Money Trail: Kanye West Proves Huge Boost for Media Lobbyists

Kanye West wows the crowd at an exclusive entertainment industry party in Denver Wednesday night.

(ABC News Photo Illustration)
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"Part of the problem is that it ends up turning the Justice Department into an agent of the entertainment industry," said Sherwin Siy, a staff attorney for Public Knowledge, a D.C.-based public interest group that promotes internet freedom.

"It's using government resources to pursue non-criminal activity – non-criminal activity that the entertainment industry is perfectly capable of pursuing itself," said Siy.

The House passed a version of the bill – which does not include a provision to allow civil prosecution - last year.

Just last month Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) introduced a companion bill in the Senate.

Leahy did not attend last night's concert but was recently given a small speaking role in Warner Bros Picture's latest Batman movie "The Dark Knight." Leahy, who said he was a longtime Batman fan, contributed his payment from Warner Bros (a Time Warner company and RIAA member) to charity.

The West concert capped a week of lavish parties and entertainment put on by corporate lobbyists who push legislation and regulatory issues in Washington.

Watch the final Money Trail report from Denver tonight on World News with Charles Gibson, and all next week from Minneapolis.

Sen. Barack Obama has repeatedly criticized the role of special interest and corporate lobbyists and has refused to accept any campaign contributions from them or allow any of them to work in his campaign.

But Obama's position stood in stark contrast to the reality in Denver where lobbyists and their corporations put up $50 million to pay for the cost of the convention itself and millions more for scores of private parties.

This post has been updated. The previous version erroneously attributed the statements made by Neil Portnow of NARAS to RIAA president Cary Sherman. Sherman did attend the event, but did not speak to reporters there.

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