The insider: A reputation for straight talk in a jungle of spin

Sept. 20, 2011

Frank Maisano, a senior figure at one of the nation's top lobbying firms, keeps thousands of reporters, lawyers, industry players and others in the loop on energy, ice hockey and heavy metal

Climate Query For Frank Maisano

Interview conducted and condensed by Rae Tyson

The Daily Climate

Editor's note: Climate Query is a new semi-weekly feature offered by Daily Climate, featuring short Q&A's with players large and small in the climate arena. Read others in the series.

Washington, D.C.-based Frank Maisano, 43, is senior principal at Bracewell & Giuliani, a law firm heavily involved in energy and climate politics on behalf of electric utilities and the fossil fuel and wind industries. Environmentalists, journalists, politicians and industry insiders know Maisano through his weekly emails detailing all things energy-related in the capital. Originally from Detroit, he is an avid sports fan and has worked on the Hill for an array of senators and congressmen, as well as industry-funded lobbying groups like the Global Climate Coalition, which fought emissions reductions before folding in 2002.  

Some 5,000 people get your weekly email. How did it start?

Around 1999, I started sending a brief note to a handful of reporters on a few items that we were working on. It seemed to be a very effective way of connecting and updating people who cared about these issues. It blossomed from there.

Your updates are remarkably spin-free, even though you have clients in the energy business.

Obviously I do represent industries with a view. But I do try and keep it relatively objective. I would rather have objectiveness with a couple of warts than something that is so one-sided it is unbelievable.

Are you surprised Congress has yet to pass climate legislation?

I am really not surprised. The biggest problem they face is, this issue just doesn't resonate with the electorate.

Some in industry have tried to slow regulations by challenging the validity of climate change science. You don't seem to take that approach.

I never, in 15 years of working on this issue, have wanted to get into a nasty fight over the science. It is better to just admit the premise that we are, in some way, affecting the climate. Industry should not play a role in a discussion about the science. They have much more expertise talking about the economic impacts.

But a lot of people right now are denying the science and opposing solutions. How do you square that?

I don't think the science matters much to the policy decisions. Because if the science mattered, we would be making much more dramatic policy decisions.

You can't physically do what the 350.org guys want in the political environment we're in. You have to build a scenario where you can make the small steps toward improvement. But they're not interested in small steps. Jim Hansen wants to go over the cliff now. And the economy and the political environment is not going to allow that.

What about your spare time?

I have many hobbies, but most involve chasing my three kids - Hannah (13), Adam (10), and Olivia (8) - and sports. I am a high school football referee and also referee ice hockey at all levels, from high-level juniors to the littlest mites.

How do you juggle family in a 24-hour news cycle?

Technology. I've got iPods, iPads, Blackberries, all kinds of stuff. It's not about where you are and what time it is, it's about what you can do for somebody when they need something right away. 

Close readers of your emails understand you are a big heavy metal fan.

I do manage to take in a good rock concert every now and then - usually using my kids as a prop to get my wife, Stacey, to let us go. We've been to Rush, Iron Maiden, Metallica and Godsmack, among others.

Iron Maiden? Do your kids really like the music, or are they humoring dad?

They absolutely love it. In fact, they were after me to take them to the Rockstar Mayhem Festival. [It was] either that or the beach. In the end, they chose the beach. But they reminded me that Rockstar Mayhem comes around next year, too.

Rae Tyson pioneered the environment beat at USA Today in the 1980s and today restores and races vintage motorcycles in central Pennsylvania. 

Photos, from top to bottom: Frank Maisano sends a player from Calvert Hall High School hockey team to the penalty box in the last minute of a tie game during the Maryland High School playoffs in 2009. Photo courtesy Peggy Torre. Maisano at work, courtesy Frank Maisano. Maisano's children at a Godsmack concert. Photo courtesy Frank Maisano.

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