The Sunlight Foundation, a government ethics group, says U.S. Rep Jo Ann Emerson began talking with her new private employer -- the National Rural Electric Cooperative Assn. -- less than two weeks after election day.
That's when Emerson, MO-08, began the talks, according to a document she filed with the House.
And see this, from the Center for Responsive Politics:
"The National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) has consistently supported Emerson throughout the years as well as her late husband, Rep. Bill Emerson, for whom she took over in 1996 when he passed away. Since 1996, people associated with the organization have contributed nearly $80,000 to Jo Ann Emerson -- including $8,000 in the 2012 election cycle -- and gave Bill Emerson $7,500 between 1990 and 1996, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
"Emerson will be joining one of our Heavy Hitter organizations. NRECA spent nearly $3 million lobbying Congress in 2011 and $2.1 million doing so in the first three-quarters of this year. (Emerson won't be allowed to lobby her former colleagues for a year, but there are plenty of other activities she can engage in.) The group's PAC contributed $1.7 million to candidates in the current election cycle, about two-thirds of it to Republicans."
And the Post-Dispatch says the man she's replacing, former Rep. Glenn English, earned $1.9 million from the association in 2010.
