New details emerge about forged letters to Congress

The Washington lobbying firm that sent forged letters to U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello - and at least two other congressmen - was working on behalf of a coal industry advocacy group.

The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity said that its longtime grassroots contractor the Hawthorn Group had hired Bonner & Associates to do “limited outreach” in opposition to the American Clean Energy and Security Act that was narrowly approved by the House in late June.

The president of the organization, which is headquartered in Alexandria and represents a consortium of coal companies, said he was “outraged” at the conduct of Bonner & Associates.

“ACCCE has always maintained high ethical and professional standards,” said Stephen L. Miller, the coalition’s president, in a statement. “In this case, the standards and practices that we require for grassroots advocacy outreach were not adhered to by Bonner & Associates. In this sense, the community groups involved, the members of Congress who received the fraudulent letters, as well as ACCCE, were all victimized by this misconduct.”

Bonner & Associates has not returned calls for comment.

Perriello was not the only congressman to receive forged letters urging him to oppose the so-called cap-and-trade legislation. Reps. Kathy Dahlkemper and Christopher Carney, both of Pennsylvania, also received falsified letters that originated at Bonner & Associates, the clean coal advocacy group said.

After the forged letters were revealed in a Friday news story by The Daily Progress, U.S. Rep. Edward J. Markey, D-Mass., co-author of the cap-and-trade bill and chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, announced that he was launching an investigation into Bonner & Associates.

Markey sent a letter to the “strategic grassroots” lobbying firm on Monday asking a long list of questions about the forged letters, including whether other instances of the faked letters occurred and documentation of the forgeries. The company has until Aug. 12 to respond.

Read more in Wednesday’s Progress.