Trent Lott to Slip Through Revolving Door Before it Locks

Way back in February of 2006, Time Magazine featured an article titled The Lobbying Game: Why the Revolving Door Won’t Close explaining Jeffrey Shockey’s back and forth movements between Capitol Hill and K Street.

This year, Congress passed and Bush signed into law the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007. This law was introduced by Harry Reid and cosponsored by a veritable Who’s Who of the Senate, including Trent Lott.  The law includes a change that will affect Congress members post-Office employment opportunities.

Section 531 says…
`(A) SENATORS- Any person who is a Senator and who, within 2 years after that person leaves office, knowingly makes, with the intent to influence, any communication to or appearance before any Member, officer, or employee of either House of Congress or any employee of any other legislative office of the Congress, on behalf of any other person (except the United States) in connection with any matter on which such former Senator seeks action by a Member, officer, or employee of either House of Congress, in his or her official capacity, shall be punished as provided in section 216 of this title.

House members have a similar waiting period of one year in the new bill.  Interestingly, I can’t find section 216 with the penalties for breaking this law.

Section 215 says… 
Except as otherwise provided in sections 203, 204, 206, 211, 212, and 213, the amendments made by this title shall apply with respect to registrations under the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 having an effective date of January 1, 2008, or later and with respect to quarterly reports under that Act covering calendar quarters beginning on or after January 1, 2008.

Knowing this law takes effect on January first, does anyone have any doubts as to why Sen. Trent Lott, intends to resign by the end of the year?  Under that is in effect until December 31st, Lott will only need to wait one year before lobbying his former colleagues.

Edit:  With the current news about his resignation there have been plenty of updates to the {en:Trent Lott} Wikipedia page.