March 4, 2012
Budget Deficit Forces Questions About Charity Spending on Lobbying
Washington
When President Obama sought to limit the value of all itemized deductions last year, many interest groups set out to persuade Congress to block the plan.
Among them was a mix of powerful real-estate groups that spent nearly $30-million to preserve the mortgage-interest deduction and lobby lawmakers on other matters important to the industry.
Another group was much smaller: a coalition of nonprofits spent $830,000 to protect deductions for gifts to charities and to press
