It's All The Rage For Candidates To Say They Won't Take Corporate Cash-- While Taking It

Would you guess this came from Gideon or Collins? Or one of their corporately-funded super-PACs?

Over the last week I've had a running argument with some centrist Democrats about the bullshit pledge-- bullshit in some cases, heartfelt in others-- Democratic candidates routinely take to eschew corporate PAC money. Why bullshit? Three reasons:

1- corporate PACs tend to spend on incumbents, not challengers, especially not Democratic challengers.
2- when the challengers get to Congress-- especially the ones who join the New Dems or the Blue Dog caucus, they forget they ever took the pledge.
3- corporate PACs gives loads of money to leadership PACs which then use it to buy loyalty from candidates by laundering the corporate cash into their campaigns.

Although the Democratic Party establishment grifter/sham/scam outfit, End Citizens United, makes excuses for the practice, candidates from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party benefit from corporate cash by getting it via the DCCC and from leadership PACs run by corrupt Democrats like Schumer, Pelosi, Hoyer and other corporate shills.

Late last year Open Secrets took a deeper dive into the sneaky way centrist candidates get around the pledge. The report is by Karl Evers-Hillstrom, who focused on the Senate. "The top Democratic challengers," he wrote, "want voters and donors alike to know they are rejecting corporate PACs. It’s a central talking point for Democrats in competitive races like Sara Gideon in Maine, Mark Kelly in Arizona and John Hickenlooper in Colorado. 'I am not taking a dime in corporate PAC money during this campaign, because it will always be clear who I’m working for in the U.S. Senate,' Gideon, currently speaker of the Maine House, says in a campaign ad.

For non-incumbents, the pledge to reject corporate PACs is a largely symbolic gesture to indicate a candidate wants to get big money out of politics. The pledge doesn’t become a sacrifice until they’re elected to Congress, as corporate PACs give almost all of their money to incumbents to curry favor with lawmakers. [And notice Gideon's sleazy wording, "during this campaign," a good example of why Schumer likes her so much.]

Symbolic as it might have been in 2018, the pledge may have helped land dozens of Democrats crucial House wins. After getting thwacked by those no-PAC Democrats last year, Republicans intend to portray Democratic Senate hopefuls as hypocritical and dishonest with voters on the subject of corporate PACs in 2020, according to a GOP official familiar with the party’s plans.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) aired an advertisement [below] last month attacking Gideon over her pledge to reject corporate PACs. The ad notes that Gideon’s state-level PAC received money directly from major corporations and corporate PACs. The ad also says that her Senate campaign receives money from Democratic leadership PACs that accept money from corporate PACs.





Gideon has not taken money from corporate PACs. But she has received $53,500 from leadership PACs that take money from PACs associated with major corporations.

Some of the largest checks, $10,000 each, came from leadership PACs affiliated with Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Martin Heinrich (D-NM) both of which receive roughly half of their money from corporate PACs.

Top Democrats, like Republicans, fund their leadership PACs partly from PACs representing powerful corporations. One-third of money going to Democratic leadership PACs comes from business PACs associated with corporations, trade associations and other business interests.

Four out of the top five most generous corporate PACs to Democratic leadership PACs, Honeywell International ($179,000), Lockheed Martin ($137,000), General Dynamics ($122,000) and Northrop Grumman ($107,000), are major defense contractors.

End Citizens United, the political group that encourages Democrats to reject corporate PACs, says leadership PAC contributions don’t violate the spirit of the pledge.

“Corporate lobbyists and c-suite executives decide where corporate PAC contributions go and corporate PACs give money to gain access and influence in the halls of power in Washington,” said Patrick Burgwinkle, the group’s communications director. “Leadership PACs give money to help elect more Democrats or Republicans to Congress and the decision on who to donate to resides solely with the member of Congress affiliated with the leadership PAC.”

Major corporations’ PACs regularly give to members of Congress or their less-scrutinized leadership PACs as they push their preferred policies to lawmakers. If a contribution from a corporate PAC to a leadership PAC was meant to be routed to a specific candidate, it would have to be marked as so in FEC filings.

Gideon’s campaign told the Bangor Daily News that the difference in PAC money between the two candidates is one of the “clear differences” in the race. Collins has raised $1.4 million from PACs associated with corporations, businesses and trade groups. That’s compared to one $5,000 contribution to Gideon from PACs labeled “business” by OpenSecrets, the American Association for Justice.

Democrats are hoping Theresa Greenfield can take down Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), pouring $186,000 into her campaign from leadership PACs. Greenfield, a real estate executive, was endorsed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee right after announcing her bid.

Senate Democrats also threw their weight behind Mark Kelly, an astronaut and gun control activists who is the husband of former congresswoman Gabby Giffords. Having raised an unprecedented $13.9 million through September, Kelly has a huge cash advantage over Sen. Martha McSally (R-AZ).

Business PACs give upwards of 90 percent of their money to incumbents, so these Democratic challengers aren’t losing much of anything by rejecting their checks. Still, their incumbent opponents certainly have an advantage by being entrenched lawmakers.

In Colorado, Sen. Cory Gardner’s campaign has received a stunning $2.6 million from business PACs, just behind Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for the top spot. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) is right behind him with $2.4 million as he engages in a big money battle with Democrat Cal Cunningham.

The incumbent advantage goes for some Democrats too. Sens. Gary Peters (D-MI) and Mark Warner (D-VA), both top targets of Republicans, each received more than $1.8 million from business PACs. Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN) has taken in nearly $2.6 million from PACs, half of which comes from business PACs.

By End Citizens United’s count, 47 House Democrats and 11 Democratic senators have taken the no-corporate PAC pledge.

That growing list includes some incumbent senators facing reelection in 2020, including Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) as well as Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) and his primary challenger Rep. Joe Kennedy (D-MA).

And many of the House candidates who rejected corporate PACs in 2018 are now incumbents, meaning they are passing up hundreds of thousands of dollars to stick by their pledge. Many of them are top recipients of leadership PAC money, including California Reps. TJ Cox ($104,300) and Katie Porter ($101,105), who face hungry Republican challengers in 2020.

So far this cycle, Democrats overall have taken $7.2 million from leadership PACs, compared to $9.2 million for Republicans. That’s a closer margin than in previous cycles where Republicans have historically given far more through their leadership PACs.

Everyone knows Trump hates dogs-- except Blue Dogs like Jeff Van Drew

GOP Fat Cats Are As Sick Of Republican Chaos And Broken Promises As Everyone Else Is-- And They're Zipping Up Their Wallets

Many of the multimillionaires and billionaires who fund Republican elections are fuming. The Trump Regime is a worse 3-ring circus than anyone ever expected-- even those who knew it would probably be a mess. Yesterday they were reading headlines about Jeff Sessions issuing new guidelines for going to war with the LGBT community again.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions instructed federal agencies and attorneys on Friday to protect religious liberty in a broad, yet vague, guidance memo that critics fear could give people of faith-- including government workers and contractors-- a loophole to ignore federal bans on discrimination against women and LGBT people.

The guidance says the government cannot unduly burden people or certain businesses from practicing their faith, noting, “The free exercise of religion includes the right to act or abstain from action in accordance with one’s religious beliefs.”

For most high-rollers who were hoping to kill Obamacare for get their taxes lowered, war with women the gays isn't what they were looking for when they wrote their checks. Nor were they looking for an unending series of scandals that has had the government in a constant state of flux since... well, basically, since January when Trump moved into the White House. Are there any top level Trump Regime decision-makers who haven't been ripping off the taxpayers? Yesterday there were new reports about them wasting huge amounts of money on private jets and military planes. OK, Tom Price got thrown out on his ear, but he wasn't any worse than the rest of the crooks. The EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, is just the latest-- and probably not the last.

Earlier this week, Politico's two top reporters, Alex Isenstadt and Gabriel Debenedetti reported that Republican heavy donors are sick and tired of all the bullshit pouring out of the White House and Congress-- and they're zipping up their wallets. Miss McConnell was in L.A. last week to beg for money from a couple dozen right-wing fat cats at the home of billionaire Robert Day, an oil money inheritor who serves as chairman of the Keck Foundation. He ran into a pissed off old coot, another oil money billionaire, Thomas Wachtell, who's funded every crooked GOP freak from Darrell Issa, Marco Rubio, Sharron Angle and Michele Bachmann and local monsters Mimi Walters, Issa, Kevin McCarthy, Steve Knight to McConnell himself. He's furious McConnell isn't getting anything down. He's stopped contributing to GOP Senate candidates and causes. "You’re never going to get a more sympathetic Republican than I am. But I’m sick and tired of nothing happening," he told McConnell in front of the other guests. Many wallets and purses are now closed.

The backlash is threatening to deprive Republicans of resources just as they're gearing up for the 2018 midterms. Party officials are so alarmed that North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, who oversees fundraising for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told his colleagues at a recent conference meeting that donations had fallen off a cliff after the Obamacare flop. The committee’s haul plummeted to just $2 million in July and August, less than half of what it raised in June.

"When you’re in a business and you tell your stakeholders you’re going to build a building or something, you have to follow through," said Houston-based energy executive Dan Eberhart. "I can’t borrow money to build a building and then not follow through, which is what these guys are doing.” He said he's spoken to four Republican senators over the past month to express his displeasure, mostly over the party's failure to repeal Obamacare.

Behind the scenes, the GOP has begun to try to smooth things over with its most important givers. On Monday, Trump met with the party’s most prominent donor, Las Vegas casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, who has privately expressed frustration that the president hasn't moved the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. And in the wake of an establishment-backed candidate’s loss in Alabama, a top McConnell political lieutenant, Steven Law, held a series of frank discussions with key benefactors.

Some of the donors are giving lawmakers an earful. Bruce Rastetter, an Iowa agribusiness mogul who has funded a long list of Republican elected officials, said he had informed his state’s two GOP senators, Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, that he would not donate to Republican senators “unless they pass new legislation or get new leadership.”

In the world of campaign politics, big donors have long been known as gripers — an exclusive group accustomed to stroking and attention. But this year is different. Veteran fundraisers say they’re having an unusually hard time setting up meetings with major contributors, lining up checks and organizing events.

One seasoned GOP fundraiser forwarded along a curt email from a sought-after donor. “The GOP leaders should know, no movement on remaining agenda: tax reform, infrastructure, deregulation, etc. means no funding from supporters like me,” it read. “No meetings, calls, contributions until we see progress.”

The figures turning off the cash spigot range from mid-level donors to some of the most generous contributors whom the party has long relied upon. Among those who’ve been cool to outreach are venture capitalist John Childs, real estate developer Harlan Crow, and retail executive Les Wexner, according to fundraisers.

All have funneled millions of dollars to the party over the years... “I think major donors are tired of writing checks to a do-nothing Congress,” said Roy Bailey, an influential, Dallas-based GOP bundler.

...Some exasperated givers are turning to Steve Bannon, Trump’s hard-charging former chief strategist and a McConnell nemesis, to vent. Bannon met with several contributors who were in Washington this week for an RNC gala and has eagerly stepped into the role of donor-whisperer. He is looking to establish his own finance network to fund an effort to unseat Senate Republican incumbents in 2018.

The White House has been closely monitoring the donor unease, concerned that it could derail the party’s 2018 efforts. Last week, Marc Short, Trump’s director of legislative affairs who previously served as an operative for the Koch financial network, delivered a presentation for a group of influential conservative financiers that included Frayda Levin and Art Pope.

Some in the administration, however, view a donor revolt as a useful way to motivate lawmakers. On Tuesday, Nick Ayers, chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence, told a group of RNC donors that if Congress failed to enact the president’s agenda they should withhold their financial support and instead give to primary challengers.

They're getting very tired of seeing this everyday.

Which Campaign Promises Will Trump Keep?

Many Trump voters have 2-digit IQs and lack the ability to think abstractly. That's the way it goes. But plenty of Trump voters were as intelligent, more or less, as anyone else. As they cast their ballots for him (and, in some cases, against Hillary) they knew Trump is a predator, pillager and plunderer. They are so consumed with hatred for the establishment that when they voted for him, they didn't imagine they and their families might be the victims of his and his cronies' pillaging and plundering. Some may have been chanting "lock her up" as a fun game-- but a helluva lot weren't.

Many were disappointed when it was widely reported that Trump said he didn't want to hurt the Clintons. It was like he broke a campaign pledge. Some of his voters wanted him to because they just hate women and think she's a bitch (like it says on their t-shirts) and others see the Clintons as an emblem of a status quo that has done them wrong and left them behind as roadkill and spat in their face, calling them deplorables. (They don't see themselves as deplorables even if they are.)

President-elect Donald J. Trump said on Tuesday that he had no intention of pressing for an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server or the financial operations of her family’s foundation, dropping the “lock her up” pledge that became a rallying cry for his campaign for the White House.

Mr. Trump, who branded his rival “Crooked Hillary” and said she would go to jail if he were president, said in an interview with reporters and editors at the New York Times that he was no longer interested in pursuing Mrs. Clinton, in part because he wanted to heal the wounds of a divisive campaign.

“I don’t want to hurt the Clintons, I really don’t,” Mr. Trump said during the interview. “She went through a lot and suffered greatly in many different ways, and I am not looking to hurt them at all. The campaign was vicious.”

...The decision angered some of his most fervent supporters, who immediately criticized his seeming change of heart.

“Broken Promise,” blared the headline on Breitbart News, a conservative news site that has strongly backed Mr. Trump.

Politicians break campaign promises. We're used to it. But do they renege on the whole premise of a campaign? And is that what Trump is doing now that he unexpectedly wound up as President-elect? When Michael Flynn, the crackpot general now Trump's national security advisor, met with Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga and other Japanese officials in Tokyo a couple of weeks before the election, he tried to reassure them by claiming "Trump's controversial campaign-trail remarks were merely part of the rhetoric needed to secure an election win."



Trump painted himself-- no doubt "merely part of the rhetoric needed to secure an election win"-- as a savior of the white working class, but now what does he do as the GOP comes up with their litany of anti-worker agenda items? Chuck Schumer says he wants to work with Trump on some legislation they can both get behind-- primarily cutting corporate taxes-- but Paul Ryan has far more radical plans for what he wants out of a government with a Republican House, Republican Senate and Republican White House. He's not afraid of the consequences of overreach, even if some of his members are. He sees this as a once in a lifetime opportunity to reach the golden grail-- dismantling Social Security and Medicare and turning back the regulations on business that protect consumers. Will Trump be able to stand up to him (if he even wants to)? The rogues' gallery administration he's putting together suggests that he will neither want to nor have the capacity to.