The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) is a non-profit public policy organization founded in 1984 by Fred Smith. CEI's stated belief is that consumers are best helped not by government regulation of commercial interests, but by consumers being allowed to make their own choices in a free marketplace. CEI states that it promotes classical liberal ideals through analysis, education, coalition-building, advocacy, and regulation.
CEI is a think tank funded by donations from individuals, foundations and corporations, including the Scaife Foundations, the Ford Motor Company Fund, Pfizer, and the Earhart Foundation. (More details below.) CEI cites its major issues of concern as Environmental Policy, Regulation and Economic Liberty, Legal and Constitutional, and Health and Safety. Among the methods used to implement the organization's agenda are various press releases and policy papers, testifying at governmental hearings, suits against various governmental agencies, paid advertising, editorial and op-ed pieces, open letters, books, and NGO operations.

Policy areas
According to CEI, the Wall Street Journal has called it "the best environmental think tank in the country." CEI says it promotes "free market environmentalism" and says market institutions are more effective in protecting the environment than is government.
Among other things, CEI has been an outspoken opponent of government action on global warming that would require limits on greenhouse gas emissions. In March 1992, CEI's founder Fred Smith said of global warming: "Most of the indications right now are it looks pretty good. Warmer winters, warmer nights, no effects during the day because of clouding, sounds to me like we're moving to a more benign planet, more rain, richer, easier productivity to agriculture". [1]
One of CEI's projects was the now defunct Cooler Heads Coalition, which operated the website globalwarming.org. Myron Ebell was the chairman of CHC, and is the Director of Global Warming and International Environmental Policy at the CEI.
In December of 2005 CEI participated in the UNFCCC negotiations in Montreal as an NGO, sending back several dispatches summarizing events of the conference [2].
In a 2006 letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury (after the Archbishop urged Christians to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions), the CEI said that reducing these levels, even in "baby steps," would "result in the deaths of more people in the U.S. than global warming would worldwide". [3]

Regulation
CEI is also active in the legal aspects of antitrust and government regulation. The Project on Technology & Innovation is extending CEI's efforts into new areas, including antitrust in high tech and network industries, privacy, e-commerce, intellectual property, and telecommunications.
CEI opposes a range of regulatory intervention into commercial activities including bans on alcohol advertising, fuel economy mandates and proposals to mitigate global warming. CEI supports constitutional checks over government's power over corporations.

Legal and constitutional
CEI criticises health and safety regulation and argues through its Death by Regulation project that overregulation itself can be deadly. For example, they have claimed that automotive downsizing due to federal fuel economy standards may increase road accident deaths, and have criticised the delayed availability of new medical therapies due to Food and Drug Administration rules.

Health and safety
CEI lists its Adjunct Scholars and twenty-five full-time staff members, their titles, and major area of responsibility on its website.[4]. Some notable staff members include:

Fred Smith (director) - Founder and president
Michael Greve (director) - American Enterprise Institute
Leonard Liggio (director since 1994) - Atlas Economic Research Foundation
Myron Ebell (since 1999) - specializes in climate change
Steven Milloy - editor of Junkscience.com and foxnews.com columnist CEI Staff
In May 2006, CEI released a controversial ad campaign with two television commercials [5] arguing that global warming is not a problem. The commercials used the tagline "Carbon Dioxide - They call it pollution; We call it life." One ad stated that the world's glaciers are "growing, not melting... getting thicker, not thinner."
Individuals associated with CEI have also been criticised. Steven Milloy has written extensively on global warming and other topics while receiving undisclosed funding from ExxonMobil. Following this disclosure, Milloy's name was removed from the list of adjunct scholars at the Cato Institute. He was subsequently appointed as an adjunct scholar at CEI.
Recently, President of American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) Michael T. Eckhart sent Marlo Lewis, senior fellow of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) threatening letter vowing to "destroy" his career: (excerpt) "It is my intention to destroy your career as a liar," Mr. Eckhart wrote. "If you produce one more editorial against climate change, I will launch a campaign against your professional integrity. I will call you a liar and charlatan to the Harvard community of which you and I are members. I will call you out as a man who has been bought by Corporate America. Go ahead, guy. Take me on."[7]

Criticism
In its IRS Form 990 for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, CEI reported revenues totalling $2,919,537, including donations from individuals, foundations and corporations. Its net assets were $1,670,808. Salaries and benefits to its top employees were reported as:
According to page nine of a report from the CEI contained on the University of California, San Francisco's Legacy Tobacco Documents Library (LTDL), the following companies and foundations were among those listed as supporting CEI's work with annual contributions of at least $10,000, currently the CEI's "Entrepreneurs" level:
Aequus Institute, Amoco Foundation, Inc., Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, Coca-Cola Company, E.L. Craig Foundation, CSX Corporation, Earhart Foundation, Fieldstead and Co., FMC Foundation, Ford Motor Company Fund, Gilder Foundation, Koch Family Foundations (including the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, David H. Koch Charitable Foundation, and Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation), Philip M. McKenna Foundation, Inc., Curtis and Edith Munson Foundation, Philip Morris Companies, Inc., Pfizer Inc., Precision Valve Corporation, Prince Foundation, Rodney Fund, Sheldon Rose, Scaife Foundations (Carthage Foundation and Sarah Scaife Foundation), and Texaco, Inc. (Texaco Foundation).
The listing on the Philip Morris Glossary of Names: C at the LTDL gives the note "Received public policy grant from Philip Morris (1995); Pro-market public interest group dedicated to advancing the principles of free enterprise and limited government."
ExxonMobil Corporation was a major donor to CEI, with over $2 million in contributions between 1998 and 2005. [8] In 2002 the company gave $405,000;[9] in 2004 it gave CEI $180,000 that was earmarked for "global climate change and global climate change outreach." In 2006, the company announced that they had ended their funding for the group.[10]

Fred L. Smith, President, $175,000
Marlo Lewis, Senior Fellow, $100,000
Sam Kazman, General Counsel, $98,000 Governance