Lobbying & Influence

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Leading oil industry groups said Thursday federal land managers are blocking new energy development and job creation by postponing all oil and gas lease auctions on prime public lands in California until October.

Officials with the American Petroleum Institute, the largest lobbying group for the oil and gas industry, said the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's recent announcement that it will temporarily put off energy leasing in the state will prevent economic growth.

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A national group of prominent GOP donors that supports gay marriage is pouring new money into lobbying efforts to get Republican lawmakers to vote to make it legal.

American Unity PAC was formed last year to lend financial support to Republicans who bucked the party's longstanding opposition to gay marriage. Its founders are launching a new lobbying organization, American Unity Fund, and already have spent more than $250,000 in Minnesota, where the Legislature could vote on the issue as early as next week.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A West Virginia student was charged with causing a disruption at a middle school when he refused to remove a T-shirt that displayed the National Rifle Association's logo and a hunting rifle.

Jared Marcum, 14, said the shirt did not violate Logan Middle School's dress code policy.

"I was surprised. It shocked me that the school didn't know their own dress code and their own policy. I figured they would have known not to call me out on that shirt because there was nothing wrong with it," Marcum said in a telephone interview.

LEDYARD, Conn. (AP) — Once the envy of Indian Country for its billion-dollar casino empire, the tribe that owns the Foxwoods Resort Casino has been struggling through a financial crisis and pursuing more revenue from an unlikely source: U.S. government grants.