Wife, Friend Tie Congressman to Consulting Firm

In Congress, Davis has been a leader in reshaping the nation's procurement system, pressing to overhaul what he considers to be the government's inefficient contracting rules. He has been recognized as a "True Blue Reformer" by Public Citizen, a good-government group, for what his biography calls "his consistently strong support of political and ethics reforms."

But to some, Davis's persona as a reformer does not square with his close relationship with technology corporations, many of them based in Northern Virginia, that have greatly increased their federal contracting business since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In the past five years, technology and telecommunications companies have been the largest contributors to Davis's and his wife's separate campaigns and political action committees. Those companies and their employees have donated more than $1.1 million of the $6.4 million given to the couple's campaigns, according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics and the Virginia Public Access Project.

A former top contracting official for the Bush administration who clashed with Davis repeatedly over procurement policy wrote a stinging e-mail about him to her boss in May 2002.

"The businesses in Mr. Davis district are primarily government contractors and he wants to make sure the $$ are free flowing without much regard to the fiscal consequences," said the e-mail written by Angela B. Styles, who was chief of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy at the Office of Management and Budget at the time.

'My Niche'

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Devolites Davis, 50, said she made it on her own as a consultant for ICG. She cited her experience as a state lawmaker who has worked for years on technology policy, including anti-spamming legislation and procurement issues in Virginia.

"This is just my area of expertise and my niche," she said in an interview last week. "With a deep interest in technology, math and science, certainly it was something that I came to understand, the business and the industry."

When Devolites Davis joined ICG in 2003, she was listed on the firm's Web site as a senior associate. Her biography on ICG's Web site now lists her as a partner. She said in the interview that she is not a partner but a salaried employee. Her pay rose last year to $6,500 from $4,000 a month.

She said she got a raise "as the company grew and its resources grew."

ICG collected $830,000 in revenue last year, Devolites Davis said. The firm, based in Tysons Corner with an office in Richmond, has seven employees. Upson declined to discuss the firm's finances.

"She has a couple of little clients she does, and she doesn't touch the federal sector," Davis said. "We've tried to put up bars in this case where she doesn't bring anybody up here."

But Devolites Davis told The Post that she does represent clients with interests in the federal sector -- three of her four assignments involve reaching out to federal officials.