MEDILL NEWS SERVICE > Power Trips: Congress hits the road

Harvard, George Mason top university sponsors of congressional travel
By REBECCA CHO and MATTHEW BLAKE
MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON -- Most of the $54.8 million spent since 2000 by private interests on travel for members of Congress and their staffs comes from corporations, trade groups and foundations. But universities and colleges also contributed about $1.5 million in congressional trips.

According to an analysis by Medill News Service of official travel reports from Jan. 1, 2000, through mid-August 2006, two schools, Harvard University and George Mason University, stood out, spending substantially more money on travel for members of Congress and their aides than other colleges or universities.

Harvard was the biggest university sponsor of congressional travel, spending $378,000 during the period examined. About $257,000 of that was for travel by Democrats, making Harvard the largest university sponsor of Democratic travel. The school spent $121,000 to sponsor Republican congressmen and staff on trips.

"John Kennedy was a Democrat and Massachusetts is a blue state," said Senior Lecturer Julie Wilson of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "We work really hard to recruit Republicans, but it's hard to overcome our reputation."

George Mason University, through the nonprofit Mercatus Center housed at its Arlington, Va. campus, was the top university sponsor of travel by Republicans, spending more than $180,000 from 2000 through mid-August 2006. The Mercatus Center spent $77,600 on Democratic travel.

Meridith McGehee, policy director for the Campaign Legal Center, a government ethics watchdog group, said colleges and universities receive federal funding and want to build relationships with Washington.

"The government gives millions of dollars each year to educational institutions," she said. "It doesn't mean public institutions are nefarious, but they, too, have interests like tax policy and earmarks."

In Virginia, officials at George Mason's Mercatus Center said invitations to its events are sent to all congressional offices and noted that the GOP dominance is likely because Republicans have had the majority in both the House and Senate. That will change next year as a consequence of Democratic victories in the November election.

Nearly all of George Mason's spending was to send top congressional staff members to its retreats for chiefs of staff, held annually at locations away from Capitol Hill. The Mercatus Center pays for the three-day retreats, which it says consist of seminars designed to educate participants in economic policy.

This year, 29 GOP staffers attended, compared with only nine Democratic staffers. Significantly more Republicans than Democrats have attended the event since 2000-more than 300 Republicans compared with about 100 Democrats.

Lawson Bader, vice president of the center, said as a nonpartisan organization Mercatus sends invitations to chiefs of staff for every member of Congress, as well as to other select senior Congressional staff.

With new Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, Bader said, "It's perfectly acceptable to see the numbers reverse themselves."

The center promotes free-market principles, to which Republicans have a natural affinity, said Veronique de Rugy of the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

But she added that Mercatus produces "very solid work" and does not favor either party.

Michelle Presson, chief of staff for Rep. Scott Garrett, R-N.J., attended the retreat to connect with other chiefs of staff. She said she did not notice the discrepancy in attendance along party lines.

"When we're off the Hill, we're just chiefs of staff," Presson said. "We don't really talk about those things."

Though it functions within the university, Mercatus is financially independent from George Mason. The center receives money from a variety of sources, including the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. Charles G. Koch, serves on the center's board and is the owner of Koch Industries, the world's largest private company valued at about $90 billion, according to Forbes.

A long-time champion of conservative causes, Koch donated $50,250 to the Republican National Committee in 2006, according to opensecrets.org, a campaign finance watchdog group. Mercatus spokeswoman Carrie Conko said funders have no influence over research or programs at the center.

George Mason University spokesman Daniel Walsch said it is important to the university that Mercatus not be seen as favoring one party over another.

"We want to maintain good bridges with all parties," Walsch said. "We want to grow in reputation. We want to do that by not having political affiliations."

Of the 222 congressional trips Harvard paid for between 2000 and mid-August of this year, a majority involved bringing members of Congress to the Cambridge campus to speak or attend conferences.

This weekend, Harvard holds its orientation for newly elected members of Congress, a retreat funded each election year by the school's Institute of Politics. Topics at the conference range from the process of approving spending bills to how Congress members should plan their family budgets in Washington, according to institute spokesman Esten Perez.

This year 35 Democrats and one Republican will attend, Perez said. The disparity this was not due to the fact that almost all the newly elected members are Democrats, he said.

"In terms of why there were not more Republicans here, we don't know," Perez said. "I don't think [the institute] has struggles attracting Republicans."

Wilson, the senior lecturer at Harvard's Kennedy School, said that Harvard-sponsored travel has allowed members of Congress from different parties and different chambers to come together for sustained policy discussions.

More than 70 of the Harvard-sponsored trips were for an annual health policy retreat held in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in January. Fifty-three participants were Democratic and 22 were Republican.

Between 1999 and 2005, Wilson helped organize the Bipartisan Congressional Health Policy Conference, an annual four-day retreat co-sponsored by the Commonwealth Fund, a New York-based private foundation that funds health care research.

She said that university involvement in the Florida retreat ended because the Kennedy School wanted a broader spectrum of views instead of an emphasis on research by the New York's Commonwealth Fund.

John Craig, executive vice president of the Commonwealth Fund, said the foundation is following rather than shaping national health care trends. "The states now have a major part of the health care agenda," Craig said. "Our work is really across the board…the problem is that employers are getting out of funding health care."

In Evanston, Ill., Northwestern University sponsored four trips worth $4,000 since 2000, mainly to bring members of Congress to campus.

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