Meet the 16 people inside the Beltway who are closest to Bill Shuster.

Eric Burgeson
Chief of Staff, Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa.
A former chief of staff for Rep. Robert Dold, R-Ill., Burgeson now plays the same role for Bill Shuster. He was previously chief of staff at the Engery Department.

Chris Bertram
Majority Staff Director
Bertram became the staff director of the Transportation Committee when Shuster took the helm, coming straight from the Transportation Department, where he drafted the administration’s infrastructure budget plans. Now he gets to react to those budgets.

Stephen Martinko
Majority Deputy Staff Director
Martinko, the longest-serving aide on Shuster’s Washington team, has been chief of staff in Shuster’s personal office, deputy chief of staff, legislative director, and a legislative assistant on the Railroads Subcommittee that Shuster chaired. He has also worked for the House Republican Conference.

Kelley Halliwell
Deputy Chief of Staff, Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa.
Halliwell has held senior positions in Shuster’s office for five years, including as director of public affairs and scheduling. She also worked for former Reps. Joel Hefley, R-Colo., and Cliff Stearns, R-Fla.

Jeff Loveng
Partner, SBL Strategies
Loveng stepped down as Shuster’s personal office chief of staff in 2010 to start his own consulting firm, Vandor Strategies. As Shuster’s top aide during the last three election cycles, Loveng was the office’s pragmatist and patriarch.

Alex Mistri
Managing Director, Glover Park Group
Mistri is another former chief of staff for Shuster who left that job to work at the White House under President Bush in 2005. Before moving to the Glover Park Group, he spent 15 months at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

Mike Rock
Vice President, External Relations, Union Pacific Railroad
Rock is a former legislative aide to Shuster’s father, Bud Shuster, who has also worked at the Transportation Department under former Transportation Secretary Sam Skinner. He will be a key contact for Bill Shuster on passenger-rail reauthorization.

Nick Calio
President and CEO, Airlines 4 America
Calio met Shuster when he first came to Congress and Calio was head of the White House Legislative Affairs Office under President Bush.They share a birthday and a number of mutual interests.

Jeff Soth
Legislative and Political Director, International Union of Operating Engineers
Soth is one of the industry stakeholders who has participated in the Transportation Committee’s roundtables on the Water Resources Development Act, which deals directly with the activities of the Army Corps of Engineers.

Bill Graves
President and CEO,American Trucking Associations
The former governor of Kansas and a longtime trucker, Graves has been heavily involved in highway-related issues for decades and is acquainted with both the elder and younger Shusters. He has called Bill Shuster “a great friend to the trucking industry.”

Ed Hamberger
President and CEO, Association of American Railroads
Hamberger worked for Shuster’s dad, Bud Shuster, as special counsel when the elder Shuster chaired the National Transportation Policy Study Commission. He also was assistant secretary for governmental affairs at the Transportation Department.

Jack Schenendorf
Of Counsel, Covington & Burling LLP
Schenendorf spent more than 25 years as a staffer on the House Transportation Committee and was Chairman Bud Shuster’s chief of staff from 1995 to 2001. He was named “Lawyer of the Year” for transportation in the 2013 Best Lawyers in America.

Jim Brewer
International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT)
Brewer is a longtime union activist who came to IUPAT from North Carolina working for the state affiliate of the National Education Association. He lobbies now on behalf of workers in the commercial and industrial painting and drywall industry.

Robert Shuster
Shareholder, Buchanan, Ingersoll & Rooney
Bob is Bill Shuster’s brother, who also happens to be a legal specialist in transportation and infrastructure. Bill Shuster likes to say that in referring to himself, his brother, or his father, Bud, “you get BS no matter what.”

John Sullivan
Partner, SBL Strategies
A former member of Congress, Sullivan and Shuster served on the GOP leaders’ whip team together. Sullivan also worked on the Cement Sector Regulatory Relief Act of 2011, intended to reduce the costs of cement for producers.

Jeff Shoaf
Senior Executive Director, Government and Public Affairs, Associated General Contractors of America
Shoaf is a longtime associate of Shuster’s who specializes in public-private partnerships and was among the lobbyists willing to publicly criticize fiscal conservatives who wanted to cut government infrastructure programs beyond what was necessary before the 2012 highway bill passed.

Barry Schoch
Secretary, Pennsylvania Department of Transportation
Schoch has played a key role in most of the pending or completed transportation projects in Pennsylvania for the past three decades. He knows the Shuster family well.

Mary Peters
Former Transportation Secretary
Now a consultant, Peters was Transportation Secretary from 2006 to 2009 under President Bush. She served as head of the Federal Highway Administration from 2001 to 2005. Peters began her Washington tenure at the same time as Shuster.

John Tolman
National Legislative Representative, Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen
Tolman is a big rail guy, which means his input will be key during the committee’s passenger-rail reauthorization. He started work as a railroad hostler in 1971 and his brother was an Amtrak yardmaster. He has served several terms as a Massachusetts state senator.

Full article: http://www.nationaljournal.com/congress/the-insiders-closest-to-bill-shuster-20130724