Four months after voting to approve a controversial billion-dollar merger between Comcast and NBCUniversal, Meredith Attwell Baker is leaving the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to become a lobbyist for…Comcast.

 

Baker was one of four FCC commissioners who supported the Comcast-NBC deal. Her term on the commission expires at the end of June.

 

Comcast was proud to announce the hiring of Baker, daughter-in-law of former Secretary of State James Baker III, and praise her “exceptional relationships in Washington.” During the administration of President George W. Bush, she served as acting administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). Comcast Executive Vice-President Rick Cotton gushed, “"I’ve seen Meredith’s mastery of issues up close as we’ve worked together on issues at the FCC and NTIA.”

 

The fact that Baker has accepted a lobbying job with the telecommunications giant is noteworthy, given that when she accepted the FCC position in July 2009, she signed President Barack Obama’s ethics pledge, which forbids her from lobbying anyone at the FCC for two years after leaving the government or until the end of Obama’s presidency. The pledge does not bar her from lobbying members of Congress.

-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky

 

FCC Commissioner to Join Comcast: Goodbye, and Don't Let the Revolving Door Hit Ya... (by Neil Gordon, Project on Government Oversight)

F.C.C. Commissioner Leaving to Join Comcast (by Edward Wyatt, New York Times)