2007 Press Articles
Roll Call
CBO Scoring Just Another Lobby Target
Kate Ackley
11-12-2007
In such case, lobbyist Dean Rosen, who runs the health care practice at Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti, said he found a receptive audience. His client, Medicare Cost Contractor Alliance, felt the data the CBO used to score a program was outdated. The group hired an actuary firm and made its case to the CBO.
“It’s very difficult to try to spin stuff with the CBO,” Rosen said. “We went in and met with the CBO to talk to them about the methodology. I’m not saying they bought everything we had, but I think we filled a gap by modernizing the study methodology.” The final score came out this year lower than the original estimate, Rosen said.”
CQ Weekly
Some of K Street’s Best Links to the Democrats
11-5-2007
David Castagnetti is a partner in bipartisan firm, Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti and has expertise in telecommunication, energy, trade, and other issues from his days as an aide in the House to Norman Y. Mineta of California and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and in the Senate to Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus of Montana.
Roll Call
Breaking the Fast
Kate Ackley
10-15-2007
Grown-Ups. The group Majority Under 40, started by several under-age-40 Democratic lobbyists earlier this year as a way to get to know their party’s freshman class, is turning 21 – sort of.
David Thomas, a founder of the network and a lobbyist with Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti, said Majority Under 40 has held 20 meet- and – greet breakfasts with Members…“ What I’m excited about is we got halfway through the class in less than halfway through the Congress,” Thomas said.
Roll Call
Chamber Music
Kate Ackley
9-26-2007
K Street Moves. Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti has added a new lobbyist to its health care practice. Colette Desmarais, most recently a top health policy aide to Senate Finance ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), will join the firm on Oct. 1.[2007] “It’s really significant,” said firm partner Alex Vogel. “She’s really widely respected from the substance perspective. This is part of building a strong and diverse health practice.” Dean Rosen heads the firm’s health practice.
Roll Call
Pollsters: Lobbying’s Next Frontier
Kate Ackley
9-25-2007
Alex Vogel, a lobbyist with Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti, said that when he was on the Hill as a top aide for then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) he viewed polls somewhat skeptically. “Sometimes it was extremely valuable to get a sense of where the issue was in people’s consciousness,” he said. “I think they can be really valuable when you need their data. But I didn’t react terribly well if somebody came in and said you need to do this because of this poll.”
National Journal
People
7-21-2007
Lobby Shops: Republican lobbysit Jamie Brown is leaving Google to join Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti. Brown, 37, was the No. 2 hire at Google’s Washington office just over a year ago. She found the company its spiffy new digs at 1101 New York Ave., launched Google’s first political action committee. So why the move to Mehlman Vogel? “ They’re the New York Yankees of Lobbying firms.”
Roll Call
Two Jamies in Two Jobs Move Downtown
7-12-2007
Jamie Brown, who joined Google’s expanding lobbying outpost last summer, is taking her exit from the tech company to join the lobby shop Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti in September. Before Google, Brown served as a special assistant for legislative affairs to President Bush and helped then-Supreme Court nominee John Roberts navigate his senate confirmation. Mehlman Vogel’s Alex Vogel said he and Brown got to know each other when she worked at the Justice Department and he was an aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Bill First (R-Tenn.). “The great thing is that she’s coming from a tech company, but Jamie’s experience is broader than that. She will be an asset to all clients across the board,” Vogel said.
Roll Call
The Engler Era
Kate Ackley
7-9-2007
Earlier this year, for example, the tech-heavy immigration coalition Compete America, which had been housed at NAM, moved its base to operations to the lobbying firm Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti.
The Polictico
Lobbying firm mines Calif. Connections
Jeanne Cummings
5-1-2007
When Bruce Mehlman and Alex Vogel founded their lobbying firm, they wanted a diverse group of clients, a bipartisan balance and several specialty issues.
Three years later, they’ve accomplished those goals and wound up with an accidental asset: a team with unusually high number of ties to California… While the geographic ties don’t define the shop, they do blend well with the firm’s originating clients: the high-tech community.
While their expertise on technology helped launch their lobbying venture, the partners had broader ambitions. “We wanted to be a firm involved in every major piece of legislation,”
In 2004, Mehlman set out to recruit David Castagnetti to become the firm’s top Democrat … With a new bipartisan nameplate, the firm relaunced itself in January 2005. The office operates much like a Capitol Hill shop. All of the lobbyists work for all of the clients, and they have no separate tiers for “rainmakers.” The firm’s client list is a mix of high-tech firms, health care companies and general business.
Mehlman’s early decision to go bipartisan paid off last fall, when it didn’t los any clients as power switched hands on Capitol Hill.
The Hill
The New Sheriffs in Town
Hill Staff
4-24-2007
David Castagnetti, Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti A former chief of staff to Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), Castagnetti has worked with Republicans to build a growing bipartisan firm.
Alex Vogel, Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti Vogel’s bipartisan firm continued to attract new business in 2006, as it registered to lobby for Pepsico and Wal-Mart.
Roll Call
Comstock in Trade
Paul Singer
4-11-2007
Workers Needed: With the immigration debate heating up again, tech industry honchos are hoping they can finally convince lawmakers to lift the cap on visas for the high-skilled workers they say their companies desperately need… As the lobbying push gets focused, the sector is turning to David Castagnetti and his team of hired top guns at Mehlman Vogel Castagnetti to take the lead. The firm is now heading up Compete America, the industry coalition for the issue formerly housed at the National Association of Manufacturers.
