Last summer, after Firestone recalled defective tires linked to more than 100 deaths, Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) proposed a bill requiring jail time for auto manufacturers and car dealers who deliberately conceal dangerous defects. The measure was approved unanimously by the Commerce Committee, but never made it to the Senate floor. Under intense lobbying by the transportation industry, the bill fell victim to anonymous holds in the Senate. Instead, Congress approved what consumer advocates consider a much weaker bill -- one which absolves car dealers of responsibility for reporting defects.

While McCain's measure stalled in the Senate, auto dealers were busy steering large contributions to elected officials and their parties. During the last election, dealers and their trade associations contributed $8.5 million to candidates for federal office. Donors from three of the industry's four most generous dealerships made the Mother Jones 400: Bert Boeckmann of Galpin Motors (No. 78, $384,000), Cortright Wetherill Jr. of Devon Hill Motors (No. 146, $288,550), and Jim Click Jr. of Jim Click Automotive (No. 198, $255,950).

Transportation has a political agenda that mirrors that of other major industries. The "outstanding priority" among car dealers, according to industry spokesmen, is repealing the estate tax, which currently cuts into inherited businesses valued at more than $1.3 million. "We will not quit until the death tax is killed," says Lori Barnes of the American International Automobile Dealers Association.

Given that Clinton vetoed a repeal of the tax last year, dealers had no doubt about which party to back. "We support a Congress who we would consider pro-business," says Mike Morrissey of the National Automobile Dealers Association. "We'd like to see the estate tax repealed completely, which is the more Republican outlook."

Like other industries, transportation also wants the GOP to strike down new federal standards designed to protect workers from repetitive-motion injuries on the job, and to support "tort reform" measures that would limit corporate liability for defective products. Ironically, auto dealers are also crusading for Senate Bill 1020, which would allow them to settle legal disputes with auto manufacturers in court rather than through mandatory arbitration.

While most executives in the transportation industry supported the GOP, a few sided with the Democrats. Sandra Wagenfeld (No. 114, $313,850) is an officer of ABS Partnership, a manufacturer of muffler systems that bring older planes in line with current noise standards. The European Union has banned planes outfitted with the so-called "hush kits," a regulation likely to hurt ABS if it is implemented as scheduled in 2002. Saying the ban represented an "unfair trade practice," President Clinton went to bat against the ban. On October 27, 1999, he met in the Oval Office with the president of the chief policy-making body of the European Union, lobbying his guest to permit the sale of hush kits. That same day, Wagenfeld and her business partner, Francine Goldstein (No. 259, $208,000), each wrote a check for $50,000 earmarked for Hillary Clinton's Senate campaign -- reportedly the First Lady's largest contribution at the time.

Wagenfeld and Goldstein, both executives of another company called Aviation Products Management, live together on a $4.7 million estate in Westport, Connecticut. All told, the two women gave $521,850 to the Democratic Party and its candidates during the last election cycle. Wagenfeld insists that she expects no favors in return, telling reporters that she and Goldstein just want to "help good Democrats get elected."