AT&T and the GOP: More than $400K donated to anti-Network Neutrality senators

Six Republican senators co-sponsoring an amendment to prevent the Federal Communications Commission from enacting new broadband rules have received more than $400,000 in campaign and political-action contributions from AT&T, the telecom giant that has criticized the new FCC rules, as well as other large telecoms and cable companies.

Campaign finance records compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics show that AT&T-related entities have donated some $67,300 to the campaign and political action committees of Sen Kay Bailey Hutchison, the Texas Republican and lead sponsor of the amendment to an unrelated Interior Department appropriations bill that would bar the FCC from spending money "to develop and implement new regulatory mandates."

Four of Hutchison's five co-sponsors have received hundreds of thousands of dollars from AT&T and Verizon, and a fifth worked for a DC lobbying firm -- before he was elected senator -- when it represented Comcast, the cable giant.

Over the course of his career, Sen Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) has received $220,914 from "telephone utilities," including some $83,130 from AT&T, his second-largest donor, in the form of employee and lobbyist donations to his campaign and political-action committees. Sprint Nextel has given Brownback $35,550 over the course of his career.

Two of the co-sponsors of the bill, Sen David Vitter (R-LA) and Sen John Ensign (R-NV), have been on the receiving end of AT&T's largesse. AT&T and predecessor BellSouth have donated $82,050 to Vitter's campaigns and political-action committees. And over the last four years, AT&T has donated some $61,250 to Ensign's campaign and political-action committees. Verizon-related entities donated $46,600 to Ensign during that period. During that time, AT&T has donated $63,750 to the campaign and political-action committees of Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC). AT&T is DeMint's second-largest donor.

Sen John Thune (R-SD) has not received significant donations from the telecom industry since his 2006 defeat of Sen. Tom Daschle, then Senate majority leader Tom Daschle. But from 2003 to 2005, Sen Thune served as a senior policy adviser to the D.C. lobbying firm of Arent, Fox, when its client Comcast, the largest cable company in the U.S., paid some $40,000 in fees.