David Safavian - Career Prior To GSA

Career Prior To GSA

An Iranian-American from Grosse Ile, Michigan, Safavian graduated fifth in his class at Detroit College of Law. In Michigan, he served as an aide to Congressmen Robert William Davis (R-MI) and Bill Schuette (R-MI), and still later he worked for the lobbying firm of Janus-Merritt Strategies.

Safavian was a longtime friend of lobbyist Jack Abramoff. In the mid-1990s, the two worked at the Washington-based lobbying firm of Preston Gates & Ellis. There they brought in millions to the firm while working on the Mississippi Choctaw tribal account. The pair were members of a team, reports CNN, “that was lobbying to keep the Northern Mariana Islands free from certain US labor and immigration laws.”

In 1997, Safavian and Grover Norquist founded a lobbying firm, the Merritt Group, which was renamed Janus-Merritt Strategies (and is sometimes referred to as "Janus Merritt" or simply "Janus"). The tenor of the firm was fiercely ideological. "We represent clients who really do have an interest in a smaller federal government," Safavian told Legal Times in a 1997 interview. "We're all very ideologically driven, and have a bias in favor of free markets." He went on: "We're not letting people who offer us money change our principles."

The firm's clients included businesses like BP America, the U.S. division of British Petroleum. There were foreign companies like the Corporacion Venezolana de Cementos and Grupo Financiero Banorte. There were gaming interests, including Indian tribes: the Saginaw Chippewa - a client the firm shared with Jack Abramoff, the Viejas band of Kumeyaay Indians, and the National Indian Gaming Commission. Safavian also registered as a lobbyist for the government of Pakistan, the government of Gabon, and Pascal Lissouba, the former president of the Republic of the Congo.

In 1999, Safavian founded the Internet Consumer Choice Coalition, a nonprofit one purpose of which was to fight a bill authored by Republican Arizona senator Jon Kyl that would have made online gambling a federal crime. Coalition members included the American Civil Liberties Union, the Association of Concerned Taxpayers, Citizens for a Sound Economy, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Interactive Services Association, the Small Business Survival Committee, and the United States Internet Council. Some coalition members—the Interactive Services Association, for one—were also clients of Safavian's. Another, Americans for Tax Reform, was Norquist's activist group. An Oct. 12, 2006 Senate Finance Committee report concludes most of these organizations abused their tax exempt status.

In January 2001, Safavian left Janus-Merritt to become Chief of Staff for Representative Chris Cannon.