The Louisville Courier-Journal reports that the president of the Kentucky State Senate, David Williams, held a luncheon with 80 attendees, with about half of them lobbyists. At this luncheon, he encouraged the lobbyists to raise money--with a goal of up to $50,000 per person--to elect Republicans to the State Senate:

None of this would be a problem, really, if it weren't such an attempt to skirt the law. As the article notes, lobbyists cannot give to a candidate's campaign or the Senate Republican Caucus Committee, but they can give to the Senate Trust, and their clients can give to the Trust as well as the Caucus Committee, who in turn fund candidates--thus, the law is bypassed through a process that bears more than a passing similarity to money laundering.