Tag: pac
David McCormick

Carpetbagger! GOP's Rich Senate Picks Don't Live Where They May Run

Wealthy hedge fund executive Dave McCormick differentiated himself from his former Pennsylvania Senate primary opponent, New Jersey resident Mehmet Oz, by touting his strong ties to the Keystone State. But the Associated Press reports that McCormick actually still lives in Connecticut.

National Republicans reportedly have been trying to convince the failed 2022 Senate candidate to challenge incumbent Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey in 2024 and he has indicated he is considering a race.

Politicoreported in March that the National Republican Senatorial Committee is attempting to find candidates for 2024 who can afford to self-fund all or some of their campaigns. After being outraised by Democrats in the 2020 and 2022 Senate campaigns, NRSC Chair Steve Daines acknowledged that it was helpful to find candidates who can provide their own funds, telling the outlet, “We’ve got some work to do to catch up.”

But most of the wealthy candidates Daines, a U.S. senator from Montana, and his team have been recruiting are like McCormick: conservative male business executives who are recent transplants or may not even live in the state in which they’re seeking office.

In the 2022 Pennsylvania Senate primary, Democrats accused both McCormick and eventual nominee Mehmet Oz of not really being Pennsylvania residents.

In a March 2023 interview with the conservative American Enterprise Institute, first flagged by the progressive super PAC American Bridge 21st Century, McCormick suggested that Oz lost to Democratic nominee John Fetterman in part over the issue: “That explains a lot, I think, because people wanna know that the person that they’re voting for kind of gets it, and part of getting it is understanding that you just didn’t come in yesterday.” (Disclosure: The American Independent Foundation is a partner organization of American Bridge.)

The AP report noted that McCormick listed his Westport, Connecticut, mansion in public documents as his primary residence and has done remote interviews from the property as recently as this spring. McCormick has said he is considering a challenge to Democratic incumbent Sen. Bob Casey.

In Wisconsin, as prominent elected officials declined the chance to challenge Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin in 2024, national Republicans are reportedly eying wealthy real estate developer and banker Eric Hovde. Hovde reportedly owns a multimillion dollar home in Laguna Beach, California in addition to his Madison, Wisconsin home. He lost a bid for Senate in 2012.

In May, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Hovde spends a significant amount of time in California and was named one of Orange County, California’s top 500 most influential people by the Orange County Business Journal in 2020.

“We hope California Hovde had a safe trip to La Crosse from his Laguna Beach mansion. As Republicans continue to scramble to find a candidate for U.S. Senate, California Hovde is back once again to pitch his extreme and out of touch policies in Wisconsin,” Democratic Party of Wisconsin rapid response director Arik Wolk quipped in a June press release.

Daines has also urged New York Stock Exchange vice chair John Tuttle to run for retiring Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow’s open seat in Michigan next year. As of last September, Tuttle listed a New York City address as his home when making a campaign donation.

Former Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers, who moved to Florida to run a consulting business and reportedly registered to vote there in 2022, is also reportedly considering a run in his former state.

In Nevada, the NRSC recruited business owner Sam Brown to challenge first-term Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen. Prior to moving to Nevada, he unsuccessfully ran in the 2014 Republican primary for a seat in the Texas Legislature.

Brown will face another wealthy newcomer in the GOP primary. President Donald Trump’s controversial former ambassador to Iceland, Jeffrey Ross Gunter, announced on August 7 that he will also run for the Nevada Senate seat. The GOP mega donor told theNevada Globe two days earlier that he has been a full-time Nevada resident for four years, though the Daily Beastnoted in June that he has been registered to vote in the state only since 2021.

The U.S. Constitution requires that every senator “be an inhabitant of that state for which he shall be chosen” as of Election Day, but it does not specify what that means.

On August 10, Washington Post fact checker Glenn Kessler noted that Republican Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville appears to reside primarily in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida.

Reprinted with permission from American Independent.

Adam Laxalt

Adam Laxalt, Former Trump Ally In Nevada, Will Chair DeSantis SuperPAC

An ally to former President Donald Trump and ex-Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt has been appointed as chairman of Never Back Down, a super political action committee (PAC) backing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, ABC News reports.

Last week, Axiosreported the super PAC aired its first ad via Fox News, slamming Trump for "spending millions on attacking"DeSantis.

Although a longtime friend to Trump, according to ABC, the former attorney general is also a "close friend" to the Florida governor, who is expected to announce his 2024 presidential bid in the coming weeks.

ABC reports:

Laxalt chaired Trump's campaign in Nevada in 2020 and has repeated Trump's false claims of fraud about that race, won by Democrat Joe Biden. Laxalt was a public face of many of Trump campaign’'s lawsuits in the swing state that challenged election rules and results. Trump endorsed Laxalt in the 2022 Senate race won by Catherine Cortez Masto, who was considered the most vulnerable Democratic incumbent in the midterm elections.

Now, the GOPer is choosing to back DeSantis' campaign over Trump's.

Laxalt ran for political office in Nevada twice — for governor in 2018 and for U.S. Senate in 2022 — but lost both times.

Additionally, during each race, a dozen or more of his family members publicly opposed him.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Super PAC Ad Spreads Lies About Kelly, Masters, And Abortion Rights

Super PAC Ad Spreads Lies About Kelly, Masters, And Abortion Rights

The Arizona Senate ad was sponsored by a group tied to the anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.

An anti-abortion super PAC released a misleading new ad on Friday, dishonestly claiming that Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) supports abortion "right up to the due date, for any reason." The ad also attempted to present Arizona Senate Republican nominee Blake Masters as only wanting a reasonable "compromise," despite his long history of backing total abortion bans.

The 30-second ad is being run by Women Speak Out, a super PAC affiliated with the anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America — formerly known as Susan B. Anthony List. In the 2020 campaign, the super PAC reported receiving at least $4 million from right-wing billionaire Richard Uihlein.

After showing images of people celebrating the beginning of a pregnancy, a narrator says, "From that moment, a child should be protected. Blake Masters supports compromise: reasonably regulate late-term abortion, with an exception to protect the mother. But Mark Kelly's position is extreme: abortion even after the sonogram, right up to the due date, for any reason. Kelly is just not reasonable."

Arizona polling has shown that most voters oppose an abortion ban.

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America is one of the leading anti-abortion groups in the United States. Its website touts "life-saving laws" barring even "early abortion" and tracks the effort to enact "total/near total limits on abortion" in all 50 states.

The ad repeats a debunked claim being pushed by Masters that because Kelly voted for the Women's Health Protection Act — a bill that would have codified the right to choose an abortion as had been guaranteed in the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling — that means he backs unrestricted abortion up until the moment of birth.

In reality, the legislation expressly allowed for restrictions "after fetal viability," as long as they included an exception for the rare cases where, "in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating health care provider, continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk to the pregnant patient's life or health."

Kelly told the Washington Post on Thursday that he is not opposed to "restrictions on abortion late in pregnancy." His campaign site notes that "Mark will always defend and protect the right of Arizona women to make their own healthcare decisions."

And while the ad attempts to paint Masters as a centrist seeking a "compromise" position, he has long advocated for a near-total abortion ban.

Before winning the GOP Senate primary in August, Masters sold himself to voters as "100%" against abortion at any time.

"I'm just unapologetically and unqualifiedly pro-life," he told the Pima County Republican Club in August 2021. "From conception."

That December, he posted a video in which he called legal abortion "a genocide happening in America."

Indeed, up until last month, his website contained language backing "a federal personhood law (ideally a Constitutional amendment) that recognizes that unborn babies are human beings that may not be killed."

Since that time, Masters has scrubbed his anti-abortion positions from his website.

Kelly has been endorsed in the race by both NARAL Pro-Choice America and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

An Arizona Republic poll of likely voters released Tuesday found Kelly leading Masters by a 49%-42% margin.

Reprinted with permission from American Independent.

Christie Said To Form Presidential Political Action Committee

Christie Said To Form Presidential Political Action Committee

By Terrence Dopp, Bloomberg News (TNS)

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie formed a political action committee, a step toward entering the 2016 race for president, according to a person familiar with the move.

Christie, a second-term Republican, filed paperwork on Jan. 23 with the Federal Election Commission establishing the Leadership Matters For America PAC, according to the person, who asked not to be identified because he wasn’t authorized to disclose the information. The PAC also established a website, where it lists Christie as its honorary chairman.

The step allows Christie, 52, to begin raising money for a potential run. A fundraising strategy is being worked out and will start taking shape as soon as this week, the person said. The governor, who has said he was considering higher office, has been under pressure to announce his intentions since former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney made moves this month toward entering the race.

“America has been a nation that has always controlled events and yet today events control us,” the PAC said in a mission statement on its website. “Why? Because leadership matters.”

Photo: Gage Skidmore via Flickr