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Burson-Marsteller

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This article is part of the Nuclear spin analysis project of SpinWatch (UK) and the Center for Media and Democracy.
This article is part of the Tobacco portal on Sourcewatch, sponsored by the American Legacy Foundation. Help expose the truth about the tobacco industry.

Burson-Marsteller is the world's fifth largest PR company (Source: Council of PR Firms, 2002) and part of the WPP Group. According to a 2004 profile in The Hill, a Washington, DC newspaper, "This multinational PR behemoth has an active public-affairs practice led by Richard Mintz, who ran the media shop at the Department of Transportation during the Clinton administration. He also served as staff director for Hillary Clinton during the 1992 campaign. B-M has won awards recently for its work for the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and the "No on Proposition 54" campaign in California. Its public-affairs practice is bolstered by its affiliation with Direct Impact (grassroots marketing) and BKSH & Associates (lobbying)." [1]

Contents

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Pushing Ethanol

Burson-Marsteller's Neil Grace works with Monsanto, Dupont, Archer Daniels Midland pushing their front group the Alliance for Abundant Food and Energy, announced July 24, 2008. The Washington Post reports, "A group of the world's biggest agribusiness companies announced it will use lobbyists on Capitol Hill and national ads to build the case for fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel, even as grain prices climb worldwide. The biofuels industry has blossomed under federal mandates requiring the United States to increase alternative fuel usage by 2009. The mandates are under attack from groups who blame the new industry for rising food prices that have sparked riots and hoarding in several countries. ... The alliance has a budget of several million dollars for the campaign, but it did not disclose the exact amount." [2]

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Hillary Clinton

In May, 2007, the Nation magazine ran an article about the relationship between Burson-Marsteller's top executive world-wide, Mark Penn, and Hillary Clinton. "As Hillary Clinton charges toward the Democratic nomination for President, her campaign has a coterie of influential advisers. ... But perhaps the most important figure in the campaign is her pollster and chief strategist, Mark Penn, a combative workaholic. ... Yet Penn is no ordinary pollster. Beyond his connections to the Clintons, he not only polls for America's biggest companies but also runs one of the world's premier PR agencies [Burson-Marsteller]." [3]

The Wall Street Journal first reported on April 4, 2008, that Penn "met with Colombia's ambassador to the U.S. on Monday to discuss a bilateral free-trade agreement, a pact the presidential candidate (Clinton) opposes." Burson-Marsteller "has a contract with the South American nation to promote congressional approval of the trade deal." The New York Times later noted that Penn apologized for his conflict of loyalty saying "the meeting was an error in judgment." [4]

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U.S. Government PR contracts

According to the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform Minority Office, Burson-Marsteller received the following amounts per year, for federal PR contracts: [5]

  • $1,878,636 in 2003

According to the Public Relations Society of America's Silver Anvil award records and global public affairs chief Richard Mintz, Burson-Marsteller's federal contracts have included work for the Census Bureau, on participation rates; Bureau of Engraving and Printing, on “Introducing the New Color of Money” (the $20 bill redesign); Department of the Treasury, on money laundering enforcement; and Postal Service, on “Managing Communication During the Anthrax Crisis.”

In March 2005, PR Week reported that Burson-Marsteller won a $4.6 million contract, through the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Urban Area Security Initiative grant program. The contract, for two to seven months' work, was "for the development and implementation of a regional public awareness and education campaign for a major emergency or disaster, such as a terrorist act," in Washington DC. "The effort's goal is to have 50% of people in the national capital area report that they've taken steps to be prepared," reported PR Week. "In addition to conducting PR and research, Burson will partner with ad and community-outreach agencies," Burson-Marsteller's Chris Simko told PR Week, adding that "33% to 50% of the budget will go toward advertising." [6]

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History

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Nuclear industry

In February 2008, the nuclear company Exelon paid Burson-Marsteller $230,627.05, coded as "public affairs." Exelon said the work involved the Exelon-funded pro-nuclear group New Jersey Affordable, Clean, Reliable Energy Coalition (NJ ACRE) and strengthening local support for "the renewal of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant's operating license." The payments covered Burson-Marsteller's work between June and November 2007, which included carrying out a poll and setting up "speaking engagements and events for Patrick Moore." [1]

B-M has worked for the nuclear company Entergy for several years. "In April 2002, Entergy's communications director told O'Dwyer's PR Daily that the firm had been hired 'mainly for the Indian Point issues' -- the security and environmental concerns raised by the company's Indian Point nuclear power plant, located outside New York City -- 'but its work now includes handling the overall image of the company.' In 2003, Entergy created the 'Coalition Against Shutting Down Vermont's Electricity Options' and spent $200,000 to oppose a citizen campaign to close the company's Vermont Yankee nuclear plant in 2012." [2]

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Burson Marsteller, the tobacco industry and campaigns on secondhand smoke

Burson-Marsteller (B-M) has had a close relationship with cigarette maker Philip Morris (PM), having organized the smokers' rights group the National Smokers Alliance (NSA) for PM in the early 1990s. The purpose of the group was to mobilize smokers on behalf of the tobacco industry to protest clean indoor air laws, increased cigarette taxes and other legislated efforts that would affect cigarette consumption. The smoke-free advocacy organization Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights compiled a report exposing NSA's links to Philip Morris and showing that Philip Morris funded the NSA with $4 million in seed money.[7][8] PM was not the only tobacco company that helped support the NSA. In 1997, Brown & Williamson donated $500,000 in support of NSA.[9]

After the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ruled in 1993 that secondhand tobacco smoke should be ranked as a Group A Human Carcinogen (the same rating EPA gives to asbestos, radon gas and vinyl chloride), Thomas Humber of Burson Marstellar wrote a memo to Ellen Merlo, Senior Vice President of Philip Morris Corporate Affairs, urging PM to put into action list of strategies to fight public health authorities on the issue of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS).

Humber's objectives included discrediting the EPA and its report, working to prevent private businesses from voluntarily enacting smoking bans, portraying the agency publicly as corrupt, encouraging other businesses to jump in and oppose EPA, to portray EPA as an agency under siege, and "blunt[ing] the thrust of employer and manufacturer liability suits" over employees' exposure to secondhand smoke in the workplace. Humber urged PM to "Sue the bastards!" (meaning the EPA) to "at the very least, delay or cloud precipitous actions against us," and to help "regain some percentage of industry credibility." Humber also postulated that suing the EPA would help "stimulate other [businesses], who have heretofore been too timid to fight back against the EPA, to summon up their own courage for their own battles." Humber recommends these activities be carried out through others, rather than by PM directly. Humber wrote,

...[I]n the interests of overall strategy, all activities...require the recruitment of outside organizations or individuals...against ETS specifics or more general objectives."

Humber said Philip Morris needed to keep major employers from voluntarily stampeding towards smoke-free workplace policies, while at the same time the company should position itself as a defender of democratic principles and protector of "rights for all."

Humber listed agencies through which PM could apply the listed strategies, and proposed that these groups be used to "achieve a rapid start and broadscale umbrellas under which other specific operations can be unfolded."

Humber's memo also reveals his awareness of the risk of potential lawsuits against PM from exposure of employees to ETS in the workplace. To help defray such suits, Humber suggested the immediate establishment of a sort of ETS legal-aid group he called the "ETS Defense Resources Council." Humber claimed this strategy has been effective for other companies, saying,

While [forming such a legal advisory group] will obviously not prevent new laws nor stop employers from imposing workplace smoking bans based on the threat of litigation, the rapid institutionalization of...such a [legal consulting] center would...signal the antis and plaintiffs bar that there will be no free ride on this tobacco issue either.[10]

PM eventually carried out Humber's "sue the bastards" strategy. In 1993, the same year Humber wrote the memo, PM filed a lawsuit in North Carolina before Judge William Osteen claiming the EPA's ruling on secondhand smoke was invalid. Judge Osteen ruled against the EPA, saying the agency had used bad science. The EPA stood by its report and appealed. On December 11, 2002--almost 10 years after the EPA first issue its report on secondhand smoke--the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in the EPA’s favor, and vacated Judge Osteen's opinion.

This memo also reveals the power of major public relations firms to shape the American political landscape. Humber boasts how, through front groups like Citizens for a Sound Economy" and the Institute for Regulatory Policy, B-M arranged a symposium where the vice-president of the U.S. was a keynote speaker, then assured that the media surrounding the event was dominated by the corporate message of "overregulation."

Humber also discusses partnering with ventilation businesses, since they too could profit from PM's stance that ventilation was the singular solution to problems caused by secondhand smoke.

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Founding

According to a brief introductory note on the Burson-Marsteller website, Harold Burson recounted that the catalyst for the formation of the company was a phone call in January 1952 from Harry Leather, "a close friend at The New York Times". According to Burson, Leather called "to alert me that he had recommended our firm to a Bill Marsteller, owner of an industrial advertising agency in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Marsteller needed a small public relations firm to handle a project for his agency's largest client, Rockwell Manufacturing Company (now Rockwell International). Rockwell wanted to publicize that its chairman, W.F. (Al) Rockwell Jr., had purchased a helicopter for executive travel--a first." [11]

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Mergers

In 1979, Burson-Marsteller became a part of the Young & Rubicam company which was in turn bought by the WPP Group in October 2000.

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Media

Speaking to a 1997 Public Affairs Council conference Jim McAvoy, who went on to work as the head of B-M Media Practice summed up the news media's prioritization as "If it bleeds, it leads." [12]

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Fake news

In July 2006, Burson-Marsteller announced a new partnership with the broadcast PR firm The NewsMarket, which produces video news releases and b-roll footage for clients.

"This partnership enables Burson to offer its clients a highly scalable, fully integrated solution to market and deliver digital content to journalists, new and emerging news platforms, and direct-to-consumers globally in local languages," read the press release. "This marks the first time a PR agency will offer a comprehensive, integrated strategic counsel capability with a digital content management and distribution platform that will enable turn-key execution for clients." [13]

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Propaganda via Wikipedia entries

As described in the Swiss newspaper Wochenzeitung on 21.12.06, the Bernese office of Burson most probably copied their clients websites (propaganda in favour of nuclear energy and genetic engineering in Switzerland) as (German language) Wikipedia entries. [14]

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Crisis management

In a listing of PR companies with crisis capabilities, the American Meat Institute listed B-M as having "made its name in crisis communications during the Tylenol tampering case. Other clients for whom Burson has managed crises include Schwan's (Salmonella), Jewel Supermarkets (Salmonella contamination of milk), Perrier (worldwide product recall and relaunch), McDonald's (BSE monitoring) and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (BSE/CJD issues, Jeremy Rifkin)".[15]

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Timeline

In 2001 B-M also developed a close working relationship with Leeds Metropolitan University, prompting protests from student groups. According to the Leeds Student Campaign "Burson-Marsteller will provide input into LMU's courses, share research, provide visiting lecturers and offer undergraduate and graduate training programmes. In the summer Harold Burson will be receiving an honourary degree from Leeds Metropolitan University, at a time when most students have gone home".[16]

In 2003, the Public Relations Society of America awared B-M was a co-winner for a campaign it ran for the U.S. Postal Service. According to the PRSA media release "the campaign helped restore public trust and confidence during and after the anthrax crisis almost two years ago. As a result of these efforts, a public opinion poll taken in December 2001 reflected positive ratings for the Postal Service for its overall handling of the crisis. In fact, a year later, mail volumes were running at pre-crisis levels of 700 million pieces a day." [17]

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European women for front groups

In January 2004, the Observer (UK) reported that European Women for HPV Testing was a front group being run by B-M campaign for the US biotechnology company Digene. The Observer reported that some of the celebrities cited as endorsing the campaign on the groups website were not aware of the links of the group with Digene. [18]

Following the article B-M the list of celebrity names on the website was substituted with a message that those previously listed were being "re-contacted to confirm their continued support". B-M also sent a letter to The Observer claiming the articles was 'seriously defamatory'. [19] However, six weeks later B-M confirmed that no legal action would be taken. [20]

Carmelo Ruiz, in his article available in a link below, mentions many ventures B-M has spearheaded for clients in the past. They created a citizen group named the Coalition for Clean and Renewable Energy to create a positive image for the James Bay 2 hydroelectric dam project in Canada. They were hired by Philip Morris and then created the National Smokers Alliance to combat oncoming smoking restrictions. They infiltrated activist groups opposing the use of rBGH in dairy cows when hired by Eli Lilly and Nutra-Sweet, a subsidiary of Monsanto, to promote the benefits of the hormone. They were hired by A.H. Robbins after their Dalkon Shield IUD failed, damaging thousands of women. They also employed the talents of Otto Reich, former ambassador to Venezuela and head of Reagan's State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy (OPD) which was responsible for spreading disinformation about the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and blocked critical coverage of the Contras. The GAO found their activities to be illegal and Congress shut the office down in 1987.

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Burson and Bush men

In April 2005, Jack O'Dwyer's Newsletter reported that Burson-Marsteller had joined with Quinn Gillespie & Associates to launch 360 Advantage, a public affairs shop filled with "key players in George W. Bush's successful presidential campaigns."

360 Advantage is headed by Russ Schriefer, who did advertising with the Bush/Cheney 2000 and 2004 campaigns and produced the 2004 Republican National Convention, and by Stuart Stevens, a "Bush adman and veteran political strategist." Schriefer and Stevens were also partners in the Stevens & Schriefer Group in Washington, DC, and have worked on presidential campaigns in the Czech Republic, Nigeria, the Philippines and Congo (Jack O'Dwyer's Newletter, Vol. 38, No. 17, April 27, 2005).

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Blackwater USA

Burson-Marsteller has been hired by the two firms representing PMC Blackwater USA, McDermott Will & Emery and Crowell & Moring, to help with the account. [21]

According to PRWeek, Burson subsidiary, BKSH & Associates, was hired through an internal connection at Blackwater to help with Erik Prince's October 2, 2007 testimony to Congress and that this "temporary engagement has ended". [3]

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Political action committee

According to the Center for Responsive Politics database, Burson-Marsteller's federal political action committee had raised more than $69,000 as of October for the 2004 election cycle, with 37% of the donations given at that point going to Democrats, and 58% to Republicans. In the 2002 election cycle, the PAC gave 41% of the $92,500 raised to Democrats, and 58% to Republicans. In 2000, 56% of the $83,500 raised went to Democrats, 44% to Republicans. In 1998, 31% of the $70,300 raised was given to Democrats, 69% to Republicans. [22]

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Clients

B-M does not publicly provide a list of its past or current clients. However, a selection of its client list, laregly based on O'Dwyers PR Daily database and other public sources (referenced separately), includes:

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Personnel

Employees include:

The Executive Board, as of December 2005, consists of:

According to O'Dwyers PR Daily profile of the company, B-M has over 1,600 employees around the world.

In March 2009, Burson-Marsteller hired "former Fannie Mae communications spokesperson Jason Lobo as a director in its U.S. public affairs practice." Lobo "will manage the team servicing Burson-Marsteller client Ginnie Mae and will lead the team’s media relations, executive speech writing, marketing materials development, web site overhaul and third-party outreach activities." Before working at mortgage giant Fannie Mae, Lobo was at the Ketchum PR firm. [7]

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Contact information

B-M offices has 46 wholly owned offices as well as another 46 affiliates companies in 52 countries. Office contact information can be accessed at bm.com/overview/offices.html.

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Articles and resources

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Related SourceWatch articles

Other SourceWatch articles on BM activities can be found by looking under B on the list of article titles.

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References

  1. ↑ Sam Stein, "Mark Penn Tied To Controversial Nuclear Firm," The Huffington Post, February 14, 2008.
  2. ↑ Diane Farsetta, "Moore Spin: Or, How Reporters Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Nuclear Front Groups," Center for Media and Democracy / PR Watch, March 14, 2007.
  3. ↑ http://www.prweek.com/us/news/article/743606/Blackwater-incident-sheds-light-crises/
  4. ↑ Hillary's Marlboro Man. New York Observer (December 19, 2005). Retrieved on August 13, 2008.
  5. ↑ Colin Barraclough, "Chile plans to dam Patagonia wilderness," San Francisco Chronicle, April 7, 2008.
  6. ↑ "B-M Recruits Keeton," O'Dwyer's PR Daily (sub req'd), July 31, 2008.
  7. ↑ "Housing Expert Lobo Joins Burson Public Affairs Practice," The Holmes Report (sub req'd), March 23, 2009.
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External resources

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External articles

See Burson-Marsteller:External articles for a list of news articles and commentaries on the firm.

This article may include information from Tobacco Documents Online.

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