Campaign Finance

Mother Jones obtained audio tapes from a June retreat in Aspen that the Koch Brothers held for other like-minded wealthy conservative business people. During the meeting, Charles Koch may have even -- although it's disputed -- referred to President Obama as “Saddam Hussein” and called the 2012 election “the mother of all wars.”  (See the Koch brothers' photos below.)

Also included in the tapes is a thank you to many of the donors who gave over $1 million dollars to the causes that the Koch Brothers support. Included in that list of people to thank, was the Humphreys family – well know donors to Missouri Republican candidates. Here is their family bio from the Mother Jones report:

The Humphreys family: Ethelmae Humphreys is the chair of the board of Tamko Building Products, one of the country's largest independent roofing manufacturers. She also serves on the board of directors of the Cato Institute, a Koch-funded think tank. Her son David is Tamko's CEO. The two have doled out hundreds of thousands of dollars to Republican candidates. That includes David's $25,000 donation to the successful recount effort this year of conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser, who came under fire recently for allegations that he choked a fellow justice. (He wasn't charged.)

David Humphreys made news recently for asking prospective Republican gubernatorial candidate Peter Kinder to return over $125,000 in contributions after the ongoing back and forth in the media between Kinder and a former stripper and Penthouse Pet.

The Koch Brothers are known for backing “the movement to discredit climate science and sow doubt on the scientific consensus that human activities contribute to global warming.” They were also prominent backers of Americans for Prosperity and other groups that built up the “Tea Party” movement in 2010.

The extent of the Humphreys donations to organizations supported by the Koch Brothers was unknown until recently because of campaign finance rules that allow their donations to remain anonymous in public filings. 

Ed Martin filed amended campaign finance reports with the Federal Election Commission for the "post-general" and "year-end" reporting periods today, following Friday's embarrassing debacle in which Martin tried to blame his bogus fundraising numbers on an unspecified campaign staffer and "computer problems." 

According to today's numbers, Martin ended 2010 with just $25,317 in the bank, not the bogus $175,514 cash-on-hand total submitted to the FEC last week.  This new total is also a fraction of the "forty grand" estimate he provided to The Hill on Friday.  

We're now told that Martin didn't raise a penny from November 23 through December 31; never mind all that about hauling in $229,275 during the holidays. Moreover, an updated expense report shows $92,439 in expenses for November and December -- about ten times the the fictional $9,404 total filed last week.  Ed's $83,000 in just-discovered expenses include checks for almost $54k to Patrick Media in Marshfield. and about $15k in federal taxes. 

Read the reports yourself:

• Year-End Report: Original | Amended
• Post-General Report: Original | Amended

The campaign's post-general report experienced some serious revision as well.  Instead of being more than $44,350 in the hole on November 22, Martin now says he had $117,750 in the bank on that date, and raised $250,000 between October 14 and November 22 instead of just $64,500.

Saturday, the American Democracy Alliance sent a $50,000 check to "Freedom PAC," a committee formed in 2009 and used to pay Jeff Roe's Axiom Strategies for a campaign to oppose a St. Joseph tax proposal.   Later in the 2010 cycle, funds were directed through the committee to oppose Rep. Jason Grill's (D-Kansas City) re-election campaign. 

It's not clear what this $50k is for, of course. 

The Turner Report flags legislation filed by new Sen. Will Kraus (R-Lee's Summit) that would reinstate campaign contribution limits. 

The bill calls for capping contributions for statewide office at $2,000, and setting limits at $1,000 for state senators, $500 for state representatives, $325 for any other office if the population is under 100,000,  $850 if it is between 100,000 and 250,000, $1,275 if the population is more than 250,000.

Team Tilley doesn't want legislators to accept meals from lobbyists at fine establishments like El Jimi's in Jefferson City (pictured here), but if a lobbyist writes a $100,000 check in the parking lot, that's totally cool

Forgive me for not being impressed with incoming Speaker Steve Tilley's request that his colleagues not accept gifts and meals from lobbyists this year.  Tilley's proposal to ban lobbyist gifts is a good one -- the legislature's lobbyist-funded slush "party" funds are particularly gross -- but his selective concern about the kinds of influence-peddling that "look bad to someone who doesn't know him" is as transparent as it is absurd.

Remember that this is the same Steve Tilley who has cashed $200,000 in checks from Rex Sinquefield this cycle, while opposing even the most basic campaign contribution limits.  The ability to accept enormous donations from right-wing ideologues have obviously served Tilley well, but how is the public supposed to believe that he's going to tell Rex "no" if he thinks that his crazy ideas will hurt the people of Missouri?

Republicans successfully filibustered a vote on the DISCLOSE Act today, bowing to corporate and Tea Party pressure on behalf of wealthy interests.   But before the vote, Sen. Claire McCaskill passionately argued for greater transparency in campaign spending. 

As summarized by McCaskill's office, "The bill would force corporations that make political donations to disclose their donors and be held accountable for any ads they sponsor. It would also ban contributions from foreign-controlled corporations, large government contractors and companies that have received substantial government assistance. McCaskill believes that American voters have a right to know where campaign donations are coming from and who paid for political ads that they see on television."

So the Post-Dispatch has a story today headlined, "GOP may restrict attack tactics in ads."   (Apologies if coffee just spewed out your nose).

The article is interesting, even if it doesn't provide any evidence to believe the headline, or give any indication of how Sen. Majority Leader Kevin Engler (R-Farmington) and House Floor Leader Steve Tilley (R-Perryville) might enforce a "a code of conduct for primary campaigns" if they ever get around to drafting such a code. What's notable (to me, anyway) is that in an article in which Engler complains about "hard-charging consultants who orchestrate political attacks" and  "political consultants that use people like pawns in a chess game and don't care whether what they're saying is the truth," the consultant retained by each of the allegedly dirty campaigns is Jeff Roe.  Something tells me Roe doesn't really care what Engler thinks.  "You strap on the chinstrap and go to war" when you run for office, Roe told the Post-Dispatch.

But stepping back from the intraparty squabbling for a moment, the thing I find most striking about Engler's proposal is that his alleged concern for honesty and dignity explicitly excludes general election and public policy campaigns. His "code of conduct" is only meant to apply to primaries, and he's only worried about "whether what they're saying is the truth" when it concerns his Republican candidates.  How commendable! 

Couldn't he at least pretend to care about honest campaigning in the 90 days between the primary and general elections?

Randy Turner has Rep. John Burnett's (D-Kansas City) latest constituent report. In it, Burnett has praise for Rep. Kevin Wilson (R-Neosho), chairman of the House's special ethics committee, but is critical of Majority Floor Leader Steve Tilley's (R-Perry) involvement in the process.

This week we had a committee meeting and had been discussing the limit issue for over an hour when Steve Tilley, the Majority Floor Leader, and one of the dozen who filed bills just popped into the meeting and joined the discussion. Now he has that right as a member of the leadership but this is the first time in 7 years I have seen such a thing happen. He makes no pretense he will do all he can to stop limits.

Oh. It is his job to raise big bucks for the Republican House candidates and he is doing a very good job at it and limits would make his job more difficult. I understand. I just do not agree. 74% of the Missouri citizens voted for campaign limits in Proposition A a few years ago. Beyond me how they can keep a straight face in this argument.

Good news:

While there is still considerable disagreement on the amount, one thing was made clear during the special House committee on ethics reform’s discussion this morning: There will be campaign finance limits in the bill the committee passes.

Reps. Jason Kander (D-Kansas City) and Tim Flook (R-Liberty) met with the press at the Capitol this morning to talk about their bipartisan ethics reform bill, intended to limit the use of political committees to obscure campaign donation trails. Their multi-part proposal makes it a felony to "transfer funds through political committees with the intent of masking the original source of money, would prohibit individuals from serving as the treasurer or deputy treasurer of multiple committees, and create disclosure requirements for "de facto lobbyists." 

From the presser:

At the press conference, Flook indicated that Speaker Ron Richard is at least somewhat supportive of the effort, and Kander said Minority Leader Paul LeVota may become a co-sponsore.

More coverage can be found here and here.

Friday, David Lieb of The Associated Press reported on Ed Martin's use of the SaveAB.com website and email database to direct people to his congressional campaign website. 

In 2008, Martin created the "SaveAB.com for America" website and nonprofit corporation to oppose the sale of Anheuser-Busch to InBev. That effort came and went (as many Ed Martin adventures do), and Martin voluntarily dissolved the "SaveAB.com for America" nonprofit corporation in December 2008.  However, Martin has since relaunched the SaveAB.com website, and last week emailed "about 40,000" SaveAB.com petition signers to tell them about his latest adventure -- his campaign for Congress.    

Perhaps responding to her energized challenges from the left and right,  Rep. Jo Ann Emerson has set up a new leadership PAC called GOJO.

Leadership PACs provide a campaign bank account for candidate travel, and "allow politicians to donate dollars to (and collect favors from) friendly candidates."

Speaking with KSPR and KY3 last week week, Roy Blunt expressed grave concern with a recent ad from the League of Conservation Voters criticizing his ties to big oil and energy interests and opposition to the clean energy legislation before Congress this year. In both interviews, Blunt suggested that the issue ads circumvented campaign finance laws that limit total donations to a candidate campaign.  On KSPR, he said:

The money you can spend on ads like this are unlimited, so it's an interesting way to kind of get around the campaign finance law...

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Looking through Roy Blunt's Q3 campaign finance report, it looks like Blunt's efforts to court oil company lobbyists are still paying off.  Blunt has a been a huge recipient of oil and gas industry donations (he ranked #8 in the entire House for the 2008 cycle, without a competitive race).

Already, a number oil company PACs have maxed out to Blunt, with more to come. Exxon Mobil Corporation PAC, Marathon Oil Company Employees PAC and Devon Energy Corporation PAC have all already given $5,000 to the campaign.

Speaker Ron Richard lets us know exactly where he stands on the various ethics reform proposals in the House:

"Some are for changes, and some are not," he said of opinions among members of the House GOP caucus. "We'll visit it, but I’ve determined no parameters."

Speaking with the editorial board of the Joplin Globe, Richard also reiterated his opposition to campaign donation limits, which he believes eliminate the need for any other changes to state ethics or campaign law. 

Here's a surprise for you: new Democratic candidate Tommy Sowers significantly outraised incumbent Rep. Jo Ann Emerson in the third quarter, and now has more cash on hand than Emerson.

A factoid from the fresh FEC filings: Roy Blunt's Senate campaign still owes $46,766.81 to to The Ritz Carlton Resort in Naples, FL for "event expenses" and "room charges."

The Sunlight Foundation's archive of political fundraising events shows two separate "Friends of Roy Blunt Spring Retreat" events at the resort in April: April 11-13 and April 24-26. For those not invited to the festivities, the itinerary included a lobster bake on the "North Beach" and a "Day of Leisure" at the resort.

Intrigued by news of Roy Blunt's upcoming energy industry fundraiser -- hosted by an Exxon Mobile lobbyist -- I was curious to find out how much oil money Blunt has accepted in recent years.

A lot, it turns out.

In fact, according to the The Center for Responsive Politics, Blunt has been one of the top recipients of oil and gas money in the last two cycles. In 2008, for example, Blunt received more oil and gas money than all but six House members, and his leadership PAC (the ROYB fund) ranked #13 among all Represenatives and Senators. Combining data from different cycles on OpenSecrets.org and his recent Senate campaign finance report, Blunt has raised more than $600,000 in oil and gas money since 2000.

On holidays like today, I like to splurge and grill up some nice steaks. I can't do it all of the time, but it's nice to live like a king in my own backyard from time to time.

Sadly, I don't have a leadership PAC to finance my own expensive meals and luxurious trips. But fortunately for Roy Blunt, Roy Blunt has such a fund.

Leadership PACs are separate from politicians' main campaign accounts, and file separate reports with the Federal Election Commission. They're used to make donations to other candidates, build relationships with other legislators and leaders, and generally further a politician's ambitions.  Blunt's PAC, the Rely on Your Beliefs Fund (ROYB Fund) has been one of the most active in the entire country over the past few election cycles. In 2006, for example, Blunt raised $985,281 into his PAC, and was surpassed only by Reps. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and John Boehner (R-OH) in total receipts. That money -- much of it from big special interest checks -- is then forwarded on to other campaigns or spent to further Blunt's career.

Thumbing through Roy Blunt's recently-filed Q1 campaign finance report, a number of interesting expenses stand out. First, Blunt spent some serious cash on food and liquor in Washington and Manhattan. And overall, some of the spending decisions just don't make sense for a campaign that should be trying to save money for things that actually win votes -- here are some of the more notable expenses:

The chartered airplane for the campaign kick-off:

• $14,548 to Central Missouri Aviation on March 4

Meals in Washington, DC:

• $2,425 at Ruth's Christ Steakhouse in Dupont Circle
• $1,359 at La Prima/Via Cucina in Downtown DC
• $1,073 at La Prima/Via Cucina in Downtown DC
• $472 at Wagners Liquor in Georgetown (conveniently down the street from Blunt homestead)
• $192 at The Caucus Room in Downtown DC
• $179 at Tenpenh in Downtown DC
• $163 at Martin's Tavern in Georgetown
• $127 at Gandels Liquors on Capitol Hill
• $66 at Teatro Goldini on K Street
• ....and many other smaller meals.

Meals in Manhattan:

• $445 at Waverly Restaurant on the Avenue of the Americas
• $290 at Il Mulino on West 3rd Street