Ben Barnes

Ben Barnes (born April 17, 1938) is an American lobbyist and former Lieutenant Governor of Texas. He was a vice-chair http://www.johnkerry.com/pdf/topfundraisers.pdf and top fund-raiser of the John Kerry campaign, being one of only 8 people who have raised over $500,000 for Kerry http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/18/politics/main624711.shtml.

Related Topics:
April 17 - 1938 - Lieutenant Governor of Texas - John Kerry

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

While a student at the University of Texas at Austin, Barnes was working at the Texas State Health Department. After discovering some financial irregularities that led to the indictment of the State Health Commissioner, Barnes became interested in politics, went back to his home area of the state and ran for State Representative when he was barely 21 years old and pulled off an upset victory. Advancing quickly through the Texas Legislature, by 1963, Barnes was Chairman of the powerful Rules Committee. Barnes served as state Speaker of the House in Texas from 1965-1969, U.S. representative to the NATO Conference in 1967, and United Nations Representative to Geneva, Switzerland, in 1968.

Related Topics:
University of Texas at Austin - Texas Legislature - 1967 - 1968

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Barnes served as Lieutenant Governor from 1969 until 1973. In 1971, he was caught up in the political fallout of the Sharpstown scandal, which helped Ben Barnes eventually step down.

Related Topics:
1969 - 1973 - 1971 - Sharpstown scandal

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

By the late 1990s Barnes had become a millionaire lobbyist working for GTech, a company that operated lotteries in 37 states including Texas. The Texas lottery was losing money, in part because of a lucrative deal in which Barnes received 3.5 cents for every ticket sold ? more than $3 million per year. For many years Ben Barnes and the lobbying firm he founded in Austin, EntreCorp, have made many millions of dollars by acting as the go-between bringing special interest groups and companies together with highly-placed Democrat officeholders. The Center for Responsive Politics has listed Barnes as the third largest all-around Democratic donor in America 1999-2004. So influential and important is Barnes to the Democratic Party, as this column reported last January, that Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle has nicknamed this money man and lobbyist ?the fifty-first Democratic Senator.?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Since leaving elective office, Barnes has become a successful business executive and civic leader. He is the founder of Entrecorp, a business consulting and lobbying firm. He has served as a consultant, director or chairman of more than two dozen companies, including SBC, American Airlines, Dallas Bank and Trust, Grumman Systems Support Corporation, Laredo National Bank and the Barnes/Connally Partnership.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In 1999, Barnes claimed that while Speaker of the House he had "personally interceded" with Texas Air National Guard officials to get George W. Bush into the Guard http://www.texasobserver.org/showArticle.asp?ArticleID=253. Barnes repeated the claim in the U.S. presidential election, 2004, specifically stating that he had assisted Bush while Lieutenant Governor. The charge met heavy criticism over its inconsistency (Barnes did not become Lieutenant Governor until 1969 - after Bush joined the guard) and after his daughter Amy publicly challenged the veracity of his story.

Related Topics:
1999 - George W. Bush - U.S. presidential election, 2004

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~