UsAgainstAlzheimer's Ends Lobbying Contract With Sole-Client Firm Godes, Niles Lee
A new LDA termination filing reveals that UsAgainstAlzheimer's, the Washington-based nonprofit dedicated to conquering Alzheimer's disease, has ended its lobbying relationship with lobbyist Niles Lee Godes. The lobbying disclosure act termination, filed for the Fourth Quarter of 2025 with an effective date of December 31, 2024, closes out what appears to have been a brief engagement focused on federal health appropriations and Alzheimer's-specific legislation.
The LDA filing reported $20,000 for the final quarter — consistent with the $20,000-per-quarter rate Godes charged throughout the relationship.
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Why the LDA Termination Matters
A Sole-Client Operation Goes Dark
This lobbyist registration termination is notable for a simple reason: UsAgainstAlzheimer's was the only client Godes, Niles Lee had on the books. Across all four quarterly filings in 2025 — from the First Quarter report through the Second Quarter, Third Quarter, and the Fourth Quarter lobbying termination filing — every disclosure listed the same client at the same rate.
That means the Godes, Niles Lee lobbying operation generated a total of $80,000 in disclosed revenue for 2025, all from a single source. With the termination now on file, the firm has no remaining active clients in the lobbying disclosure database.
What UsAgainstAlzheimer's Was Paying For
The engagement centered on health issues, specifically:
- Fiscal Year 2026 appropriations funding for the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
- Advocacy for the Concentrating on High-value Alzheimer's Needs to Get to an End (CHANGE) Act
These are core policy priorities for UsAgainstAlzheimer's, which has long pushed for increased federal investment in Alzheimer's research and public health infrastructure. The organization has previously called for a $289 million increase in NIH Alzheimer's research funding and operates its Center for Brain Health Equity in collaboration with the CDC's Healthy Brain Initiative.
The available data did not reveal whether UsAgainstAlzheimer's has hired another firm to continue lobbying on these same issues.
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Broader Context
NIH and CDC Funding Under Pressure
The issues at the heart of this LDA filing — NIH and CDC appropriations — are among the most contested items in the current federal budget landscape. Alzheimer's research funding has been a bipartisan priority in recent years, but the broader fiscal environment has created uncertainty for health research advocates.
As reported by USA Today, UsAgainstAlzheimer's chair George Vradenburg has been vocal about the potential impact of research funding cuts on Alzheimer's science. The organization's advocacy work sits at the intersection of appropriations politics and health policy — an area where the stakes are high and the lobbying competition is intense.
The CHANGE Act
The other focus of the Godes engagement was the CHANGE Act, a bill aimed at concentrating federal resources on high-value Alzheimer's priorities. The available data did not include information on the current legislative status of the bill or whether it has advanced through committee in recent sessions.
Congressional Attention
The available data did not include information about whether UsAgainstAlzheimer's or the CHANGE Act were mentioned in recent congressional hearings or by specific members of Congress in a way that might have influenced the decision to end this particular lobbying engagement.
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The Bottom Line
What We Know — and What We Don't
UsAgainstAlzheimer's is a well-resourced nonprofit with a related 501(c)(4) entity — UsAgainstAlzheimer's Action — that handles its lobbying and political advocacy. The organization counts partnerships with AARP, Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, and GN Group among its recent initiatives. It is not an organization retreating from Washington.
The termination of the Godes contract does not appear to reflect a reduction in the organization's policy ambitions. UsAgainstAlzheimer's continues to list NIH funding, CDC programs, FDA accelerated approval pathways, clinical trial diversity, and Medicare coverage for new Alzheimer's treatments among its core advocacy priorities.
What remains unclear from the current disclosure data is whether the organization has retained a new firm to pick up where Godes left off — and if so, what additional capabilities or congressional relationships that firm might bring to the table. Background information on Niles Lee Godes' prior congressional staff experience was not available in the data reviewed.
For a nonprofit spending $20,000 per quarter on a single outside lobbyist, the financial footprint is modest. But the policy terrain — FY2026 health appropriations and the CHANGE Act — is anything but. How UsAgainstAlzheimer's chooses to fill this gap, if at all, will say more than the termination itself.
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