Many top corporations vowed to hold back political donations to Republican lawmakers who helped provoke the Jan. 6 insurrection, but GOP lobbyists predicted that promise would soon be broken.
The party in power or close to gaining it tends to get the most campaign money, and GOP lobbyists say last week's elections in New Jersey and Virginia sparked interest from their corporate clients looking to buy influence on Capitol Hill, reported Politico.
"After talking to several clients today, they'll be a lot more aggressively Republican giving," said Republican lobbyist Brian Ballard, who has ties to the Trump administration. "It's much more bullish for Republicans than it was perhaps six months ago."
Some corporations are starting to resume their relationships with lawmakers who voted against the certification of President Joe Biden's electoral win, and several lobbyists told Politico they knew of companies that planned to restart their contributions to Republicans who would regain leadership of key committees.
"Where we are today from where we were six to eight months ago is a fundamentally different political environment," said lobbyist David Tamasi, managing director of Chartwell Strategy Group. "I think people are realizing that you know it's likely that the House is gonna flip, and that you're gonna have to engage with some of the folks that are going to have greater political profiles than they did previously."
Republican lobbyists held a fundraiser for Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and House minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) on Tuesday, before the election results came back, but they "had trouble" raising PAC money for the event, according to Sam Geduldig, co-CEO of CGCN Group.
But he suspects that will change by the end of this year.
"I think they'll want to figure out how to repair relationships with people that hold gavels and hold chairmanships that are important," Geduldig said.