Harold Simmons' Waste Control Specialists long concentrated its lobby power in Austin as it sought to open its West Texas nuclear dump. The company's federal lobby spending then briefly matched its Texas expenditures in 2009 and 2010, as Simmons pressed Democrats in Congress and the White House to send more radioactive junk to Texas. When that lobbying effort appeared to strike out Simmons quickly established himself as the nation's No. 1 contributor to anti-Obama super PACs.
Read TPJ's radioactive new Lobby Watch.