Campaign Donors: Accounting Standards

• In 1994, Lieberman sponsored legislation to prevent the Financial Accounting Standards Board from enforcing a new rule that “would paint a more consistent and accurate picture of profits.” (Senate Amendment 1688 to S 783, 103^rd Congress)

• Following is an excerpt of text from a February 23, 2002 article published in National Journal, detailing the events leading to Lieberman’s sponsorship of a bill that prevented new accounting regulations:

In 1991, the FASB raised the idea of treating stock options as compensation. That change, the board argued, would paint a more consistent and accurate picture of profits. But corporate America, led by the new high-technology sector, objected immediately.

Companies argued that the FASB’s rule would put a huge dent in corporate profits-and thus stock prices-and make it tough for start-up companies to attract the best and the brightest. Coloring the debate was the fact that many top executives were partly compensated in stock options, giving them a personal incentive to rally opposition against the FASB’s proposed rule.

In mid-1993, the day before the FASB was supposed to issue its rule on stock options, Sens. Lieberman, Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Connie Mack, R-Fla., introduced a bill that would have essentially forced the FASB to drop the idea. (National Journal, 2/23/02)

• Lieberman’s 1994 campaign received $425,292 in PAC and individual contributions from the securities and investment industry. Lieberman also received $66,100 from accountants and their industry PACs. (Center for Responsive Politics)

• The Employee Stock Ownership Coalition, spearheaded by the American Electronics Association, was a key opponent of the new FASB rule. During the debate in Congress, Lieberman’s “point man on stock options,” legislative assistant Kenneth Glueck, took a job with the American Electronics Association and was tasked with ramping up the lobbying against the rule. (National Journal, 2/23/02)