Mercury Public Affairs

Background

Mercury is a public affairs and lobbying agency owned by Omnicom.¹ Its lobbyists include former high-level staff from Democratic and Republican administrations.²

In 2021, Mercury sued its parent organization, Omnicom, after a former Mercury partner alleged Omnicom mishandled a relationship with a nonprofit tied to Paul Manafort,³ exposing Mercury to reputational and legal risk.⁴ Thirty-two of Mercury’s thirty-four employees in its California office resigned due to the dispute between Mercury and Omnicom.

Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future

In August 2020, several natural gas companies launched Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future, a front group created to improve gas’ climate image among Democratic voters.⁵ Natural Allies hired Mercury Public Affairs and Kivvit, an independent PR firm, to manage the $10 million multi-year campaign. A Natural Allies pamphlet distributed by a utility employee read, “Success for the natural gas industry will be rooted in whether we can message to the left and the Democratic base of Black and Latino and age 18 to 34 voters as effectively as we have messaged to the right.”

In 2020⁷ and 2021, Natural Allies spent nearly its entire operating budget on a public relations contract with Omnicom PR, Mercury’s parent organization.⁸ Mark DuHaime, a Mercury partner who worked closely on the Natural Allies campaign, left Mercury in December 2021⁹ and founded MAD Global Strategy.¹⁰ In 2022, roughly half of Natural Allies’ budget went to Omnicom PR and MAD Global Strategy.¹¹

Mercury Public Affairs’ campaign for Greenidge Power Plant

From 2014 to 2021, Greenidge Generation LLC paid Mercury over $600,000 to lobby in New York.¹² Most of those lobbying costs were incurred from 2014 to 2015 when Greenidge was paying Mercury $20,000 a month¹³ to lobby the Cuomo administration to approve its new gas-fired power plant in Dresden, New York.¹⁴ In 2014, Governor Andrew Cuomo banned fracking and launched an initiative to reduce state emissions by 40 percent by 2030.¹⁵ That year, Atlas Holdings purchased Greenidge Generation, a shuttered coal plant in upstate New York, intending to reopen it as a gas-fired power plant.¹⁶

To make sure the plant’s reopening secured regulatory approval, Greenidge turned to Mercury,¹⁷ which had extensive ties to the Cuomo administration.¹⁸ Mike McKeon, the Mercury partner who led the Greenidge account, had been the executive director of Republicans for Cuomo during the 2010 gubernatorial election and the spokesman for the pro-Cuomo lobbying group Committee to Save New York in 2012.¹⁹ In March 2015, McKeon and Atlas Holdings executives met with the commissioner of the NY State Department of Conservation.²⁰ Atlas Holdings and its two principals, Andrew Bursky and Tim Fazio, each donated $25,000 to Cuomo’s campaign for a total of $75,000.²¹ In August 2015, Greenidge secured a significant victory when the NY State Department of Environmental Conservation determined that the plant’s reopening would not have a substantial adverse environmental impact and therefore waived Greenidge’s environmental impact statement requirement.²² In December 2015, Greenidge won a $2 million development grant from New York State to convert the defunct coal plant into a gas power plant.²³

Though the coal plant had been shut down in 2011 because there was not enough demand in the area to cover its operating costs, Atlas Holdings found a way to make the plant profitable when it began mining Bitcoin in 2020.²⁴ Mercury partner Mike Mckeon defended Greenidge from criticism that the plant’s emissions increased tenfold from 2019 when it started mining Bitcoin.²⁵

Stance on Climate Change

On February 23, 2021, during a presentation to explain the public relations strategy behind the natural gas industry group Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future, Mark DuHaime said:

“Anti fossil fuel groups have really spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to bring – especially the brand of natural gas down, because the coal and oil brand is obviously not the same as natural gas.”

Explains how Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future was formed

Showed how Mercury's campaign increased natural gas favorability in three states

Mercury presented this slide A Vision To Change the Narrative — Mercury Public Affairs partner Mike DuHaime presented with Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future on the Close of Business Tuesday podcast/video series. February 23, 2021.²⁶

Funding

Mercury was one of the top ten highest-paid lobbying firms in New York State in 2016,²⁷ 2018, 2019,²⁸ 2020,²⁹ 2021,³⁰ and 2022.³¹

Key People

Actions

February 1, 2024

Mercury filed documents with the Department of Justice under the Foreign Agents Registration Act detailing its campaign to drum up support for Libya’s National Oil Corporation with U.S. political leaders.³² Mercury lobbied both Democratic and Republican Senate offices as part of its campaign to reassure National Oil Corporation’s foreign partners that it could ramp up production after years of political turmoil in Libya.³³ Mercury also set up a roundtable discussion with the Atlantic Council.

March 14, 2023

Mercury organized a U.S. Senate briefing with the National Oil Corporation’s chairman.³⁴ The Senate Foreign Relations Committee hosted the briefing, which advertised the National Oil Corporation’s determination to increase oil production.

February 21, 2023

Mercury began lobbying for Libya’s National Oil Corporation.³⁵

April 2021

Mercury partner Micheal McKeon³⁶ defended Greenidge Generation LLC as it faced scrutiny from environmental groups after emissions from its gas plant in Dresden increased tenfold from 2019 to 2020.³⁷ McKeon was a spokesman for Greenidge, a power plant operator in upstate New York. When Greenidge reopened Dresden’s defunct coal plant as a gas-powered plant in 2017, New York State waived the requirement to file an environmental impact statement because the new plant would not have a significant adverse environmental impact. However, the Greenidge plant’s emissions rose sharply in 2020 when it began powering a Bitcoin mining operation.

February 23, 2021

Mercury Public Affairs partner Mike DuHaime presented with Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future’s Executive Director Susan Waller on the Close of Business Tuesday podcast and video series.³⁸ On the podcast, DuHaime identified four threats to Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future’s goal of protecting the natural gas industry’s license to operate: anti-fossil fuel campaigns worth hundreds of millions of dollars, state and local climate policies, the Biden administration’s climate policies, and fossil fuel divestment campaigns. To combat these threats, DuHaime explained that Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future sought to position natural gas as different from oil and coal and build support for the natural gas industry among Democrat voters.

“The reality is, there’s been hundreds of millions of dollars spent attacking fossil fuels lately, really bringing down that negative brand – really bringing the brand down negatively – natural gas was very high in terms of what the public thought of it,” DuHaime said during the podcast.³⁹

Slide from presentation Natural Gas' Hostile Geopolitical Environment — Mercury Public Affairs partner Mike DuHaime presented this slide on the Close of Business Tuesday podcast/video series on February 23, 2021.⁴⁰

January 2021

Natural gas is accelerating or clean energy future, Natural allies ad — Source: Meta Ad Library⁴¹

Natural gas emits fewer pollutants & 50 percent less carbon dioxide than coal — Source: Meta Ad Library⁴²

Mercury Public Affairs launched a “large-scale, multi state media campaign to change the conversation” about natural gas’ climate impacts.⁴³

November 2020

Source: Meta Ad Library.⁴⁴

Mercury Public Affairs wrapped up a six-week ad campaign for Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future.⁴⁵ The advertisements described natural gas as “clean” and ran in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Texas. Mercury conducted polling after the initial campaign and found that positive perceptions of natural gas increased by 32% among 18-34-year-olds who had seen the ads.⁴⁶ Mercury later wrote about the campaign: “Natural Allies was particularly focused on determining what messages might resonate with key elements of the Democratic party’s base.”

Through a records request to Municipal Gas of Georgia, the Energy and Policy Institute obtained a Natural Allies pamphlet describing the findings from Mercury’s post-campaign polling.⁴⁷ The pamphlet said Natural Allies found that Black voters were most receptive to its ads saying natural gas was more affordable.⁴⁸ “Black voters also register lower support for the Green New Deal when informed of the practical effects of such policies on energy affordability and reliability,” read the pamphlet.