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Roberts makes a correction

BY TOM BRUNE | WASHINGTON BUREAU; Staff writer John Riley contributed to this story.

August 4, 2005

President Bush has nominated Judge John G. Roberts Jr. to succeed Justice William H. Rehnquist as Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. (AP)

WASHINGTON - John G. Roberts yesterday conceded he should have said he was registered to lobby on behalf of the cosmetics industry in the completed questionnaire he submitted Tuesday to the Senate for his Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

In an amendment filed yesterday in response to a Newsday story about the omission, Roberts confirmed he was registered to lobby for the Cosmetics, Toiletry and Fragrance Association and had met with two agencies on its behalf in 2001.

Roberts also said it was "appropriate" for his former firm to file the lobbying disclosures, but said he omitted the cosmetics group when answering the questionnaire because he thought his work was a legal task, not lobbying.

But Food and Drug Administration records show Roberts was working for the cosmetics group earlier and for a longer period than he says in his amended filing and that is shown in the lobby disclosure forms filed by his former firm, Hogan & Hartson.

Roberts, through the White House, declined to comment.

"Judge Roberts looks forward to answering the questions of the [Senate Judiciary] Committee in hearings beginning Sept. 6," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino.

Some in the Senate expressed surprise at Roberts' failure to include a publicly available lobbying disclosure form.

In his letter amending his answers yesterday, Roberts said the cosmetics association retained Hogan & Hartson in 2001 to oppose a proposed FDA sunscreen labeling regulation.

"I was asked to prepare a legal analysis of how the proposed regulation would violate the First Amendment," he wrote. "In meetings with the general counsels of the Office of Management and Budget and the Food and Drug Administration, the latter attended by other FDA employees, I made clear my client's position that implementing the regulation would result in litigation."

He said that explained his failure to include the cosmetics group as a lobbying activity.

"My conversations with the government attorneys were focused on the prospect of litigation," Roberts said. "Consequently, the question about lobbying on the Questionnaire [sic] did not trigger a memory of these meetings."

Roberts worked for the cosmetics group longer than he mentions in his letter and in the public disclosure statements.

The group's executive, Edward Kavanaugh, said he had hired Roberts for two tasks, to draft a lawsuit based on First Amendment and commercial free speech issues, and to work on the labeling of cosmetics like lipstick treated as over-the-counter drugs. But he did not return calls seeking clarification on when he hired Roberts.

An FDA record shows that on Jan. 4, 2000, Roberts and the cosmetic group's general counsel met with FDA officials to discuss a final rule for labeling over-the-counter drug products. The FDA calendar shows that in October 2001 Roberts and cosmetic association officials, including Kavanaugh, met with FDA lawyers about sunscreen labeling.

Hogan & Hartson did not register as a lobbyist for the cosmetics group until March 20, 2001. It filed that registration and a report on the first six months of 2001 in August 2001, and noted Roberts had met with OMB officials.

Subsequent reports, until a final report in 2003 ending the firm's work for the group, do not mention Roberts.

Warren Gorrell, chairman of Hogan & Hartson, said, "No filing was required for the two discussions that Judge Roberts had with the FDA personnel."

The public disclosure act requires reporting meetings with high-ranking officials. The FDA's chief counsel falls outside the reporting requirement.

Meanwhile, while working for Kavanaugh, Roberts was nominated to the D.C. Appellate Court. At the time, Kavanaugh's son, Brett, was a White House associate counsel vetting judicial nominees. Perino said Brett didn't vet Roberts.