Federal election law requires the lawmakers to reimburse companies for the travel. But the report, which analyzed federal election records of the number of reimbursement payments, shows tobacco companies provided lawmakers more private air travel than any other corporate interest, and that Republicans by far received the bulk of such perks.
Companies pick up the remainder of the cost, which can be tens of thousands of dollars.
As far as tobacco companies are concerned, this is a way for them to buy greater influence with Republicans who run the Congress. Republicans say they reimbursed the companies for the cost of the flights as required by federal election laws. Since those same laws often require lawmakers to write several checks for the reimbursement of the cost of one flight, the number of checks written does not accurately reflect the frequency with which Republicans used tobacco company planes. No Republicans interviewed could provide an accurate count of the number of private flights their lawmakers made. You can't have it both ways.