Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA), who has long slammed K Street's influence, pocketed tens of thousands of dollars in donations recently from dozens of lobbyists, records show.
The Pennsylvania Democrat often touts how he is standing up to "corporate special interests" and faces a challenge in 2024 from Republican businessman Dave McCormick, who unsuccessfully ran in the 2022 primary against Mehmet Oz and worked in the Bush administration. Between July and September, Casey's reelection campaign took roughly $60,000 from federal lobbyists, including for a company nearly delisted from United States stock exchanges for alleged ties to China's government, according to campaign finance disclosures.
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The cash transfers appear to undercut Casey's rhetoric over the years decrying corporate power and further illustrate how the senator has been affiliated with the lobbying world. In the lead-up to 2024, lobbying firms, including Washington, D.C.'s influential Van Scoyoc Associates, have been hosting ritzy fundraisers for Casey where the price of admission costs thousands of dollars, flyers show. Casey, in 2006, famously criticized his former GOP opponent, ex-Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), for "spending a lot of time with people that practice the politics of influence peddling on K Street."
“Bob Casey is K Street’s favorite senator," National Republican Senatorial Committee spokesman Philip Letsou told the Washington Examiner, noting Casey's "family is getting rich off his connections while working Pennsylvanians are struggling."
One of Casey's donors has been John Halliwell, who gave $1,000 in June 2022 and $500 in July of this year, filings show. In 2020, Halliwell registered to lobby for the U.S. subsidiary of China's BeiGene, a biotechnology company the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in 2022 told to turn over information within three years or else be potentially removed from stock exchanges over apparent Chinese Communist Party ties. BeiGene claimed to the SEC in February 2023 that it is not owned by the CCP, according to documents filed with the agency.
Halliwell, head of public policy for BeiGene USA Inc., has appeared on lobbying disclosures between 2020 and 2023 for the company totaling over $1.3 million, documents show. Meanwhile, in late 2022, Halliwell lobbied the Senate on the DIVERSE Trials Act, legislation co-sponsored by Casey that hasn't passed and aims "to improve diversity in clinical trials and data collection for COVID-19 and future public health threats to address social determinants of health," government records show.
The Casey campaign did not return a request for comment.
"Sen. Bob Casey has repeatedly failed to recognize and address the threat the Chinese Communist Party presents to the future of America," Spokeswoman Elizabeth Gregory for McCormick told the Washington Examiner. She pointed to New York Post reporting on Casey in 2006 as Pennsylvania Treasurer approving millions of dollars from state employee pensions into China Mobile, which the Defense and Treasury Departments in recent years designated as backed by China's military and a national security threat.
The McCormick campaign also pointed to an August Breitbart story on Casey skipping a vote on a National Defense Authorization Act amendment from Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) seeking to ban the Thrift Savings Plan, which is the federal retirement system for federal employees, from investing "millions in Chinese companies that make weapons designed to kill Americans serving in the military."
Other lobbyists who have cut checks recently to Casey include Jennifer Poersch of HLP&R Advocacy, Jeffrey Forbes of Forbes-Tate, Amy Rosenbaum of CVS Health, Joseph Britton of Pioneer Public Affairs, Michael Merola of Winning Strategies Washington, Nancy Zirkin of the Raben Group, and various others, according to campaign finance disclosures.
"I was elected to represent all Pennsylvanians," Casey said in 2018. "I was not elected to genuflect to the hard Right, who are funded by corporate America."
The senator said in 2022, "Campaigns are about whom we're fighting for. And in this election, the difference between parties could not be more clear: While Republicans fight for their corporate donors & special interests, Democrats are fighting for families, union workers, & middle class Americans."
News of the donations come after reports on Casey's campaign receiving cash from attorneys at his brother Matt Casey's law firm for over a decade as Sen. Casey tapped its partner Robert Ross to co-chair a panel that has confirmed dozens of Pennsylvania judges. Casey, in May, went to Scranton, Pennsylvania, to "celebrate" a $200,000 grant to a nonprofit group that has paid Patrick Brier, Casey's brother-in-law, to lobby, Broad and Liberty reported.
Patrick Casey registered in late 2022 to lobby on behalf of Semiconductor Components Industries, a subsidiary of ON Semiconductor Corporation, which has three factories in China, Politico reported.
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Halliwell and BeiGene did not reply to requests for comment.
The 2024 Pennsylvania Senate race leans blue, according to Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan elections tracker. An October Franklin & Marshall poll found Casey leading McCormick 46% to 39% in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup.