A6 The Region The Boston Globe FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 2019
work to her firm.
She has pleaded not guilty.
Her attorney, Scott Lopez, said
Thursday that his client had
builta reputation for honesty.
“The allegations are inconsistent
with that reputation,” he said.
Lynch’s company — Lynch
Associates Inc. — is now head-
ed by her sons, Peter and Greg,
whosoughtto distanceher
from the firm Wednesday, not-
ing she gave up her ownership
stake in 2016 and provided on-
ly “limited” consultinguntil
- State records show Lynch
has madeabout $7,000 in lob-
byingfees throughthe compa-
ny this year.
For muchher career, Lynch
was an advocate and manager
for varioustrade groups, from
the Massachusetts Academy of
Trial Attorneys and the Massa-
chusetts Movers Association to
larger groups, such as the
Truckers Association of Massa-
chusetts and its hundreds of
members.
She served as executivedi-
rector of the truckers group
starting in 1991,whenit was
calledthe Massachusetts Motor
uLY NCH
Continued fromPageA
Transportation Association, ac-
cording to her LinkedIn page.
And she was still director as re-
centlyas September, whenshe
wrote to the Baker administra-
tion to opposea pilotproposal
to put noncommercial traffic on
the South Boston Bypass Road.
RichardDeslongchamps,
whosits on the association’s
board and is its past chairman,
declined to comment Thursday.
It was whenshe represented
the Massachusetts Auto Body
Association decades ago that
BrianS. Hickeyfirst met Lynch,
he said.The association was
Hickey’s first lobbying client
and as its director, Lynch was
his boss, he said.
But over time, Lynch’s busi-
ness grew to includeboth man-
aging, and in somecases, lobby-
ing for the varioustrade groups
that employed her.
“She had a niche,” said Hick-
ey, who runshis own lobbying
firm.“She took on a larger role,
pitchingherself as more than
an associationmanager but
someonewhoknew her way
aroundthe State House as well.”
But, he said, he often didn’t
see her on Beacon Hill. “She
had a good book of business,”he said. “I just didn’t see her as
being as prolific in the State
House.”
Knapp, the director of the
movers trade group, said it nev-
er hiredLynch as a lobbyist.
(“We couldn’t affordit,” he
said.) But her firm managed the
association’s business for nearly
10 years,givingher the title of
executive director.
Her work wouldalso include
organizingevents where mem-
bers could network with elected
officials.In one instancein
2016,Lieutenant GovernorKaryn Polito spoke to the asso-
ciation in Framingham. Polito’s
office described the event as an
informal “stop-by.”
“It was nice that she could
get the lieutenantgovernor,”
Knapp said of Lynch. “I found
her to be professional.And
whenit got serious,she would
go after a guy.”
That hard-nosed edge could
come out at board meetings,
whereKnapp said Lynch was
unafraid to correct members on
the spot.
“She was not afraid to go af-ter people,” Knapp said.
It was her role with the State
Police Association of Massachu-
setts that was amongher most
high-profile. In 2016,when the
firm received nearly $900, 000
in lobbying fees and Lynch
$160,000 in salary, SPAM was
its most lucrative client, spend-
ing $84,000 for its services, re-
cordsshow.
Second to the union that
year was Taser, who authorities
say paidLynchAssociates
$138,000between 2015and
2016 after Dana A. Pullman,
former headof the police asso-
ciation, allegedly pressured the
company into hiringLynch’s
firm, even though it already
had local lobbyists on retainer.
After the company — now
knownas Axon — hiredLynch
Associates, Pullman helpedset
up a meeting in February 2016
with Thomas Turco, then an
undersecretary of criminaljus-
tice for the ExecutiveOffice of
Public Safety and Security.
“Unbelievable meeting with
[the Undersecretary],” an un-
named lobbyist, whom authori-
ties described as one of Lynch’s
relatives,wrote to Pullman af-
ter the meeting. “Thank you!”Four days later, Lynch wrote
Pullman a $5,000 check from
her personalaccount, but later
drew the sameamountfrom
the company, classifying it as a
paymentto “Boston Consulting
Group.”
Two years earlier, authori-
tiessay, Pullmanhadalso
leanedon the union’s treasurer
to issue a $250,000checkto
Lynch’s firm for the work it did
in negotiating a $22 million set-
tlementwiththe state to com-
pensate trooperswhohad
worked on days off, according
to the complaint.
The union had already paid
$100,000 to Lynch’s firm, and
after the company receivedthe
additional $250,000, she wrote
a $20,000 check to Pullman’s
spouse, which was classified as
a paymentfor consultingwork,
the federal complaint said.
Neither Pullmannor his
spouseever did any consulting
workfor Lynch Associates, ac-
cording to authorities.
SPAM no longer uses Lynch
Associates as its lobbyist.Matt Stout can be reachedat
[email protected]
himon Twitter @mattpstout.Lobbyist accusedin scheme is known for her edge on Beacon Hill
motely. The agency said it has
taken similar actionsin the
pastand “it has always been
temporary.”
Earlier, the agency’s direc-
tor, Ken Cuccinelli,tweeted:
“Just learned a Senator is false-
ly alleging@USCISBoston/
Newarkstoppedprocessing
asylum claims. Completely
false!” he wrote. “They are shift-
ing somestaff to help w/cred-
ible fear workloadresulting
from the historic humanitarian
crisis at the border that Con-
gress REFUSES to help fix.”
Cameron and other attor-
neys in Boston questioned why
the Trumpadministration
chose to redirect the majority of
officersfromthe Boston and
Newark offices, insteadof di-
verting staff from acrossthe
country, putting less strain on
all offices.
They suggested political mo-
tives were a factor. “You’re es-
sentially freezing asylum appli-
cations in one of the bluest areas
of the country,” Cameron said.
It was unclearThursday if
the agency was ordering a simi-
lar halt to asylumcaseselse-
where around the country. The
WhiteHouse did not respond
to requests for comment.
BothMassachusetts sena-
tors condemned the change.
Senator Elizabeth Warren
said it is part of the Trumpad-
uASYLUM
ContinuedfromPageA
ministration’s “shameful cam-
paign to prevent people fleeing
violence from finding refuge in
the US.”
Senator EdwardMarkey,
meanwhile, said that “reassign-
ing Boston asylumofficerswill
onlypunish the thousandsof
local asylum-seekers who have
been waiting— in many cases,
years— to have theircases pro-
cessed.’’
The types of cases that will
be affected in New England are
called “affirmative” asylumcas-
es.
Unlike migrants who cross
the border and immediately re-
quest asylum, the vast majority
of affirmative asylum-seekers
arrivedlegally, accordingto
Cameron, and apply for asylum
within a year. Asylumofficers
then interview the applicants
and determine if their claims
are valid. In March, the Boston
office completed almost 200
cases, approvingasylumfor 34.
Immigrants at the border
face a differentprocess: They
usually have a “credible fear”
interview, an initial screening
by an asylum officer to deter-
mine whether they have a valid
fear of persecution backhome.
That asylumofficercannot
grant asylum. The migrants
who are found to have a valid
fear are sent to an immigration
judge for a full hearing.
The asylumofficersin Bos-
ton are being sent to the borderto conduct thosecredible fear
interviews, which they will do
in personor by phone,accord-
ing to the letter fromUS Citizen-
ship and Immigration Services.
Even before the new delay,
asylum-seekers were already
waitingthree or four years to
interview in New England, said
Mahsa Khanbabai, who is chair
of the New England chapter of
the American Immigration
Lawyers Association.“Now it’s going to take,
what, five, 10 years?”she said.
Those who have applied for af-
firmative asylumcan generally
workand live legally in the
country while they wait for ver-
dicts on theircases.But still,
the yearsof uncertainty take
their toll.
“They just want somefinali-
ty,” Khanbabai said.Sometimes
they’re forcedto wait for the an-
swers to basic questions: “ ‘CanI get a driver’s license? Can I get
a job? Where can I put my chil-
dren in school?’ ”
Somepeoplewho are wait-
ing for asylum resolutions have
familywho are in danger back
home,said ElianaNader, an im-
migration attorney in Boston.
If they weregranted asylum,
they couldpetitionto bring
theirfamilies to the United
States. They could get green
cards,travel outside the coun-try, and get on track to eventual-
ly become citizens. But with no
asylum interviews, her clients
are stuck in limbo, desperately
waitingfor any kind of informa-
tion aboutwhat comesnext.
That’s no accident, she said.
“Causing suffering through
processing delays seems to be
the point,” Nader said.ZoeGreenberg canbe reached
at [email protected].Trump’s move puts
asylum-seekers in
New England on hold
Instead, they said,they were
committing their companies to
a “free market economy that
serves all Americans.” Along
with profits for shareholders,
companies must “deliver value”
to customers, employees, sup-
pliers,and the communities
where they operate.
It’s taken years,and many
peopledoubttheircommit-
ment, but some of America’s
best-known chief executives are
ditching the free market funda-
mentalism of the Chicago
School for a more liberal defini-
tion of corporate citizenship —
one that evolved,in good part,
through the workof Porter and
Kramer and other leadersin
Boston’s academic,corporate,
and political realms.
People such as Arnold Hiatt,
the former CEO of Lexington-
basedStrideRite and cofound-
er of BusinessSocialResponsi-
bility, a nonprofitthat focuses
on sustainable business strate-
gies; Joseph KennedyIII, the
Massachusetts congressman
who has preachedthe gospel of
“moral capitalism”; and Brian
Moynihan, the Wellesley resi-
dent and CEO of Bankof Amer-
ica, and one of the 181 signers
of the Business Roundtable’s
statement.(OthersincludeJeff
uEDELMAN
ContinuedfromPageA
Bezosof Amazon,Tim Cook of
Apple,Jamie Dimon of JPMor-
gan Chase, Thomas Kennedy of
Raytheon, and Larry Merlo of
CVS Health.)
The business group’s move
reflects just how concerned cor-
porate chieftains are that so
many people see big companies
as the enemy. They knowthere
is a real danger that capitalism
couldyield to socialism or an un-
democratic, crony populismif it
can’t developa bigger heart and
moreempathetic conscience.
“It’s a critical moment,” Por-
ter said Thursday in an inter-
view.
A little background. For
nearly 50 years, since the end of
the era of paternalistic capital-
ism embodied by Henry Ford,
the first commandment of busi-
ness has been that the needs of
shareholders are paramount.
Executiveswho believe busi-
ness has a social responsibility
“are — or would be if they or
anyoneelse took themseriously
— preachingpureand unadul-
terated socialism,” Milton
Friedman, a Pulitzer Prize-win-
ning economist at the Universi-
ty of Chicago, wrote in 1970.
“Businessmenwhotalk this
way are unwitting puppets of
the intellectual forces that have
beenunderminingthe basisof a
free society these past decades.”Friedmancodified a belief
that underpinnedmuch of the
thinking about corporate strat-
egy that has held sway into the
new century, as wellas the
“greedis good” mindset of cor-
porate raiders suchas Carl
Icahn and the short-term“hit-
the-quarterly-numbers” men-
tality so prevalent today.
There wereexceptions. Hiatt
took over Stride Rite in 1970
two years after the company
bought his smallshoe-making
firmin Lawrence. StrideRite
wasbasedonHarrisonAvenue
in Roxbury at the time.In a
neighborhoodwithmany chil-
drenof single parents, “the first
thingI did was to start a chil-
dren’s center [for residents and
his employees],” he recalledin
an interview. “And that’s whenI
saw what a difference one could
make with early education.”
StrideRite wenton to pro-
videneighborhoodchildren
with health care services, and
whenit moved to Kendall
Square, Hiatt opened a fitness
centerfor employees, paidfor
smoking-cessation programs,
and allowedworkers to spend
timevolunteeringat inner-city
schools.
By the time Hiatt stepped
down in 1992,he had delivered
some of the most consistently
high returns for shareholdersamong US companies, and was
recognized as a model for pro-
gressive corporate leadership.
“For me it was trial and er-
ror,” he said.
Throughout the 1990s, cor-
porate social responsibility
gained momentum, particular-
ly around environmental is-
sues. But the efforts werenot
central to companies’strate-
gies,and often wereseenas a
cost that ate into shareholder
profit. Porter and Kramer’s big
contribution was to showthat
making shared value integral to
every aspect of business could
actually improve returns.
At Bankof America, Moyni-
han says, the choiceisn’t be-
tween shareholders or other
stakeholders.
“We call it the genius of the
‘and.’ We beenat this for years.
We know that we have to look
after shareholdersandour oth-
er stakeholders,” he said.
The bankmakes invest-
ments, lends, and funds philan-
thropy to address income in-
equality, clean energy, health
care, and affordablehousing.
Accordingto Moynihan, the
private sector needsto take the
lead becauseunlike nonprofit
and government spending, “so-
lutionsinvolving capitalism are
sustainable.”
One example,citedin Bankof America’s most recent annu-
al report: It is morethanhalf-
way through a 10-year, $
billion initiative focused on cre-
ating a sustainable energy fu-
ture.In addition, the bank
plans to be carbon neutral by
2020.
Last November, Joe Kenne-
dy, a Democrat, stood up before
the New EnglandCouncil,a
businesstrade group, to urge
companies to pushfor action to
helplow-and middle-income
workers instead of cutting taxes
for the wealthy.
The Globe’s Jon Chesto re-
ported that it was the first time
Kennedywove themes suchas
economic inequality, the envi-
ronment, and accessto health
care into a plea for a more com-
passionate system that balances
investors’ demands withsoci-
ety’s needs.
“A moral capitalism,” he lat-
er explained in a op-ed for The
American Prospect, is “judged
notbyhowmuchitproduces,
but how broadlyit empowers,
backed by a government un-
afraid to set the conditionsfor
fair and just markets.”
In the Boston business com-
munity, many leaders are
speakingout on issuessuchas
paid familyleave and equal pay
for women (InkHouseCEO
Beth Monaghan),transgenderrights (Eastern BankCEOBob
Rivers), and an end to manag-
ing companies for the short
term(Panera cofounder Ron
Shaich and hedge fundmanag-
er Seth Klarman).
Whenthe BusinessRound-
table issued its statement, it
was closely scrutinized by in-
vestors,who fear that shared
value could meanlower returns
for them.
Ken Bertsch,executivedi-
rector of the Council of Institu-
tional Investors, notedthat the
Business Roundtable’s list of
stakeholders put investors last,
even thoughthey are the own-
ers of publiccompanies.He
worries that group’s abandon-
mentof the Friedmanview of
the corporation “seems to be
part of an effort to erode share-
holders’ rights.”
It’s that kind of thinking that
riles up Porter. Too many inves-
tors,he says, still have a view
that profit and socialgood are
inconsistent.
“This is a historic moment in
business,” he said.“Businesses
have finally started to under-
stand capitalism at a different
level.”You can reachmeat
[email protected]
followmeon Twitter
@GlobeNewsEd.CEO group’s decree poses a new test for capitalism
SUZANNE KREITER/GLOBESTAFF
AnneM.Lynchleft thecourthouseWednesday withher
lawyerafterpleadingnotguilty.MATTHEWJ. LEE/GLOBE STAFF
Matt Cameron,animmigrationattorney, watchedonlineasPresidentTrumpspoke aboutthesouthernborder.