Barbour Continues Lobbyist Lifestyle
Politico reports:
The Mississippi state plane, a zippy Cessna Citation with a capacity of 12, is a model favored by corporate executives and the wealthy, and its principal passenger, Gov. Haley Barbour, might easily be mistaken for one of them when he arrives with a small entourage at airports in Washington, Las Vegas or New York, a car and driver waiting there at their disposal.
Barbour has traveled extensively on the jet, brushing off suggestions from Mississippi Democrats that he give it up in favor of a more modest propeller plane for his travel. The trips, according to a POLITICO review of the Cessna’s flight manifest since 2007, have mixed state business with both pleasure and national politics.
Some of Barbour’s travel may well have been worth it to Mississippi, a state that is heavily dependent on federal funds. But much of the time, he has used the plane to go to fundraisers for himself and other Republican candidates and committees, to football games and to at least one boxing match — travel that has a less obvious connection to what Barbour, a former top lobbyist in Washington, has cast as his lobbying on behalf of his state.
The flight logs obtained by POLITICO indicate that Mississippi has spent more than $500,000 over the past three years on Barbour's air travel. That total does not include security and other logistical costs associated with his trips. And through a quirk in Mississippi law, whenever the governor is out of state, Mississippi must pay the lieutenant governor a salary differential as acting governor.
Barbour has reimbursed the state for a handful of flights, but he has more often scheduled obscure official business to coincide with the business of politics, according to the manifest and logs, which were obtained from the Mississippi Department of Finance and Administration under a Mississippi Public Records Act request by a Democrat who has worked in the state, who provided them to POLITICO.
Critics say the flights suggest that Barbour has continued to live the lifestyle of a highflying lobbyist as he's slashed his state's budget for government services across the board since taking office in 2004.
"All he has to do is meet with one congressman or senator for five minutes, and he can say that he's on official business," complained Mississippi Democratic state Rep. Johnny Stringer, who introduced the bill in the state Legislature to sell the Cessna.
