In a June 13 article on former Sen. Fred Thompson's (R-TN) appearance on NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, the Associated Press asserted that "[i]f he runs, it will be as a Washington outsider" and uncritically quoted the following remark from Thompson: “I often say after eight years in Washington, I longed for the realism and sincerity of Hollywood.” But, contrary to Thompson's portrayal of himself as an outsider, he had worked as a Washington lobbyist for 18 years prior to taking office in 1994, a fact nowhere to be found in the AP story. Moreover, as Media Matters for America noted, Thompson resumed his lobbying work after he left the Senate in 2002.
From the June 13 AP article:
Fred Thompson didn't enter the 2008 presidential race Tuesday, but he talked like he was getting close to jumping in.
[...]
He griped about campaigns that “are entirely too long.” And he took a swipe at Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, saying she was “trying to balance ... her prior positions with the new requirements of politics in the Democratic Party.”
If he runs, it will be as a Washington outsider.
Referring to his time in the U.S. Senate, he said, “I often say after eight years in Washington, I longed for the realism and sincerity of Hollywood.”
By contrast, a June 7 USA Today article similarly noted that Thompson has said he intends to “run [as] an outsider,” but went on to debunk this image by noting that “his résumé is that of a longtime Washington operative who has crossed ideological lines to represent corporate and foreign clients.” From the article:
Although the folksy-sounding Tennessean recently told USA TODAY that he would run an outsider, just as he did while campaigning as a “country lawyer” in a red pickup during his 1994 U.S. Senate race, his résumé is that of a longtime Washington operative who has crossed ideological lines to represent corporate and foreign clients.
Before he was elected to the Senate, Thompson spent nearly two decades in Washington as a lawyer-lobbyist, representing such entities as Westinghouse, the deposed government of Haiti, the Teamsters Union pension fund and the Tennessee Savings and Loan Association, according to Senate records and published accounts.
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After a review of lobbying records and Thompson's tax returns, The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal reported in 1994 that he earned $507,000 from lobbying in 1975-93. That figure, a fraction of his total legal income, reflects a narrower definition of lobbying than the one in the current law. Thompson reported $3.7 million in income from lawyering and acting from 1983 to 1993, according to The Commercial Appeal and other Tennessee newspapers that cited his tax returns.
USA Today further reported that Thompson re-registered as a lobbyist after leaving the Senate in 2002:
After he left the Senate in 2003, Thompson resumed his acting career with a role as the district attorney on TV's Law & Order. Less visibly, he registered in 2004 as a lobbyist for Equitas, a company created to manage the asbestos liability for Lloyd's of London.
Equitas hired a bevy of lobbyists to protect its interests in the proposal to set up a federal trust fund, paid for by insurers, asbestos-makers and others, to compensate asbestos victims. The bill failed to pass, but before that happened, Equitas got what it wanted: a change in a provision the company said singled out foreign insurers for unfavorable treatment. Jon Nash, a firm spokesman, on Wednesday credited Thompson as having “contributed to the successful outcome.”
The company paid Thompson $760,000 from 2004 to 2006, according to Senate records.
An article in the April 30 issue of New York Magazine similarly noted that "[c]ritics point out that Thompson's aw-shucks, shit-kicker populism is more than a little bit phony" because “he spent eighteen years as a registered Washington lobbyist, doing the bidding of such high-powered clients as General Electric and Westinghouse, pushing for the passage of the deregulatory legislation that led to the savings-and-loan crisis of the eighties.”