Hundreds of groups spent a combined $28.2 million lobbying the Kentucky General Assembly in 2025, making it the fourth consecutive year of record-breaking spending to influence state lawmakers in Frankfort.
The record-breaking amount slightly eclipsed the previous record for lobbying spending set in 2024, despite last year having a short 30-day legislative session instead of the 60-day budget session on even-numbered years.
For the ninth time in the past 11 years, the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce led all of the 917 groups that reported lobbying spending in 2025, according to filings submitted to the Kentucky Legislative Ethics Commission.
The statewide business advocacy group reported spending just shy of half a million dollars to influence Frankfort lawmakers last year, with nearly all of that directed to its 14 registered lobbyists.
Some of the chamber’s top priority bills made their way to passage in the 2025 session, including ones cutting the state’s individual income tax rate from 4% to 3.5% at the beginning of 2026, making it easier for Kentucky to hit tax cut triggers in future years, and rolling back enforcement of any state worker safety regulations.
Placing far behind the chamber with the second most lobbying spending among groups in 2025 — and for the second consecutive year — was the Kentucky Hospital Association, with $289,042.
The hospital advocacy group unsuccessfully lobbied during the session for a bill to allow facilities to receive drugs from pharmaceutical manufacturers at a lower cost, but then faced a larger setback over the summer in Congress. The KHA heavily opposed the final version of the “Big Beautiful Bill” heralded by President Donald Trump and Republicans, arguing cuts to Medicaid and direct payments to hospitals would “devastate” health care in Kentucky, potentially causing hospital closures and the loss of 20,000 jobs.
The hospital group lobbied Frankfort lawmakers over the summer on the same state-directed Medicaid reimbursement program for hospitals that was cut by Congress, ahead of the 2026 session where Frankfort lawmakers are crafting a state budget for the next two years.
The KHA was one of six health care or medical-related groups to make up the top 10 lobbying spenders last year, including:
- HCA Healthcare, which owns hospitals in Frankfort and Bowling Green
- Humana, a Louisville health insurance company with a Medicaid managed care contract
- Kentucky Primary Care Association, which advocates for primary care providers
- Kentucky Medical Association, which advocates for physicians
- Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, a trade group of pharmaceutical companies
The final lobbying reports for 2025 that were filed in January document spending over the final four months of the year. These reports show groups continued spending a large majority of their funds on lobbyist compensation, but also included a few groups spending high amounts on either entertainment for legislators or public polling on their issues.
The University of Louisville reported spending $21,753 on tickets and receptions for legislators at the school’s football and basketball games against the University of Kentucky in November. The university reported spending nearly $32,000 on events for state lawmakers throughout 2025, ranking first among all groups in that category.
Danny Wimmer Presents — a national music festival company that holds the annual Bourbon & Beyond and Louder Than Life festivals in Louisville — also reported spending on legislators. The company spent $9,450 on tickets and entertainment for members of the General Assembly at both festivals in Kentucky last year.
These Kentucky festivals occurred a few months after the General Assembly passed a bill to allow multiday music festivals with more than 60,000 attendees to recoup half of the state sales tax revenue generated on their admissions, food and drink. The only annual Kentucky events that currently fit that category are Bourbon & Beyond and Louder Than Life.
The third-largest lobbying spender among all groups in the final four months of 2025 was Nature Conservancy, a land conservation advocacy group that rarely places high among lobbying spenders in Frankfort.
Nature Conservancy ranked so high due to spending nearly $40,000 in September on a public opinion poll “related to funding for conservation in Kentucky,” according to the ethics commission. The group did not respond to an inquiry about its poll, but reported lobbying on issues related to conservation, land use, easements and “the state budget/appropriations.”
Here is a list of the top 10 lobbying spenders from 2025, according to the ethics commission filings.
- Kentucky Chamber of Commerce — $493,391.12
- Kentucky Hospital Association — $289,042.44
- LG&E and KU — $172,986.60
- HCA Healthcare — $156,648.00
- Kentucky League of Cities — $152,807.17
- Humana — $152,386.75
- Kentucky Primary Care Association — $145,442.29
- Kentucky Medical Association — $138,041.07
- Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America — $137,261.77
- Greater Louisville, Inc. — $135,695.82
