Inside Exxon’s Covert Plan to Redefine Recycling

ExxonMobil is waging a sophisticated campaign of misdirection to weaken regulations on the processing of plastic waste into new industrial feedstocks and fuels, confidential documents obtained by Fieldnotes reveal. In the past two years, the oil giant has:

• concealed its work behind a new industry front group, the Recycling Leadership Council;
• quietly enlisted the support of some of the world’s largest companies—including via an apparent quid pro quo with major pesticide manufacturers; and
• obscured its intent with legislative sleight of hand in a bill it “[d]eveloped and championed.”

Exxon’s goal is to vastly expand the federal definition of recycling to include what the oil major has branded “advanced recycling,” a suite of energy-intensive and environmentally hazardous technologies that use extreme heat and chemical reactions to break down plastic waste into its molecular building blocks. In theory, those molecules can be used to make new plastic; in reality, that has yet to happen on any meaningful scale. Nonetheless, Exxon and other industry interests have long hailed chemical recycling as a solution to the global plastic waste crisis, using the promise of “circularity” tomorrow to forestall limits or outright bans on plastic production today.

In an apparent attempt to conceal its role in pushing for the change, Exxon quietly turned to a Beltway firm that specializes in recruiting industry lobbies to join cross-industry coalitions, according to internal documents of one of the groups Exxon convinced to join the effort. The result was the Recycling Leadership Council (RLC), which has been the public face of the influence campaign and is nominally led by the Consumer Brands Association, which represents Coca-Cola, Pepsi, General Mills, and other processed food manufacturers. Other powerful lobbies representing Amazon, Apple, Costco, GM, Toyota, Uber, and Walmart have likewise joined the council, giving the impression of broad support. But while RLC bills itself as a group of “leaders from manufacturing, packaging, and recycling,” it obscures its ties to Exxon—which is a member of at least seven of the council’s 16 member-groups, according to an analysis of federal tax filings and other industry documents.

Exxon’s recruitment efforts have involved an apparent quid pro quo on at least one occasion, with the company agreeing to conduct a private pilot project on its petrochemical campus in Baytown, Texas, to process hard-to-dispose-of hazardous pesticide containers, while the leading agrochemical corporations agreed to advocate for Exxon’s position on recycling. The deal was approved by executives at Bayer, Syngenta, and other ag mega-corps and is subject to a non-disclosure agreement, according to confidential meeting notes and other material from the Ag Container Recycling Council, which ultimately joined RLC after Exxon’s outreach.

RLC’s ongoing efforts have also been backed by a pair of dark-money “centrist” groups, the Progressive Policy Institute and Center Forward, both of which have significant ties to Exxon. The former has received direct funding from the oil giant. The latter, previously known as the Blue Dog Research Forum, was co-founded by two men who previously ran FTI Consulting, which conducted corporate influence campaigns on behalf of Exxon and other oil & gas interests. In addition, Center Forward’s advisory board includes a lobbyist whose firm was recently hired directly by RLC, according to federal lobbying records.

Exxon is pushing to redefine chemical recycling nationally via the Recycled Materials Attribution Act (HR 7502), for which the oil giant is spending aggressively to lobby lawmakers. The bill's stated objective is to prevent companies from making a "misleading recycled content claim"; in reality, it would greatly expand what they could label as recycling. The legislation extends the definition to include “non-mechanical” technologies such as pyrolysis and other forms of solid waste management. And it also allows for a controversial accounting scheme known as “mass balance,” which lets companies claim specific products are made from recycled plastic even if they’re not. Exxon “[d]eveloped and championed” the bill, according to ACRC material.

The legislative sleight of hand mirrors a change proposed by the U.S. EPA earlier this year that would reclassify chemical recycling as manufacturing—which the agency buried in a rulemaking on an entirely different category of waste incineration. Lobbyists for Exxon and other petrochemical companies met with EPA officials weeks before it released its proposal, visitor logs show. Similarly, communications obtained via public records request show that Exxon previously helped state regulators write a similar rule in Louisiana.

The RLC influence campaign remains active.

• On July 9, 2026, RLC announced a “six-figure ad buy” in support of RMAA. The ads were designed to reach ten members of Congress—seven of whom already back the bill and three of whom the group is hoping to convince to sign on: Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-KY), Sen. Todd Young (R-IN), and Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV).
• On July 22, 2026, CBA vice president John Hewitt testified in support of RMAA on behalf of RLC before a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee.
• On July 30, 2026, the Buffalo News published a letter to the editor from CBA’s Hewitt in support of RMAA—the latest in a series of LTEs placed in local newspapers by Hewitt.
• On August 30, 2026, RLC renewed its call for passage of RMA ahead of a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee markup of the bill.

This investigation is based on confidential meeting minutes and slides from ACRC, IRS tax filings, federal lobbying disclosures, EPA visitor logs, and emails between lobbyists and state regulators obtained via public records, among other material.

ACRC did not dispute the findings of this investigation. “That information is confidential and so I’m not at liberty to comment on it," Mark Hudson told Fieldnotes. "The only thing that I can say is that what is public information is that we are a member of RLC.” Neither Exxon nor Consumer Brands responded to requests for comment—nor did the bill’s author, Rep. Nick Langworthy (R-NY) or any of its 13 co-sponsors.

While Consumer Brands Association (CBA) is listed as the public contact for the Recycling Leadership Council, industry documents show that Exxon was involved long before the council officially launched on January 15, 2026. Confidential meeting notes and other material from the Ag Container Recycling Council (ACRC) show Exxon was recruiting industry allies in the fall of 2024 and continued to be active in the years that followed.

At ACRC’s executive board meeting in Charleston, S.C., in early February 2025, ACRC executive director Mark Hudson first informed members about his ongoing conversations with Exxon. In November 2024, Exxon had “reached out to me through a lobbying group called Monument Advocacy to learn more about ACRC and how we might work together,” according to slides that accompanied his presentation. And in January 2025, Hudson had a “good call with Exxon and Monument about our mutual interest in advanced recycling.”

“Our interest is in them helping us to evaluate the suitability of py[rolisis] oil made from ACRC plastic, as a feedstock to downstream petrochemical cracking units,” the Feb. 2025 slide reads. “Their interest is in our ag chem industry helping advocate for advanced recycling as a recycling technology.”

Hudson delivered the same message while speaking to his group’s technical committee the day before, according to minutes of that meeting “ACRC and ExxonMobil (through lobbying group Monument Advocacy) are in conversations on how to work together for mutual benefit,” the document reads.

Hudson continued to update ACRC members about his discussions with Exxon, which remained ongoing as of the group’s meeting in February 2026. Slides from that meeting show that the Recycling Materials Attribution Act (RMAA) was “[d]eveloped and championed by ExxonMobil,” which was working with Monument Advocacy and Invariant, two government affairs firms. The slides likewise suggest Exxon’s original outreach led directly to RLC.

Further confirming Exxon’s original efforts evolved into RLC:

• Invariant, which Exxon worked with on RMMA, registered to lobby for RLC on Nov. 1, 2025. (Invariant continued to lobby for RLC through Feb. 16, 2026, at which point RLC changed lobbyists to the S-3 Group.)
• Metadata on several RLC documents, ostensibly developed by Consumer Brands, similarly show the material was created in part or in whole by Invariant lobbyists.

Monument Advocacy boasts online of “build[ing] coalitions from A-to-Z” and offers clients “Third-Party Identification & Mobilization,” among other services. Monument describes its coalition-building work like so:

Coalition management work includes recruiting and vetting members, drafting governance and messaging documents, running regular member calls and strategy meetings, producing collateral and Hill materials, coordinating direct advocacy and media activity, and managing the budget.

Monument Advocacy was previously registered to lobby for Consumer Brands between Jan, 1, 2020 and June 30, 2025, during which time CBA paid the firm a total of $1.02 million. However, Monument has never registered to lobby for Exxon or RLC. Similarly, Monument does not include Exxon among the 45 entities it lists as clients on its website, nor does it list RLC among the ten coalitions it has built and managed.

The Recycling Leadership Council formally launched on January 15, 2026, under the nominal leadership of Consumer Brands, a long-time ally of Exxon. The council describes itself like so:

The Recycling Leadership Council (RLC) is a cross-industry coalition committed to reducing plastic waste and advancing practical, bipartisan solutions to increase U.S. recycling capabilities. Led by the Consumer Brands Association (CBA), the RLC brings together leaders from manufacturing, packaging, and recycling to serve as the unified national voice pushing for the policies and clarity needed to improve recycling outcomes across the country.

While RLC largely avoids mentioning “advanced recycling” in its public-facing materials, its federal lobbying disclosures reveal that is its focus. The council spent $140,000 during the first six months of this year, all of which pushed chemical recycling in general and RMAA in particular.

• 2026 Q2 via S3 Group: $20,000: “Issues pertaining to advanced recycling”
• 2026 Q1 via S3 Group: $20,000: “Issues pertaining to advanced recycling”
• 2026 Q1 via Invariant: $100,000: “Discuss issues related to the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) Green Guides and consumer labeling. Support the Recycled Materials Attribution Act of 2026 (H.R. 7502).”

RLC also previously spent $80,000 via Invariant in the final three months of 2025 on “issues related to the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) Green Guides and consumer labeling.”

(Note: Consumer Brands had previously run a coalition under the same RLC name; that group, however, does not appear in federal tax filings or in lobbying disclosures.)

RLC currently lists 16 member organizations, creating the impression of broad support. But Exxon has direct ties to half of those groups—including recent leadership positions in the five with the most financial resources.

RLC members with explicit ties to Exxon

1. Consumer Brands Association (2024 revenue: $37.4MM) Exxon is one of CBA’s two “CPG Industry Champions,” a distinction given to companies that are “the top supporters of Consumer Brands and work with us on long-term initiatives.”
   1. The other is PricewaterhouseCoopers, or PwC, which among other things, prepares reports on behalf of CBA touting the consumer-goods industry’s economic impact.
2. American Chemistry Council (2024 revenue: $186.1MM): Exxon is a member of ACC and Exxon executive Matt Crocker sits on ACC’s board of directors. Exxon is also a member of ACC’s plastics division, which has a standalone presence as America's Plastic Makers, which has also publicly advocated for RMAA.
3. Plastics Industry Association (2024 revenue: $58.6MM): Exxon is a member of PIA. The group does not publicly list its current board of directors, but Exxon executives have previously held a number of leadership positions within the group, including as vice chair of the group's Recycling Committee in 2023 (Melanie Bower).
4. American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (2024 revenue: $51.7MM): Exxon is a member of AFPM and Exxon’s Tanya Bryja sits on AFPM’s executive committee.
5. Vinyl Institute (2024 revenue: $10.2MM): Exxon is a member and Exxon’s Frederik Donkers was on its board of directors in 2024, the most recent year for which info about the board is available.
6. National Lubricant Container Recycling Coalition (2024 revenue: N/A): Exxon is a member and Exxon’s Thejas Srinivasan is on its board of directors.
7. Household & Commercial Products Association (2024 revenue: $7.5MM): Exxon is a member.
8. Ag Container Recycling Council (2024 revenue: $8.9MM): Exxon directly recruited ACRC to join the effort with a quid pro quo, ACRC documents show.

Remaining RLC members

9. Alliance for Automotive Innovation (2024 revenue: $30.4MM)
10. Retail Industry Leaders Association (2024 revenue: $22.4MM)
11. Meat Institute (2024 revenue: $16.8MM)
12. Council for Responsible Nutrition (2024 revenue: $7.4MM)
13. North American Association of Food Equipment Manufacturers (2024 revenue: $2.1MM)
14. Printing United Alliance (2024 revenue: $21.4MM)
15. International Sleep Products Association (2024 revenue: $11.2MM)
16. American Circular Textiles (Not registered with the IRS; is a “registered assumed name” of Circular Services Group II, LLC.)

Exxon’s ability to shield its involvement is illustrated by the original press release for the RMAA bill, issued by its sponsor, Rep. Nick Langworthy (R-NY). Langworthy’s release does not mention Exxon and instead quotes three industry groups, all of which Exxon is directly involved with: the RLC, which Exxon helped launch; America’s Plastic Makers (itself a project of ACC), of which Exxon is a member, and Consumer Brands, of which Exxon is a top ally.

Exxon’s ability to shield its involvement is illustrated by the original press release for the RMAA bill issued by its sponsor, Rep. Nick Langworthy (R-NY). Langworthy’s release does not mention Exxon and instead quotes three industry groups, all of which Exxon is directly involved with: the RLC, which Exxon helped launch; America’s Plastic Makers (itself a project of ACC), of which Exxon is a member, and Consumer Brands, of which Exxon is a top ally.

ACRC is made up of 78 member companies, including the four corporations that dominate the global pesticide market: Syngenta, Bayer, Corteva, and BASF. ACRC is a spinoff of CropLife America, the leading agrochemical trade lobby.

An abbreviated timeline of the quid pro quo, as described in minutes and slides for meetings of ACRC’s Executive Board and its Technical Committee:

• November 2024: Exxon reaches out to ACRC to discuss how the two “might work together.” The introduction was facilitated by Monument Advocacy, a DC lobby shop that boasts of “build[ing] coalitions from A-to-Z” and “Third-Party Identification & Mobilization.”
• January 2025: ACRC executive Mark Hudson has a “good call” with Exxon about advanced recycling, during which the outlines of the quid pro quo begin to take shape. During the call, which Hudson recounted at an ACRC meeting the following month, he shared ACRC’s interest in Exxon evaluating the “suitability” of using ag-container plastic in advanced recycling, and Exxon shared its desire for the “ag chem industry helping advocate for advanced recycling as a recycling technology.”
• Feb. 3, 2025: ACRC’s Hudson proposes a motion to ACRC’s Technical Committee: “If requested, ACRC will allow unwashed and/or washed program plastic to be sent to ExxonMobil in small or large quantities (TL) for further pilot evaluation of suitability for AR feedstock.” The motion passes, as confirmed in minutes from the next meeting.
• Feb. 7, 2025: ACRC’s Hudson has a call “directly with Exxon AR business unit.”
• May 12, 2025: ACRC signs an non-disclosure agreement with Exxon “to engage in information exchange, sampling and potential trials” regarding using ACRC plastic as “feedstock to downstream petrochemical cracking units.”
• May 20, 2025: ACRC’s Hudson confirms that ACRC members previously confirmed their respective organizations are in agreement that “Chemical / Advanced Recycling makes sense for our industry as a secondary recycling technology, only after mechanical recycling” and “to support advocacy for Chemical / Advanced recycling.” A note on Hudson’s slide adds: “this may not involve significant investment, but potentially a willingness to partner with ExxonMobil, ACC, or others.” The member-signoff action item was marked “COMPLETE - no objection from members.”

• May 21, 2025: ACRC’s Hudson informs the executive board of his internal goal of “large scale pilot testing by Exxon (supersacks or greater)” by the end of September 2025 and “approval for commercial volumes by Exxon” by the end of the year.
• Feb. 2, 2026: ACRC’s Hudson informs the Technical Committee that the group remains in “[a]ctive conversations” with Exxon regarding advanced recycling.
• Feb. 3, 2026: ACRC’s Hudson makes explicit to the executive committee that the goal is to pass RMAA, which was “[d]eveloped and championed” by Exxon along with Monument Advocacy and Invariant. Among the direct benefits to ACRC members are a legal shield “from lawsuits for compliant claims.”

In the same presentation, Hudson also shares his Q2 goal for this year: “Maintain advocacy coalition support for advanced recycling legislation.”

Exxon is pushing to redefine chemical recycling via the Recycled Materials Attribution Act (HR 7502), for which the oil giant and its allies have spent aggressively to lobby lawmakers.

The bill's stated objective is to prevent companies from making a "misleading recycled content claim"; in reality, it would greatly expand what they could label as recycling. The legislation extends the definition to include “non-mechanical” technologies such as pyrolysis and other forms of solid waste management. And it also allows for a controversial accounting scheme known as “mass balance,” which lets companies claim specific products are made from recycled plastic even if they’re not.

• The bill’s stated goal is to “prohibit a person from making a misleading recycled content claim in advertising, marketing, selling, or offering for sale a product to a consumer, and for other purposes.”
• The terms “advanced recycling,” “molecular recycling,” or “chemical recycling” do not appear in the text of the legislation.
• Instead, the bill greatly broadens the definition of recycling to include any process whereby “a material is collected, sorted, cleaned, and transformed through technology that alters the chemical structure of the material and that produces an output used to manufacture products.”
• The bill would also preempt any state or city effort to regulate chemical recycling.

That legislative sleight of hand is similar to a change proposed by the U.S. EPA earlier this year that would reclassify chemical recycling as manufacturing—which the agency buried in a rulemaking on an entirely different category of waste incineration. Lobbyists for Exxon and other petrochemical companies met with EPA officials the month before it released its proposal, visitor logs show. On Feb. 10, 2026, the following individuals signed in together at EPA-HQ:

1. Kellie Alvarado — Anchor Packaging, Director of Sustainability
2. Melanie Bower — ExxonMobil, Regulatory Development Manager, Plastics Circularity
3. Eloissa Wells — ExxonMobil, Global Director of Circular Products
4. Glenn Mersky — Coperion, Sales Manager, Recycling
5. Mariane Maximous — Lyondell Basell, VP, Americas Feedstocks and Mechanical Recycling
6. Tamsin Ettefagh — PureCycle Tech, Chief Sustainability Officer, VP of Government Affairs
7. Carla Toth — Nexus Circular, SVP Corporate Strategy and Regulatory Advocacy
8. Zach Muscato — Plastics Ingenuity, Director of Sustainability and Innovation
9. Chris Rager — Plastics Industry Association, VP, Government Affairs
10. Patrick Krieger — Plastics Industry Association, Senior VP, Sustainability and Policy
11. Hodayah Finman — Plastics Industry Association, Senior Director for Regulatory Affairs
12. Colleen Tague — Dow, Global Director of Public Policy and Plastics/Circularity
13. Michael Blume — SABIC, Senior Specialist, Government Relations

On March 20, 2026, EPA posted a 17-page notice in the Federal Register for a proposed rule on wood incineration; just one paragraph related to advanced recycling.

Similarly, communications obtained via public records request show that Exxon previously helped state regulators write a similar rule in Louisiana.

On July 22 of this year, Hewitt testified in support of RMAA before a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee. Notably, Hewitt did not use the term “advanced recycling” in either his oral or written opening statement, instead referring only to “innovative non-mechanical [recycling] technologies.” It wasn’t until the end of the two-plus hour hearing that Hewitt used the “advanced recycling” terminology—and then only after one of RMAA’s Democratic co-sponsors, Rep. Marc Veasey of Texas, used the term in his question to Hewitt.

At least two other related industry-backed recycling bills are also currently winding their way through Congress—both of which were introduced by RMAA co-sponsors. Like RMAA, each would codify industry’s preferred definitions into federal law:

• Rep. Randy Weber’s (R-TX) Packaging Claims and Knowledge Act would broadly define terms like “recyclable” at the federal level, which would supersede stricter state definitions.
• Rep. Dan Crenshaw’s (R-TX) Recycling Technology Innovation Act (H.R. 6566) would redefine advanced recycling as manufacturing instead of solid waste management, thereby weakening the Clean Air Act regulations to which it’s subject.

Industry has publicly hailed the former and RMAA as "complementary legislative solutions” and privately described the latter as RMAA “companion legislation.”

Exxon, American Chemistry Council, and Consumer Brands reported spending a total of more than $16 million on federal lobbying during the first six months of 2026. While the disclosures do not specify exactly how much of that was spent specifically pushing for RMAA, the forms make clear the legislation was among their top priorities.

ExxonMobil (total 2026 lobbying to date: $5.88MM)

Q2 total: $2.16MM

• $1.85MM on in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA
• $50K lobbying via Empire Consulting Group, entirely on “HR 7502-Recycled Materials Attribution Act (RMAA)”
• $20K lobbying via Harbinger Strategies, including on "Advanced recycling technologies."
• $30K lobbying via Penn Avenue Partners, including specifically on RMAA.
  • ($210K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

Q1 total: $3.72MM

• $3.4MM on in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA.
  • The most money Exxon spent on lobbying in any quarter since Q1 2017.
• $50K lobbying via Empire Consulting Group, including on "Advanced Recycling."
• $30K lobbying via Penn Avenue Partners, including specifically on RMAA.
• $20K lobbying via Harbinger Strategies, including on "Advanced recycling technologies."
  • ($220K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

American Chemistry Council (total 2026 lobbying to date: $7.22MM)

Q2 total: $2.96MM

• $2.57MM on in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA.
• $130K lobbying via Holland & Knight, including specifically on RMMA
• $110K lobbying via Mehlman Consulting, including specifically on RMAA.
  • ($150K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

Q1 total: $4.26MM

• $3.76MM on in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA.
• $130K lobbying via Holland & Knight, including specifically on RMMA
• $110K lobbying via Mehlman Consulting, including on "issues related to advanced recycling."
  • ($260K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

Consumer Brands Association (total 2026 lobbying to date: $2.93MM)

Q2 total: $1.55MM

• $1.29MM via in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA.
• $50K via S-3 Group, including on "Consumer packaged goods and sustainability and recyclability of packaged goods."
  • ($210K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

Q1 total: $1.38MM

• $1.12MM via in-house lobbying, including specifically on RMAA.
• $50K via S-3 Group, including on "Consumer packaged goods and sustainability and recyclability of packaged goods."
  • ($210K via other firms which did not mention advanced recycling.)

RLC’s page offers links to ten “resources” on its website—seven are RLC-branded material (written at least in part by Invariant lobbyists), one is a Consumer Brands blog post, and the final two are pro-chemical recycling reports from dark-money “centrist” groups, the Progressive Policy Institute and Center Forward, both of which have significant ties to Exxon.

• Center Forward’s “Advanced Recycling Technologies and the Future of Plastic Waste Management,” which was published in March 2026.
• PPI’s "The Waste Diversion: Benefits of Expanding," authored by PPI vice president Stuart Malec, was published in May 2026.

PPI received $50,000 from Exxon in 2018 via its parent organization, the Third Way Foundation. PPI has also published the work of Keith Belton, a contributing writer at the institute whose day job is as a senior director at the American Chemistry Council, of which Exxon is a member. In 2013, PPI declared Exxon its No. 1 “Investment Hero” in the U.S. energy sector. (During his testimony before a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee in July 2026, Hewitt specifically cited PPI’s work.)

Center Forward, previously known as the Blue Dog Research Forum, was co-founded by former Rep. Robert “Bud” Cramer and his former chief of staff, Jeff Murray, both of whom sit on its board of directors. The two men were previously managing directors at FTI Consulting, which conducted corporate influence campaigns on behalf of Exxon and other oil & gas interests. In addition, Center Forward’s advisory board includes Kate Dickens, a lobbyist whose firm, S-3 Group, was hired directly by RLC, according to federal lobbying records.

More recently, RMAA has also drawn support from a pair of dark-money “free-market” groups with ties to the oil, gas, and petrochemical industry. National Taxpayers Union (NTU) vice president of federal affairs Tommy Aiello appeared on the conservative “Powering America” podcast on August 11 to advocate for advanced recycling generally and RMAA in specific. Exxon reported giving between $10.000 and $25,000 to the NTF in 2023, the last year the oil giant detailed its payments to trade groups and think tanks.

Also on August 11 of this year, Consumer Action for a Strong Economy (CASE) similarly called for Congress to pass RMAA. CASE is run by Matthew Kandrach and Gerard Scimeca, both of whom previously worked at 60 Plus Association, a "seniors advocacy group" that was backed by the Koch brothers and other fossil fuel interests.

RMAA (HR 7502) was introduced in the House on Feb. 11, 2026 by Rep. Nicholas Langworthy (R-NY). It had nine original co-sponsors, split roughly between the parties.

Author: Rep. Nicholas Langworthy (R-NY)

Original Republican co-sponsors:

• Rep. Dan Crenshaw (TX)
• Rep. August Pfluger (TX)
• Rep. Randy Weber (TX)
• Rep. Gabe Evans (CO)

Original Democratic co-sponsors:

• Rep. Marc Veasey (TX)
• Rep. Henry Cuellar (TX)
• Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (TX)
• Rep. Donald Davis (NC)
• Rep. Jonathan Jackson (IL)

Four additional Republicans have become co-sponsors in the past several months: Rep. Troy Balderson (OH), who signed on on May 12; Reps. Jeff Hurd (CO) and Addison McDowell (NC), both of whom signed on June 3; and Rep. Michael Lawler (R-NY), who added his name on Aug. 31.