Railroad Firms Bringing Aboard Lawmakers' Lobbyist Relatives

Jennifer Esposito said that her family's work will not keep her from representing the interests of her boss and the transportation committee's chairman, Rep. James L. Oberstar (D-Minn.), who favors stronger safety laws. She said she considers the railroad companies her "adversaries."

When they were hired, she said, she consulted her supervisors and House ethics advisers who she said told her to create a "wall" to prevent them from lobbying her. Her father, she decided, "can't lobby me, he can't meet with me, I can't discuss any issues with him."

Lobbying experts said such precautions are not required by law. "The rules do not prohibit hiring a family member such as this to lobby on an issue," Kenneth Gross, an ethics lawyer at the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, said about the Espositos. "It's up to the judgment of the individual."

Nevertheless, public-interest groups say such family relationships beg for oversight.

Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said: "Congressional staffers should be recused from dealing with matters their immediate family members lobby on."

Such recusals rarely happen, watchdog groups say.

Before he left Congress, William Lipinski championed the Chicago Region Environmental and Transportation Efficiency program (CREATE), a railroad improvement project for the nation's biggest freight-rail hub. The $1.5 billion project is funded by taxpayers, and $212 million of it by the nation's six big railroads. When CREATE began in mid-2003, Lipinski complained that the railroads were not picking up more of the tab.

"These improvements are worth more to the railroads than $212 million," he said at the time.

In 2004, Lipinski left Congress and joined the Association of American Railroads as a CREATE consultant. Daniel Lipinski won his father's seat, and last year his office issued a news release announcing a new funding agreement for CREATE, but the railroads' share of its cost has stayed the same.

After the November midterm elections, Daniel Lipinski was named to the transportation committee and its railroads subcommittee. And this month, William Lipinski will register as a lobbyist for the railroads but said he will not "lobby my son in regards to any of my clients."

Asked how father and son avoid the appearance of impropriety while working on the same railway project, Daniel Lipinski said: "CREATE is a very important project, not just for the Chicago area. . . . The more people working on this, the better."

In a 2001 special election, Bill Shuster won the congressional seat and the transportation committee slot vacated by his father that year. Shuster is now the new ranking Republican on the railroads subcommittee.