Bottom Line

• REGULATIONS. The boutique lobby firm Lobbyit.com is working for The National Council of Investigation and Security Services on bills related to “training and standards, licensing” of the private security industry. Firm founder Paul Kanitra and former Justice Department official Keith Nelson will also be battling “general misinformation on the role and contribution of private investigators and security services,” according to registration forms.
 
Lobbyit.com will also be working for the Tobacco Vapor Electronic Cigarette Association, a trade group that’s clashing with lawmakers and regulators who are moving to place strict regulations on the product.
 
• INTERNATIONAL. Shockey Scofield Solutions signed American Task Force Argentina as a client. The group is seeking repayment of billions of dollars owed to U.S. investors, after the South American country defaulted on its debt in 2001. Shockey Scofield will be “ensuring Argentina is held accountable for its failure to comply with U.S. court judgments,” according to the filing. The task force has five other lobby firms on retainer.
 
Former Rep. Jim Slattery (D-Kan.) is lobbying for the London-based Trident Foundation, which states its mission is to “[support] a free, independent and democratic Ukraine.” Slattery works for the law firm Wiley Rein and will be joined by Joe Williams, a public policy advisor at the firm.

• TAX REFORM. The Tax Innovation Equality (TIE) Coalition — which includes Microsoft, Adobe, Netflix and Merck — hired Washington attorney Catherine Porter to work on tax reform. The coalition is lobbying to lower U.S. corporate taxes and “implement a territorial tax system which does not double-tax income earned by U.S. multinational corporations overseas,” according to the coalition’s website. The coalition is Porter’s only client.
 
• GUN CONTROL. A new coalition that is pushing for stricter gun laws has hired Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti to lobby on its behalf. The Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund is made up of two groups: Mayors Against Illegal Guns, founded by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, which was founded the day after the Newtown, Conn., elementary school shooting in 2012. Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti will be lobbying on background checks and several pieces of legislation.