Washington Post: Scanner Companies hiring former federal workers

By Dan Eggen / December 26, 2010

About 8 in 10 registered lobbyists who work for scanner-technology companies previously held positions in the government or Congress, most commonly in the homeland security, aviation, or intelligence fields, according to a Washington Post review of lobbying-disclosure forms and data.

The extent of the connections to the federal government is particularly notable given the relatively small size of the scanner industry, which is dominated by a half-dozen specialized firms with heavy investments in airport-and border-security technology. Among Washington lobbyists as a whole, 1 in 3 has previously worked in government, according to the Center for Responsible Politics research group.

Many of the scanner companies are also on pace to spend record amounts of money for lobbying this year on Capitol Hill, where they see potential problems as some lawmakers push for limits on airport security practices. Top scanner firms have reported spending more than $6 million on lobbying this year, records show; that doesn't include industrial leaders such as General Electric, which also dabbles in scanning technology and has spent more than $32 million on lobbying this year.

The stepped up lobbying efforts by the industry come amid growing rancor on Capitol Hill over the Transportation Security Administration's use of airport full-body scanners, which are undergoing their first widespread deployment during the holiday travel season. The devices have come under fire from privacy and civil liberties advocates as ineffective and overly invasive because they generate revealing images of passengers.

The agency has purchased nearly 500 of the cutting-edge scanners - at $200,000 or more each - and plans to buy thousands more, meaning any restrictions would pose a major threat to the industry's bottom line. Faced with that threat, the industry made a strong lobbying push over the past two years to help derail any proposed limits, including legislation aimed at restricting or banning the use of full-body scanners by the TSA.

That came after the House stunned the industry last year by overwhelmingly approving a bill by Representative Jason Chaffetze, Republican of Utah who has been named as the incoming chairman of the House homeland-defense subcommittee, forbidding the TSA from using body scanners as primary passenger-screening tools at airports. The vote prompted a frantic scramble by scanner lobbyists to halt the measure in the Senate, according to legislative aides and others familiar with the battle. The effort was bolstered by the failed "underwear bomber" plot, which hastened calls for increased scanner use, last December.