BOUNDARY STONE ADDS TRUMP ALUM: Clean energy lobbying and government affairs firm Boundary Stone Partners is staffing up for Donald Trump’s second term, bringing on former Trump Energy Department official Conner Brace as a senior vice president. — Brace worked in DOE’s legislative affairs office from 2018 to 2021, and most recently served as director of policy and government relations at the climate-focused think tank Climate Leadership Council. He’s also an American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and Steve Scalise alum. ANNALS OF CAMPAIGN FINANCE: “More than 140 top Democratic operatives, fundraisers, and ex-campaign staffers are calling for executives at the party’s biggest online donation portal to clean up their operation or risk donor backlash,” per The Bulwark’s Sam Stein. — “In a letter to the leadership of ActBlue, these Democrats said they feared that ‘questionable’ fundraising tactics by unscrupulous groups and operatives were damaging the party’s reputation and hindering its ability to keep voters engaged.” — The letter’s signatories “called for a number of new features and policies designed to protect donors from exploitation,” the most significant of which “would involve ending notorious practices designed to deceive donors into believing that they are giving to official party entities, that they had limited time to donate, or that their donation would be matched by a major contribution from other donors.” — The operatives also asked ActBlue to move to prevent self-dealing by so-called scam PACs infamous for using such tactics, an issue that prompted ActBlue to boot a handful of such groups from the platform over the summer. — “[I]n an effort to prevent copycats, the Democratic operatives, in their letter, offered a novel recommendation: that ActBlue ‘set a maximum threshold for the percentage of total expenditures entities using ActBlue for donation processing can spend with companies they own or control.’” THE ALCOHOL LOBBY’S BIG WIN: “A government advisory panel has concluded that moderate alcohol consumption is associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular disease than no drinking at all,” our Marcia Brown reports, in “a major victory for the alcohol industry, which has pushed back on governments’ efforts to recommend lower alcohol consumption.” — “The report from the National Academies of Science Engineering and Medicine, which will be made public Thursday, is one of two that will inform the Dietary Guidelines for Americans on alcohol consumption, specifically.” — “Alcohol generates huge economic activity across state lines, stirring lawmakers to press back against changes to the Dietary Guidelines that could lead to slashed alcohol consumption recommendations. Already, young people are consuming less alcohol than their parents, and non-alcoholic cocktails are proliferating across menus.” THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT: “Trump surprised Washington by picking someone to lead the IRS who has little experience with tax policy or large-scale organizational management,” but our Brian Faler reports that “his intended nominee, former Rep. Billy Long (R-Mo.), has also stirred discomfort for another reason: Long has been deeply involved in touting a tax break that’s been plagued by fraud.” SPOTTED at Sonoma for a holiday happy hour hosted by Americans for Responsible Innovation, per a tipster: Rep. Bill Foster (D-Ill.), Brad Carson of ARI, Sunny Gandhi and Adam Billen of Encode, Devika Daga of the Commerce Department, Nicholas P. Garcia of Public Knowledge, Josh New of SeedAI, Will Rinehart of the American Enterprise Institute, Dominique Warren of Chicago’s D.C. office and Chris McGuire of the State Department. — And at a holiday party for Electing a Democratic Generation, per a tipster: Rep.-elect Suhas Subramanyan (D-Va.), Marina Pearce of Jeffries for Congress, Allison Childress of Rep. Greg Stanton’s (D-Ariz.) office, David Reid and Zach Marshall of Brownstein Hyatt Farber & Schreck, Katie Phillips of Federal Hall Policy Advisors, Andy Remo of the American Council of Life Insurers, Jason Ortega of the National Wooden Pallet & Container Association, Alex Catanese of the American Bankers Association, Conor Noonan of the American Veterinary Medical Association, Bobby Cunningham and Nikhil Dhingra of The Vogel Group, Victoria Krivo, Hollis Popp, Josie Martinez and Taylor Theodore of The Frost Group; Kaadé Williams of Federal Street Strategies, Mike Giblin of the American Medical Association, Stephanie Johnson of the National Grocers Association, John Christie of the Smith-Free Group, Alyssa Granados of Forward Global and Jennifer Storipan of Lot Sixteen.
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