Who pays to lobby at the State House.
Registered lobbyists, the entities that hire them and the lobbying compensation the entities reported, from the Rhode Island Secretary of State's Lobby Tracker.
registered lobbyists
Lobbyists registered for 2026, as the Lobby Tracker counts them (data last updated Oct 28, 2026 01:00 AM); the Download Lobbyist List export has the same 593 rows. Separately, 49 lobbying firms are registered.
clients (lobbyist employers)
Entities (people or organizations that hire a lobbyist) registered for 2026, as the Lobby Tracker counts them; the Download Entity List export has the same 627 rows (625 distinct names ignoring capitals).
| BALLY'S CORPORATION | $219,500.00 |
| CARE NEW ENGLAND | $180,000.00 |
| RHODE ISLAND ENERGY | $153,000.00 |
| Brightstar Global Solutions Corporation | $152,500.00 |
| COX COMMUNICATION-EAST REGION | $139,000.00 |
| American Wagering Inc. | $126,374.43 |
| BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD OF RHODE ISLAND | $114,000.00 |
| PROVIDENCE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE | $112,663.00 |
| RHODE ISLAND HEALTH CARE ASSOCIATION | $108,500.00 |
| PHARMACEUTICAL RESEARCH AND MANUFACTURERS OF AMERICA (PHRMA) | $106,743.28 |
| RHODE ISLAND FOUNDATION | $105,000.00 |
| CVS HEALTH | $95,745.97 |
| AMAZON.COM SERVICES LLC | $90,000.00 |
| BRG Sports Inc. | $90,000.00 |
| Electronic Payments Coalition | $90,000.00 |
| RHODE ISLAND BUILDERS ASSOCIATION | $85,500.00 |
| FRIENDS OF EXCEL ACADEMY, INC. | $81,000.00 |
| RHODE ISLAND LEAGUE OF CITIES AND TOWNS | $80,000.00 |
| THE BEACON MUTUAL INS. CO. | $77,999.94 |
| DELTA DENTAL OF RHODE ISLAND | $72,900.00 |
Compensation that this entity (the client) listed as paid to its lobbying firms and lobbyists on its own 2026 entity activity reports to the Rhode Island Secretary of State: the monthly reports for January through June 2026 and the quarterly report for July through September 2026, as linked from each entity's Lobby Tracker profile on Oct. 28, 2026, added up across those reports. It is compensation only: lobbying expenditures (gifts, meals, events and other spending on officials), campaign contributions and anything of value reported on the same forms are not included, and it is not money the entity spent on in-house staff it did not report as lobbying compensation. October to December 2026 is not yet filed, so these are not full-year figures.
Sources: Rhode Island Department of State, Lobby Tracker search, 2026 session (registered counts and lists); Rhode Island Department of State, Lobby Tracker entity profiles and 2026 entity activity reports (PDF); Rhode Island Department of State, Lobbying (Open Government Center).
How to read this
Under the Lobbying Reform Act (R.I. Gen. Laws chapter 42-139.1), lobbyists, lobbying firms and the entities that hire them register with the Secretary of State each year and file activity reports; the 2026 reports on file are monthly for January through June and one for July to September. Each registration lists an agreed rate of pay (annual, monthly, hourly or by contract), and each entity report lists the compensation the entity paid in that period, its lobbying expenditures, campaign contributions and anything of value given to officials. The table adds up the compensation on the 3,822 2026 entity reports linked from the 627 entities' profiles on Oct. 28, 2026. Lobbying firms' and lobbyists' own reports are not added, so payments are not counted twice. Agreed rates are not used because they come in different units. Registering to lobby and paying lobbyists is lawful and public; these records do not show that any official acted because of it.
What is not here yet
- Entity reports for the rest of 2026 (after September) are not yet filed; the compensation figures cover January through September 2026 only.
- Lobbying expenditures on the same entity reports are kept apart (expenditures_separate on each row) and never added to compensation; campaign contributions and anything of value on the reports were not totaled.
- Lobbying firms' and individual lobbyists' own activity reports were not downloaded or added up; only entities' reports are counted.
- Amounts are added up as the entities filed them. Some reports list a payment of the same size, on the same or a nearby date, both to a lobbying firm and to a lobbyist who works through that firm; that may be one payment entered twice, and it was not checked with the filers, so a few totals may count the same money twice.
- Only the version of each report linked from the entity's profile on Oct. 28, 2026 was read; earlier versions of amended reports, if any, were not compared.
- Amounts were read from the report PDFs with pdftotext; a line the reader could not match would be left out. The Lobby Tracker gives no machine-readable export of report amounts to check against.
Gaps in the lobbying records as of the date checked.