among voters. In the end, Senator Obama had a sufficient number of pledged delegates and the announced support of superdelegates to secure the nomination. Senator Clinton ultimately conceded the race and endorsed Barack Obama as the party’s nominee. The General Election After the excitement of the primaries, the two major parties had two unlikely presumptive nominees. For the Democrats, Barack Obama had been considered a long shot to win his party’s nomination given his relative youth and inexperience in national politics. Still, Senator Obama proved to be an appealing candidate who ran a highly disciplined campaign in the primaries to secure the nomination with a victory over a better known candidate, Senator Hillary Clinton. For the Republicans, John McCain was an established political figure with strong credibility on matters of foreign affairs and national security. McCain was, however, an unusual choice for the Republicans since he was not especially popular with many activists in his own party. The 2008 general election campaign thus began with two unlikely presidential candidates and proved to have more surprises in store. As the party out of power, the Democrats held their nominating convention first (for more on party conventions see Chapter 3, pp. 46-49). The Democrats had selected Denver to host their convention in part as a way to build support for Democrats in western states such as Colorado. Shortly before the convention, Barack Obama named Senator Joe Biden of Delaware as his choice for vice president. There had been a good deal of speculation prior to this announcement as to whether Obama would pick Hillary Clinton as his vice presidential candidate. The choice of Biden, a long serving member of the U.S. Senate with established expertise in foreign affairs, was intended to help shore up an expected weak point for the Obama candidacy in the area of international affairs and national security. Having not selected Senator Clinton as the vice presidential nominee, however, again raised the issue of whether Clinton would endorse Obama enthusiastically at the party’s convention. Senator Clinton spoke in prime time on the second night of the convention and delivered a speech that indeed contained a strong endorsement, beginning her speech with the line “I'm here tonight as a proud mother, as a proud Democrat, as a proud Senator from New York, a proud American, and a proud supporter of Barack Obama.” As the nominee, Obama delivered his acceptance speech on the last night of the convention—not in the convention hall but at an outdoor football stadium in front of an estimated crowd of 84,000 people. Obama’s acceptance speech played heavily on a time- honored theme for the party out of power, that it is time for a change. The theme of change was one Senator Obama had used successfully in the primaries and wanted to emphasize in the general election as well. Despite the selection of a well-worn political theme, Obama was nonetheless able to link the idea of change to his own story and the outlook of many Americans: I get it. I realize that I am not the likeliest candidate for this office. I don't fit the typical pedigree, and I haven’t spent my career in the halls of Washington. But I stand before you tonight because all across America something is stirring. What the naysayers don’t understand is that this election has never been about me; it’s about you. It’s about you. For 18 long months, you have stood up, one by one, and said, “enough,” to the politics of the past. You understand that, in this election, the greatest risk we can take is to try the same, old politics with the same, old players and expect a different result. You have shown what history teaches us, that at defining moments like this one, the change we need doesn't come from Washington. Change comes to Washington. Change happens—change happens because the American people demand it, because they rise up and insist on new ideas and new leadership, a new politics for a new time. The Republican national convention was scheduled to be held shortly after the end of the Democratic convention because the 2008 Beijing summer Olympics pushed both parties to hold their conventions later than they ordinarily would have. While some Republican strategists hoped that this timing would blunt the impact of any uptick in the polls that the Democratic nominee would get, the GOP convention was affected by two unusual events. The first event was Hurricane Gustav, a large storm that threatened the Gulf Coast region just as Republicans were assembling in their convention city of St. Paul, Minnesota. Mindful of the negative impact that the problematic federal response to Hurricane Katrina had had on the Bush presidency, Senator McCain’s campaign opted to largely suspend the first day of convention activity rather than risk having televised images of Republicans partying in St. Paul side by side with people being evaluated from their homes along the Gulf Coast. Fortunately, a weakened Hurricane Gustav did not impact the United States as heavily as had been predicted, and Republicans were able to limit any political damage by using the attention to help organize efforts to collect donations for the expected victims of the hurricane. Scaling down the first day’s activities also meant that the convention hall speeches scheduled for President Bush and Vice President Cheney were cancelled, although President Bush addressed the convention via satellite the next day. Given President Bush’s low approval rating, many political observers believed that having Bush and Cheney not appear at the convention was a benefit to Senator McCain because it reinforced the strategy to distance himself and the party from the current administration (McManus and Gerstenzang 2008). The second unexpected event that hit the Republican convention was a different kind of storm, a media storm. This media storm was generated following Senator McCain’s announcement that he had selected Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska to be the vice presidential nominee. McCain chose Governor Palin because she was a Washington outsider (the other three major party nominees were all members of the U.S. Senate), had a reputation as reformer in her short time as governor of Alaska (Palin was first elected governor in 2006), and would appeal to many Christian conservatives who otherwise might not be motivated to support the Republican ticket. As the first woman to be selected for the Republican ticket and not well known outside of her home state, Governor Palin attracted a huge amount of media attention which was intensified by the decision of the McCain campaign to manage her media contacts carefully. As a consequence, the few media interviews that Governor Palin conducted attracted a great deal of scrutiny and her speech at the Republican convention generated enormous attention and threatened to overshadow the acceptance speech by the presidential nominee. In the end, however, the Republican convention wrapped up with a rousing and widely viewed acceptance speech from John McCain in which he linked his personal story of his time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam with his campaign’s theme of “Country First:” I fell in love with my country when I was a prisoner in someone else’s. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice, and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for. I was never the same again. I wasn’t my own man anymore. I was my country’s. . . . I'm going to fight for my cause every day as your president. I'm going to fight to make sure every American has every reason to thank God, as I thank him: that I’m an American, a proud citizen of the greatest country on Earth, and with hard work, strong faith and a little courage, great things are always within our reach. Fight with me! With the nominating conventions over, the general election was underway. Each candidate got a bounce in the polls coming out of his respective convention (for more on convention bounce, see Chapter 3, pp. 47-48). Based on data from the Gallup Poll, Barack Obama got a 4 percent bounce, while John McCain got a 6 percent convention bounce (Jones 2008). As a result of his post-convention bounce, McCain came out of the conventions with a 5 point lead in the national opinion polls. McCain’s standing in the polls, however, weakened as the campaign progressed and the economy became the key issue in the election. Prior to the general election, the war in Iraq was widely regarded as likely to be a central issue in the 2008 presidential campaign, as it had been in the 2004 contest (see Chapter 5, pp. 90-92). Yet, in September the economy clearly became the dominant issue of the presidential campaign. Questions about the economy were rooted in declining prices in the housing market and the subsequent collapse of the market for subprime mortgages. The weakness in the housing market, in turn, had a dramatic negative effect on the financial viability of a number of banks, insurance companies, and financial institutions in the United States and around the world. The period of the presidential campaign saw a number of dramatic developments related to the economy including the collapse of Lehman Brothers, a major investment bank, the collapse and subsequent bailout by the government of AIG, a huge insurance company, and the government take over of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two companies that had dominated the residential mortgage business. Ultimately, these severe economic troubles lead Congress to pass the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 in early October and President Bush signed the bill into law immediately after it was passed. Thus, uncertainly over the economic future of the country came to dominate the election campaign and largely worked to the advantage of Senator Obama. The Outcome of the 2008 Elections On election day, the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden defeated the Republican ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin handily. Obama got more than 69 million votes, 53 percent, to McCain’s nearly 60 million votes, 46 percent. The total number of votes that Barack Obama received was a new record for the most votes, the previous record having been set by George W. Bush in 2004. In the electoral college, Obama won 365 electoral college votes to McCain’s 173. The Democratic ticket managed to reshape the electoral map by winning a number of states that Republicans had carried in 2004. These states included Ohio (20 electoral votes), Indiana (11), and Iowa (7) in the Midwest, Florida (27), North Carolina (15), and Virginia (13) in the South, and Nevada (5), Colorado (9), and New Mexico (5) in the West. Obama also carried the second congressional district in Nebraska, meaning that Obama won one electoral college vote in Nebraska while McCain won the other four. This election was thus the first to result in a split electoral college vote in Nebraska since state law was changed to allow the allocation of its electoral votes by congressional district in 1992 (for more on the electoral college, see Chapter 4, pp. 64-68). Data from national exit polls provide some evidence that Barack Obama’s candidacy had a particular appeal to young voters and to voters who are racial minorities (ABC News 2008). Figure E.1 shows the differences in vote choice by age group. Clearly, the youngest age group, those 18 to 29 years old, supported Obama by the largest margin. While Obama got a majority of votes in both the 30 to 44 and the 45 to 64 age groups, McCain got a majority of votes only in the 65 and older group. Senator Obama proved to be especially attractive to first-time voters. Even though first-time voters made up only 11 percent of the electorate according to the exit polls, Obama won the votes of 69 percent of first-time voters compared to 30 percent for McCain. As Figure E.2 shows, there were also big differences in support by race. McCain won a narrow majority among white voters, while Obama had decisive majorities among all other racial groups. Not surprisingly, African Americans voted for Obama by an overwhelming majority. Exit poll data showed that a person’s partisan identification played an important role in determining vote choice (for more on voting behavior, see Chapter 5, especially, pp. 83-94). On election day 2008, Democrats had an advantage in that 39 percent of voters identified themselves as Democrats, 32 percent called themselves Republicans, and 29 percent called themselves independents. As expected, party loyalty was strong: 89 percent of Democrats reported voting for Barack Obama and 90 percent of Republicans voted for John McCain. Independents favored Obama by 52 percent to 44 percent for McCain (with the remaining 4 percent voting for a third party candidate). Ideological identification had a similar effect. Most self-identified liberals (89 percent) voted for Obama, most conservatives (78 percent) voted for McCain, and 60 percent of moderates voted for Obama. Both candidate image and issues showed marked differences in the exit poll data. The images of the two presidential candidates—that Barack Obama represented change and that John McCain was the more experienced candidate—were clearly impressed on voters. Figure E.3 shows the effect of candidate image on vote choice. Among those voters who identified having the “right experience” as the most important candidate quality, 93 percent voted for John McCain, while among those who identified bringing “needed change” as the most important quality, 89 percent voted for Barack Obama. When asked which one issue was the most important facing the county, voters overwhelming said that it was the economy. Fully 63 percent of voters identified the economy as the most important issue, and among those 53 percent voted for Senator Obama and 44 percent voted for Senator McCain as shown in Figure E.4. The second choice for most important issue was the war in Iraq with 10 percent, followed closely by terrorism at 9 percent, health care at 9 percent, and energy at 7 percent. John McCain won the votes of those who identified terrorism as the most important issue, while Barack Obama won among those who identified the war in Iraq as the most important issue. The pattern of Republican voters selecting terrorism and Democratic voters selecting the war in Iraq is similar to the pattern in the 2004 election between George W. Bush and John Kerry (see Chapter 5, pp. 91-92). Still, in the 2008 presidential election, the economy was clearly the dominant issue and that issue played to the advantage of Barack Obama and the Democrats. In the congressional elections, Democrats also did well nationally. Democrats picked up 21 seats in the House of Representatives in the 2008 elections, increasing their total in the House to 257 seats to the 178 seats held by Republicans. Democrats managed to win a number of the open seats (races with no incumbent member) in House elections and even to defeat some Republican incumbents, most notably Christopher Shays in Connecticut. In the Senate, Democrats picked up 8 seats to reach a total of 59 Democratic seats (including two independents senators, Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and Bernie Sanders of Vermont who are included in the Democratic caucus). Democrats picked up three open Senate seats in Virginia, Colorado, and New Hampshire. Even more striking, Democrats were able to defeat five incumbent Republican senators, including Norm Coleman (Minnesota), Elizabeth Dole (North Carolina), Gordon Smith (Oregon), Ted Stevens (Alaska), and John Sununu (New Hampshire). One bright spot for the Republicans was that they were able to hold the Senate seat of Saxby Chambliss in Georgia even though Chambliss was forced into a runoff election, in accordance with Georgia election law, by not securing a majority vote in November. These election results left the Democrats firmly in control of Congress with a 79 seat advantage in the House and an 18 seat advantage (counting the two independents) in the Senate. Democrats did not, however, manage to reach the 60 seat threshold in the Senate that would have allowed them to prevent Republican filibusters. Still, winning the presidency and retaining control of both houses of Congress meant that 2008 was a successful election for the Democratic party. Interest Group Politics and the Beginning of the Obama Administration During the presidential campaign, the Obama and McCain campaigns clashed over the presence of “Washington lobbyists” on the campaign teams and the extent of the ties of one side or the other to various interest groups. The Obama campaign, in particular, attempted to raise doubts about McCain’s claims that he would do battle with the special interests in Washington given his campaign’s use of lobbyists. As Obama said of McCain during a campaign speech in Florida: “He says he'll take on the corporate lobbyists, but he put seven of the biggest lobbyists in Washington in charge of his campaign” (quoted in Braun 2008, A11). While much of the “anti-lobbyist rhetoric” was initiated by the Obama campaign, both campaigns competed “to prove who is tougher on this political season’s whipping boy, the Washington lobbyist” (Mooney 2008, A6). Despite the tone of this campaign language, interest groups and the lobbyists who represent them played significant roles on both sides in the 2008 presidential and congressional campaign as they have in previous campaigns (see Chapter 9 for more on the interest groups and campaigns). Furthermore, interest groups and lobbyists have played a prominent role in the ten week Obama transition and the beginnings of the Obama presidency. Indeed, given the reality of how public policy is made in Washington, it is inconceivable that interest groups would not be involved in the process—regardless of which candidate won (see Chapter 10 for more on lobbying). After winning the presidential election, President-elect Obama moved quickly to fulfill his campaign promises by setting out a very restrictive set of rules for his transition teams with respect to federal lobbyists. While on the surface President-elect Obama may have tried to ban lobbyists from the transition, in actuality they were everywhere. The federal government provides the president elect about $8.5 million, but the transition was estimated to cost about $12 million (Cooper and Zeleny 2008; MacGillis 2008). The additional money was raised from private contributions, which are limited to no more than $5,000 per person by federal law. Although President-elect Obama banned donations from corporations, federal lobbyists, or political action committees, a number of interested individuals still made the maximum contributions including the CEOs of Google, Sony, and Warner Music (MacGillis 2008). Any lobbyists working in the transition could not work on any policy area they had lobbied for in the past. This rule was similar to the Clinton administration’s transition rules. Still, it was notable that the head of the Obama transition team was Washington lobbyist John Podesta. Podesta is the head of a major Washington, DC think tank and former head of the Podesta Group, a major lobbying firm, now headed by his brother, Tony. His sister-in-law, Heather Podesta, founded Heather Podesta+Partners, another lobbying firm. The transition team consisted of about 450 people and operated agency review teams that reviewed about 100 government agencies and departments to prepare for the takeover. The huge Obama inauguration offered many of the nation’s most powerful interest groups a last chance to “throw money” at the feet of the incoming president. Inaugural fund-raising is still unregulated by federal law, but President-elect Obama banned contributions from registered lobbyists, political action committees, corporations, and foreigners. Individual contributors were limited to $50,000, much less than the $250,000 limit that the transition team for George W. Bush had established (Stewart 2008). Still, it was not difficult for individuals with money to evade these limits. For example, spouses of lobbyists could contribute, so a couple could give up to $100,000. What does a presidential inauguration cost? The total costs to hold the inaugural events were estimated to be as high as $170 million (Haberkorn and McElhatton 2009). The official Presidential Inaugural Committee raised about $40 million with big donors coming heavily from the financial, entertainment, insurance, and real estate industries (Kindy and Cohen 2009; Zajac 2009). In return, donors got tickets for the major events and private sessions with the highest level personnel in the incoming administration. The lobbyists and interest groups did not rest on inaugural day. Major lobbying firms invited their top clients to come to the suites along the parade route on Pennsylvania Avenue and to fine area restaurants to escape the cold temperatures, sip wine, and eat good food. Later in the day, major interest groups sponsored some of the inaugural balls that were hosted all over the city. Some reformers called for public funding for all inaugural costs and appealed to the new Obama administration to establish stronger lobbying rules early. Indeed, on his first day, President Obama issued an executive order that established the lobbying rules for his new administration. Central to that order was a complete ban on his administration’s personnel receiving gifts. No former lobbyist selected to the Obama administration would be allowed to work on matters they had lobbied on, or in agencies they had lobbied during the previous two years. The rule seemed to be absolute, but William Lynn, nominee for Deputy Secretary of Defense, had spent years as one of the lobbyists for Raytheon, one of the nation’s premier defense contractors. Furthermore, Hillary Clinton, the new Secretary of State, was also viewed as having a potential conflict of interest problem from her spouse’s fund raising from foreign interests. Meanwhile, thousands of lobbyists and hundreds of interest groups were mobilizing to fight for their “fair share” of the huge fiscal stimulus bills that the Obama administration would be sending to Congress shortly after the inauguration. From giant banks and mortgage companies to automobile makers to companies making cancer treatments, America’s interest groups were busy lobbying to shape the roughly $800 billion in federal money to jump start the economy. Even with all the promise of a new and historic presidency, it is also true that much of Washington politics will continue as it has in the contemporary era of political parties, interest groups, and campaigns. References ABC News. 2008. “Exit Poll Results.” Available at: abcnews.go.com. Braun, Stephen. 2008. “McCain’s Image as Reformer Takes a Hit.” Los Angeles Times, September 25. Cooper, Helene, and Jeff Zeleny. 2008. “Obama’s Transition Team Restricts Help of Lobbyists.” New York Times, November 12. Haberkorn, Jennifer, and Jim McElhatton. 2009. “Welcome Party Costs $170 Million During Tough Times.” Washington Times, January 20. Jones, Jeffrey M. 2008. “Gallup Daily: McCain’s Bounce Gives Him a 5-Point Lead.” September 8. Available at: gallup.com. Kindy, Kimberly, and Sarah Cohen. 2009. “The Donors Who Gave Big, and Often.” Washington Post, January 18. MacGillis, Alex. 2008. “Obama Lists $1 Million Plus in Donations for Transition.” Washington Post, December 2. McManus, Doyle, and James Gerstenzang. 2008. “Republican Convention: Bush Cancels—To Sighs of Relief.” Los Angeles Times, September 1. Mooney, Brian. 2008. “Lobbyists Are Boon as Well as Bane For McCain, Obama.” Boston Globe, June 1. Mosk, Matthew, and John Solomon. 2008. “Clinton and Obama Each Pull in Over $100 Million.” Washington Post, January 1. Stewart, Nikita. 2008. “Inaugural Gift Limits, Co-Chairs Announced.” Washington Post, November 26. Zajac, Andrew. 2009. “Obama’s Inauguration: Supporters; Despite Ban, Lobbyists Flood In.” Los Angeles Times, January 18. * Acknowledgement: We would like to thank Akiko Kurata and Mark Justice for their research assistance with this election update.