Your lobbying heart

Maybe there should be another ACORN investigation.

Mr. Hampton and his wife, in a series of interviews, provided a detailed account of Mr. Ensign’s efforts to mitigate the fallout from the affair, which ruptured two families that had been the closest of friends.

Mr. Hampton said he and Mr. Ensign were aware of the lobbying restriction but chose to ignore it. He recounted how the senator helped him find clients and ticked off several steps Mr. Ensign took to assist them with their agendas in Washington, activities confirmed by federal officials and executives with the businesses.

“The only way the clients could get what John was essentially promising them — which was access — was if I still had a way to work with his office,” Mr. Hampton said. “And John knew that.”

After requests from Mr. Hampton, Mr. Ensign called the secretary of transportation last year to plead the case for a Nevada airline, Allegiant Air, which was under investigation for allegedly overcharging for tickets. In April, he arranged for Mr. Hampton and his clients to meet the new transportation secretary in a successful effort to resolve a dispute with a foreign competitor.

The senator, after exchanges between his senior staff members and Mr. Hampton, also urged Interior Department officials to complete an environmental review for a controversial coal-burning plant under development by a Nevada power company, NV Energy.

Despite those efforts, Mr. Ensign’s relationship with his one-time aide and the husband of his former mistress has ended in bitterness and recriminations. Mr. Hampton grew increasingly frustrated about his financial situation, believing that the senator had reneged on a deal to find him enough clients to sustain his income.

“You have not retained three clients for me as promised, and your poor choices have led to a deep hurt and financial impact to my family,” Mr. Hampton wrote the senator in an e-mail message in July 2008. “At your request and your design, I left your organization to save your reputation and career, and mine has been ruined.”

For his part, Mr. Ensign has complained that Mr. Hampton tried to extract exorbitant sums from him.

Until he admitted the affair in June, Mr. Ensign, 51, was a top Senate Republican leader and was discussed as a possible presidential contender in 2012. The silver-haired senator with a statesman’s looks and family money — his father helped found a Las Vegas casino — has championed conservative social values.

Because, clearly, ACORN is undermining our democracy.

Senate ethics rules and federal criminal law prohibit former aides, if they have “the intent to influence,” from making “any communication to or appearance” with any senator or Senate staff member for a year after leaving their jobs. A separate law required Mr. Hampton to register as a lobbyist if he intended to press a company’s case on Capitol Hill.

Congress in 2007 toughened ethics laws to make failure to file as a lobbyist a criminal offense. Prosecutors have used the 12-month lobbying ban to bring criminal charges in several corruption cases, including the 2006 conviction of Bob Ney, then a Republican congressman from Ohio.

Mr. Hampton, who believed that Mr. Ensign’s help with his clients was crucial to his success, admitted he had ignored the restrictions. He said that it was November Inc.’s responsibility to register him as a lobbyist, but he added that he did not insist the company do so because it would have made obvious that he was making inappropriate contacts on Capitol Hill. As for violating the one-year ban, he said he did so at Mr. Ensign’s direction.

“Work with Lopez,” Mr. Hampton said the senator told him. “I will take care of Lopez. I will make sure Lopez gives you what you need.”

Mr. Lopez agreed that Mr. Ensign instructed him to work with Mr. Hampton, but offered a different explanation.

He said that after he had raised concerns about Mr. Hampton’s requests, Mr. Ensign responded by designating him to be the office’s intermediary with Mr. Hampton to ensure that the contacts complied with the law.

Mr. Lopez, who left Mr. Ensign’s office last month, also said his conversations with Mr. Hampton were simply “informational.”

“Did Doug advocate and try to lobby in a couple of instances?” Mr. Lopez asked. “Absolutely. But that’s his problem.”

Several legal experts said, however, that the communications between Mr. Ensign’s office and Mr. Hampton might have been improper. If Mr. Ensign knew that Mr. Hampton was lobbying his office and facilitated the arrangement, he could face an inquiry, said Stan Brand, a former House general counsel who specializes in government ethics issues.