Wal-Mart creates front groups such as Working Families for Wal-Mart and also hires hidden public relations operatives to create the appearance of grassroots support. Kevin Robinson of Chicagoist.com, a Web site about Chicago, reports that in Chicago, support for Wal-mart

"... is being manufactured by the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, a local PR powerhouse, and by Wal-Mart itself. A few weeks ago, a series of posts that I wrote attracted the attention not only of our regular readership, but also people that don’t normally visit our site on a regular basis. One reader in particular, going by the login 'Chatham,' took issue with the subject matter of the posts, but also with the arguments that Wal-Mart opponents have made. ... I checked out the URL that was associated with Chatham’s comments (OurcommunityOurChoice.com) and discovered it's a website promoting the opening of a Wal-Mart in Chatham ... . Then I looked up the IP address and found the comments were made from an IP address associated with Serafin and Associates ... the Chicago-based consulting firm that Wal-Mart has retained to manage its public relations campaign in Chicago. That includes push polling done last summer in Chicago. ... Michael Mini, the Government Relations Director at the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce ... told me that Wal-Mart is indeed a member of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce ... I asked him if he was familiar with Serafin and Associates. 'Yes, we have worked with them in our strategy sessions. We’ve worked with [Thomas] Serafin and his team.' When I told him that our site had gotten comments from the email address that led me to him and asked if he knew that it was being used to comment on blogs, he said 'no, not that I’m aware of.' Are you surprised that an IP address from Serafin was being used that way? 'No, not in particular.' Why not? 'I really can’t comment without looking into it further.' ... While Wal-Mart certainly has the right make its case to Chicago, the way they’ve gone about this -- creating a fake community group that purports to represent a community's residents and interests - is sneaky and underhanded."

A member of the Helena, Montana, chapter of the Coalition for Chemical Safety, a chemical industry front group, has been disavowed for calling for an all-out ban of the use of BPA, an additive in many plastic products. Richard Denison, a senior scientist with Environmental Defense Fund, noted that the woman was interviewed on Montana Public Radio’s Evening Edition. In response, Joe Householder, the Executive Director of the "coalition," argued that the woman was "not an official spokesperson," that the group "does not take a position on any specific products" and does not support any "specific product fights." Denison is unpersuaded. "Isn’t it time, Mr. Householder, for the Coalition to end this charade and come out from behind the curtain? If it’s not your members, just who are its “official” spokespeople, and for whom do they work? I assume you’re one of those spokespeople – who is paying you to represent the Coalition?," he writes.

The Campaign for a U.S.-Afghanistan Partnership is being exposed as an insidious pro-war front group. Aram Roston reports in the The Nation magazine that "As President Obama prepares a massive military buildup in Afghanistan, a House subcommittee has launched an investigation into whether Defense Department contractors are paying off the Taliban to protect American supply lines. ... One of the contractors under investigation is NCL Holdings, a U.S. firm headed by Hamed Wardak, the Afghan-American son of Afghanistan's defense minister, General Abdul Rahim Wardak. ... Parallel to his business ventures, he's been running an aggressive foreign policy campaign in Washington to keep the U.S. heavily vested in Afghanistan. A confidential lobbying memo obtained by The Nation shows that Wardak commissioned a blue-chip lobbying firm to push for an extended U.S. presence in Afghanistan -- a potentially lucrative outcome for NCL. Earlier this year Patton Boggs LLP, Washington's most monied lobbying firm, established a nonprofit front group (Campaign for a U.S. - Afghanistan Partnership) on Wardak's behalf to act as the 'face' of a campaign for increased US engagement in Afghanistan, according to confidential legal records." Blogger Steve Hynd first reported critically on this front group in a posting on October 29, 2009.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is sponsoring online pop-up ads to try and generate the appearance of "grassroots" opposition to health care reform. The ads tell readers that if they complete a survey and give their names and personal information, they will get a $150 American Express Gift Card for use at Hooters Restaurants, the chain whose name is a slang term for part of the female anatomy and which is known for its skimpily-dressed, female servers. One of the incentivized ads urges readers to sign up for "free emails" from the Chamber that explain "how to protect your family's future and bring common-sense solutions to health health care debate." The Chamber contracts with a public relations firm which in turn subcontracts with an online marketing firm that coordinates the tasks of generating the ads and signing people up for the Chamber's campaign. Such "virtual astroturfing" appears to be a growing new tactic of lobbying groups trying to generate the appearance of public support or opposition for an issue.

Early in November, thousands of angry protesters flocked to Capitol Hill to listen to House Representative Michele Bachmann (R-Minnesota) rail against a supposed "government takeover" of health care. As they exited their buses, they were given coffee and doughnuts, protest signs and talking points to use to decry "socialized medicine." Few of them were aware that the event they were attending had been bankrolled by the ninetheeth richest person in the world, oil and gas billionaire David Koch. Koch belongs to a wealthy family that has long supported ultra-conservative politics from behind the scenes. He is the funder behind Americans for Prosperity, (AFP) the fake "grassroots" group that organized the anti-government Tea Party protests and the raucous, disruptive town hall meetings during the August, 2009 Congressional recess. David Koch is the son of Fred C. Koch, who helped found the ultra right-wing John Birch Society, which in the 1960s, portrayed taxes as a Communist menace, President John F. Kennedy as a traitor who had to be impeached, and racial integration as a Kremlin plot. Like the John Birch Society, AFP hides information that it is funded by the super-rich. Rather, it portrays itself as a citizen-led group fighting for American ideals and freedoms. In the 1980s, Americans for Prosperity was known by another name -- Citizens for a Sound Economy -- a powerful, industry-funded think tank that was funded by, and had close ties to Philip Morris, and that promoted deregulation of industry.

A major Australian building products company, Boral, has been forced to publish a full-page apology for its role in an astroturf campaign against BGC, which was seeking government approval for a new brickworks. In the advertisement, Boral stated that one of its subsidiaries, the Midland Brick Company, engaged Professional Public Relations "to assist with the prosecution" of a campaign which featured a "local ratepayers association" which "produced and distributed a DVD and leaflets which contained false and defamatory statements about BGC and the proposed brickworks". The advertisement stated that "Midland Brick did not want its role in the campaign to be known publicly." On its website PPR states that one of its values is "integrity" which it associates with "honest, respected and respectful, truthful, genuine, reliable". BGC's Len Buckeridge told ABC News that he was "quite ashamed of Australian business, and particularly big business where people like Boral seem to thing it's their entitlement to do whatever the hell they like."

The Employment Policies Institute (EPI), a front group created by veteran lobbyist Richard Berman, is planning an advertising blitz claiming that healthcare reform is too costly. The ads will run in Nebraska, North Dakota, Arkansas, Louisiana, Connecticut and Maine. “We’re putting some serious money behind it,” said Berman. As to whose money it is, Berman was less forthcoming. "These are people we do business with and have an interest in the issue,” was all Berman would disclose. EPI's 2007 annual return states that the group received $2.5 million in revenue of which over $725,000 was paid to Berman & Company as the group's management company.

The House Global Warming Committee conducted a hearing to investigate the astroturf lobbying firm Bonner and Associates, which last summer sent phony letters on forged stationery to members of Congress on behalf of their energy-industry clients who oppose a climate change bill. At the hearing, Bonner and Associates president Jack Bonner claimed that the letters were generated by "one rogue temporary employee" who had since been fired, and that no one else at the company knew about them. Bonner's firm has been charged with ethics violations in the past for using unscrupulous lobbying tactics. Committee member Jay Inslee (D-WA) called out Bonner and the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), a coal industry front group, for trying to create a fake movement against the climate change bill. Insley said ACCCE head Steve Miller, "You remind me of the guy who hired a hitman and said, 'Just take care of the problem. Don't tell me whether you're using a knife or a gun.'" Inslee and Committee Chair Ed Markey (D-MA) said that when highly-funded lobbying campaigns are willing to spread lies and falsify documents in order to stop a bill, it corrupts the entire democratic process.

A freshly-minted front group, which proclaimed that it promoted "balanced chemical safety reform that protects public health, innovation, and economic growth,” has been outed.

Richard Denison, a scientist with Environmental Defense, noted that "nowhere does the website reveal who runs or is behind it" but some of the members of the coalition included the Chemical Industry Council of California, the Louisiana Propane Gas Association and the Virginia Biotechnology Association. The group's website was registered in early August by DDC Advocacy, a Virginia-based PR firm. After Denison wrote of the coalition in a blog post, the American Chemistry Council appeared as a member of the coalition too. In a comment on Denison's blog, Joe Householder, who identified himself as the Executive Director of the coalition, stated that the coalition "has yet to formally launch." However, Householder did not respond to Denison's question as to "who is paying DDC Advocacy to set up and run the website and organize the coalition?"

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is taking a closer look at insurance giant Humana. Humana sent alarming mass mailings to people enrolled in one or more of its plans. The Humana letters claim that health care reform proposals under consideration by Congress could hurt "millions of seniors and disabled individuals [who] could lose many of the important benefits and services that make Medicare advantage health plans so valuable." CMS demanded that Humana cease "immediately all such mailings to Medicare plan members and to remove any related materials directed to Medicare enrollees from your website." CMS also warned companies offering Medicare-related plans that official mailings on plan benefits must be reviewed by CMS, and that communications "claim[ing] to convey legitimate Medicare program information ... but instead offer[ing] misleading and/or confusing opinion and conjecture" are likely violations of federal rules. Earlier this year, the public relations firm Dewey Square Group sent fake letters to the editor in seniors' names, arguing against funding cuts for the private Medicare Advantage plan. Dewey Square was working for America's Health Insurance Plans.