GINGRICH SPLITS HAIRS ABOUT HIS MILLIONS MADE IN HEALTHCARE

Gingrich Gave Push to Clients, Not Just Ideas

By MIKE McINTIRE and JIM RUTENBERG

Published: November 29, 2011 --New York Times

Newt Gingrich is adamant that he is not a lobbyist, but rather a visionary who traffics in ideas, not influence. But in the eight years since he started his health care consultancy, he has made millions of dollars while helping companies promote their services and gain access to state and federal officials.

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In a variety of instances, documents and interviews show, Mr. Gingrich arranged meetings between executives and officials, and salted his presentations to lawmakers with pitches for his clients, who pay as much as $200,000 a year to belong to his Center for Health Transformation.
When the center sponsored a “health transformation summit” at the Florida State Capitol in March 2006, lawmakers who attended Mr. Gingrich’s keynote speech inside the House chamber received a booklet promoting not just ideas but also the specific services of two dozen of his clients. Executives from some of those companies sat on panels for discussions that lawmakers were encouraged to attend after Mr. Gingrich’s address.
Gerard White, president of Clearwave, which paid about $50,000 to become a center member, used the occasion to pitch his company’s system for managing patient medical data. “It was a way for companies who were part of Newt’s group to say to health officials in Florida, ‘Hey, here are some exciting things we’re doing,’ ” Mr. White said.
Mr. Gingrich and his aides have repeatedly emphasized that he is not a registered lobbyist, an important distinction in their effort to position him as an outsider who will transform the ways of Washington. They say that he has never taken a position for money and that corporations have signed on with him because of the strength of his ideas.
“You have somebody who knows what he believes in, he can effectively communicate it, and he’s successful in doing it,” said his spokesman, R. C. Hammond. “God bless America.”
Yet if Mr. Gingrich has managed to steer clear of legal tripwires, a review of his activities shows how he put his influence to work on behalf of clients with a considerable stake in government policy. Even if he does not appear to have been negotiating legislative language, he and his staff did many of the same things that registered lobbyists do.