McCain Vows Lifetime Lobby Ban on Aides

Calling lobbyists “the symptom of a disease,” John McCain railed against earmarking and pork-barrel spending yesterday, telling Politico that members of his administration would be barred from lobbying after life at the White House. Some of McCain’s top campaign aides are former lobbyists, and the senator has already pledged that none of his current staff will return to the influence game.

Claiming that lobbyists avoid his office because “they’re not going to get a pork-barrel project,” McCain charged that “Senator Obama has asked for nearly a billion dollars" for such earmarks. The GOP hopeful is ratcheting up his reform cred to undermine Obama’s central campaign pledge, contending that lobbyists would be “out of business” if Washington stopped funding “bridges to nowhere.” (More McCain 2008 stories.)