Tag Archives: elections

Secret Tape: McConnell and Aides Weighed Using Judd’s Mental Health and Religion as Political Ammo

by Selina R. Pinkstaff Posted on April 9, 2013

Mother Jones

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More Mother Jones coverage of Mitch McConnell and the 2014 Kentucky Senate race.


Secret Tape: McConnell and Aides Weighed Using Judd’s Mental Health and Religion as Political Ammo


Full Transcript and Audio of Mitch McConnell Campaign’s Meeting on Ashley Judd


Mitch McConnell Will Fundraise With Billionaires After Saying the GOP Is Not The Party of Billionaires


Mitch McConnell vs. the World


Yes, Potential Senate Candidate Ashley Judd Has Gotten Naked on Screen. So Have These Political Figures.


CPAC: Where Ashley Judd Rape Jokes Happen


Ashley Judd: I’m Not Running

On February 2, Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the US Senate, opened up his 2014 reelection campaign headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky, and in front of several dozen supporters vowed to “point out” the weaknesses of any opponent fielded by the Democrats. “They want to fight? We’re ready,” he declared. McConnell was serious: Later that day, he was huddling with aides in a private meeting to discuss how to attack his possible Democratic foes, including actor/activist Ashley Judd, who was then contemplating challenging the minority leader. During this strategy session—a recording of which was obtained by Mother Jones—McConnell and his aides considered assaulting Judd for her past struggles with depression and for her religious views.

Last month, Judd announced she wouldn’t challenge McConnell, whose reelection campaign could become one of the most watched races of the 2014 cycle (if a serious Democratic opponent emerges). But at the February 2 meeting, McConnell and his team were fixated on Judd. McConnell told his aides that at the early stage of the campaign they had to clobber any potential challenger:

I assume most of you have played the, the game Whac-A-Mole?” (Laughter.) This is the Whac-A-Mole period of the campaign…when anybody sticks their head up, do them out.

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Secret Tape: McConnell and Aides Weighed Using Judd’s Mental Health and Religion as Political Ammo

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Full Transcript and Audio of Mitch McConnell Campaign’s Meeting on Ashley Judd

by Julie Plunkett Posted on April 9, 2013

Mother Jones

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More Mother Jones coverage of Mitch McConnell and the 2014 Kentucky Senate race.


Secret Tape: McConnell and Aides Weighed Using Judd’s Mental Health and Religion as Political Ammo


Full Transcript and Audio of Mitch McConnell Campaign’s Meeting on Ashley Judd


Mitch McConnell Will Fundraise With Billionaires After Saying the GOP Is Not The Party of Billionaires


Mitch McConnell vs. the World


Yes, Potential Senate Candidate Ashley Judd Has Gotten Naked on Screen. So Have These Political Figures.


CPAC: Where Ashley Judd Rape Jokes Happen


Ashley Judd: I’m Not Running

On February 2, Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Senate GOP leader facing reelection next year, held a private meeting at his Louisville, Kentucky, campaign headquarters with several aides to discuss opposition research collected on his potential challengers and how best to defeat possible foes. Much of the conversation focused on actor/activist Ashley Judd, who at the time was the most prominent of McConnell’s potential Democratic opponents, and McConnell and his aides considered assailing Judd for her past struggles with depression and for her religious views. (Judd has since announced she will not run against McConnell.) Mother Jones has obtained a recording of the meeting. Here is the article based on the recording. Below is a complete transcript of the recording.

Sen. Mitch McConnell: If I could interject…I assume most of you have played the, the game Whac-A-Mole? Laughter. This is the Whac-A-Mole period of the campaign…when anybody sticks their head up, do them out, and we’re even planning to do it with the Courier here shortly, so…

Female voice: We’re anxious for that. Laughter.

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Full Transcript and Audio of Mitch McConnell Campaign’s Meeting on Ashley Judd

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Reformers: Publicly Funded Elections Will Tackle New York’s Corruption Problem

by graptorm Posted on April 3, 2013

Mother Jones

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It was a ham-handed scheme straight out of an episode of “Law and Order.” Federal prosecutors revealed on Monday that New York State Sen. Malcolm Smith, a Democrat, allegedly tried to bribe his way onto the New York City mayoral ballot—as a Republican. Envelopes stuffed with cash changed hands in hotel rooms and restaurants. Local Republican officials talked about “money greasing the wheels” and “the fucking money” driving local politics. Smith’s plan depended on paying off two Republicans from Queens who could get his name on the ballot in time for the November election. Instead, an undercover FBI agent and a cooperating witness infiltrated the deal and laid bare just the latest seamy corruption scandal to rock New York politics.

Preet Bharara, the US attorney in Manhattan spearheading the Smith case, told reporters on Monday that “today’s charges demonstrate, once again, that a show-me-the-money culture seems to pervade every level of New York government.” New York City Councilman Daniel Halloran, one of the two Republicans allegedly implicated in Smith’s scheme, would seem to agree. In the complaint filed against Smith et al, Halloran offers this nugget of wisdom:

“That’s politics, that’s politics, it’s all about how much. Not about whether or will, it’s about how much, and that’s our politicians in New York, they’re all like that, all like that. And they get like that because of the drive that the money does for everything else. You can’t do anything without the fucking money.”

The Smith scandal comes as a well-funded coalition of progressive groups are pressuring Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other legislators to pass legislation replacing the state’s current elections regime with publicly financed campaigns. Now, those reformers are pointing to the Smith scandal as further evidence that New York’s political systems need a major overhaul. “This is the kind of conduct that we believe comes out of a culture that is a pay-to-play, money first, voters don’t count culture,” Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York, told the Journal News. “What we’re trying to change is the role money plays in our political system.”

The editorial page of the Albany Times Union, a supporter of public financing, asked on Tuesday: “What better evidence can there be of the need for such reform than this case, in which one of their own, the onetime Senate president and Democratic leader, stands accused of trying to bribe Republican leaders to get a place on the ballot as a GOP candidate for mayor of New York City?”

The Fair Elections for New York campaign, the main force behind the public financing bill, said in a statement that the Smith scandal will only harden New Yorkers’ belief that corruption pervades every corner of state politics. “We can all agree the system is broken,” the statement reads. “Now it’s time to stand shoulder to shoulder with Governor Cuomo and the growing bipartisan majority of New Yorkers who support comprehensive campaign finance reform, which must include a system of publicly financed elections at its core.”

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Reformers: Publicly Funded Elections Will Tackle New York’s Corruption Problem

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The Taxman Turns the Screws on Dark-Money Nonprofits

by Arkady549e Posted on April 1, 2013

Mother Jones

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The Internal Revenue Service is taking a closer look at the finances of some 1,300 nonprofit organizations, including unions, trade associations, and the type of dark-money groups that controversially spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the 2012 elections. That includes Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS, the Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity, the US Chamber of Commerce, and the pro-Obama outfit Priorities USA, all of which keep their donors secret.

The IRS’ is asking these groups to answer a questionnaire (PDF) explaining how they spent their money, how their top staffers were paid, if they flew first-class or charter, any perks they received, and more. The taxman’s request for more information comes as campaign finance reformers, disclosure advocates, and at least one angry lawmaker, Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), pressure the IRS to crack down on big-spending nonprofits like Crossroads GPS, which spent at least $67 million on politics during the 2012 campaign. Levin, who is retiring after his current term, said that a priority of his remaining time in Congress is investigating “the failure of the IRS to enforce our tax laws and stem the flood of hundreds of millions of secret dollars flowing into our elections, eroding public confidence in our democracy.”

Here’s more from NPR on the IRS’ latest move on dark money:

The IRS calls the move a “compliance check.” It asks a wide range of questions about a group’s finances and internal structure. Some of the information will turn up, eventually, in a group’s tax return on the Form 990. But other intriguing information will not. For instance, how did the group set the compensation for its most highly paid officers? Did it give them first-class or charter travel? How about country-club memberships? Any other perks?

The agency has targeted groups that are “self-declared.” That is, they claim they qualify for 501(c) tax-exempt status, but they’ve never filed the application with the IRS. That lets them avoid the application form asking the group to describe its proposed tax-exempt activities.

The IRS says the questionnaire is meant “to help us understand” the self-declared groups and to learn “how they satisfy their exemption requirements.”

But the IRS may be weighing other factors, too. The questionnaire’s most explicit questions are about 501(c)(4) political activity, and the document follows months of critics’ complaints that the IRS has treated 501(c)(4) groups too gently.

Unfortunately, the IRS won’t disclose respondents’ answers to the questionnaire. But with this questionnaire—and with one IRS official’s pledge last fall that the agency would scrutinize dark-money nonprofits—it’s obvious that the agency is digging into the issue of dark money.

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The Taxman Turns the Screws on Dark-Money Nonprofits

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Hillary Clinton Holds the Purse Strings

by Aaron Duff Posted on March 27, 2013

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The courtship has already begun. A select few politicians are traveling the country, schmoozing with 1-percenters, attending the odd fundraiser, and quietly laying groundwork for—yes, that’s right—a 2016 presidential campaign. Mere days after the November 2012 elections, for instance, several Republican governors met with casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, who reportedly gave $150 million to GOP causes last election cycle. On the Democratic side, Governors Martin O’Malley of Maryland and Deval Patrick of Massachusetts are getting friendly with big left-leaning funders and building up their name recognition at invite-only meet-and-greets and out-of-state Jefferson-Jackson dinners.

But there’s a striking dynamic at play in the donor world that is apparently unique to the Democratic side. Call it the Hillary Clinton Cash Freeze. According to Clinton’s friends, fundraisers, and former campaign staffers, big Democratic money isn’t going anywhere until she makes up her mind about launching a second presidential campaign.

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Hillary Clinton Holds the Purse Strings

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Virginia Gov. Candidate Ken Cuccinelli: Outlawing Slavery and Outlawing Abortion Are Part of the Same Fight

by AshleaMelina844 Posted on March 20, 2013

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Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who is running for governor this year, has a knack for controversy. He told state colleges they couldn’t include “sexual orientation” in their anti-discrimination policies. (Current Gov. Bob McDonnell assured the academy that no discrimination was tolerated.) He led a witch hunt against prominent climate scientist Michael Mann. (Cuccinelli is a climate change denier.) He requested that the exposed left breast of Virtus, the Roman goddess adorning the state’s two-century-old seal, be brought in from the cold. (“Breastgate,” the affair was called.)

And now, the latest addition to the Cuccinelli canon. On Tuesday, Virginia Democrats released a video of Cuccinelli comparing the fight to end slavery to the anti-abortion movement. “Over time, the truth demonstrates its own rightness, and its own righteousness,” he said. “Our experience as a country has demonstrated that on one issue after another. Start right at the beginning: slavery. Today, abortion.”

Here’s the video, taken by a Democratic tracker in June 2012:

Cuccinelli added: “History has shown us what the right position was, and those were issues that were attacked by people of faith aggressively to change the course of this country. We need to fight for the respect for life, not just for life but for respect for life. One leads to the other.”

A Cuccinelli spokeswoman told the Associated Press the release of the video was an effort by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe, the former head of the Democratic National Committee, to “run a contentious campaign that divides Virginia.”

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Virginia Gov. Candidate Ken Cuccinelli: Outlawing Slavery and Outlawing Abortion Are Part of the Same Fight

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Scandal-Plagued Menendez Donor Feted Obama and Chauffeured Harry Reid on His Jet

by Larissaiyb Posted on March 20, 2013

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Salomon Melgen is the eye doctor, investor, and big-time political donor embroiled in controversy for his cozy relationship with Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), one of the most powerful Democrats in the Senate. On two occasions, Menendez pressed government officials—once over Medicare and Medicaid billing practices and another time over Latin American governments not honoring trade-related contracts—in ways that appeared to benefit Melgen, who has donated handsomely to Menendez and Democratic causes. Menendez also took two round-trip flights on the doctor’s private jet, reimbursing the doctor only after the details spilled into public view.

Menendez, it turns out, wasn’t the only powerful politician Melgen feted. Politico reported Tuesday night that Melgen hobnobbed with President Obama at 2010 fundraiser for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (though Melgen was peeved at Obama’s reluctance to fully schmooze him). Melgen also ferried Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on his private jet to a fundraiser in Boston for Majority PAC, a super-PAC devoted to electing Senate Democrats and run by former Reid aide Susan McCue. Reid flew back to Washington with Melgen. Reid’s office said the senator reimbursed Melgen for the flights.

Politico gleans some more details about Melgen’s quirkiness as a big-time bankroller:

Some rich folks looking for special treatment would work through a lobbyist with experience navigating government bureaucracy.

Not Melgen—he was his own lobbyist, with access to lots of cash and a private jet owned by his company.

He went to top officials about the Dominican government’s reluctance to implement a $500 million port cargo-screening contract with one of his companies and to challenge the finding that another of his companies overbilled Medicare.

While he was glad-handing politicians, Melgen was living the high life. He was driven around South Florida by a chauffeur in a customized Audi A8 and invited all manner of politicos to his mansion in the Dominican Republic.

Melgen keeps an enviable collection of photos with politicians—including one of him golfing with Bill Clinton—and bragged of using his plane to transport the rapper Pitbull to a super PAC fundraiser at the Democratic National Convention last summer, according to sources who know him.

Yet Democratic fundraisers interviewed for this story say Melgen fits a particular model of naive, high-maintenance donor: the type that expects politicians to help further their business or philosophical interests but don’t know enough about the process to figure out if they’re getting anything for their money.

Let’s not forget that Melgen is under federal investigation over a port deal in Latin America and his company’s Medicare billing practices. The Senate ethics committee, meanwhile, is probing Menendez’s trips on Melgen’s plane, and a grand jury is looking into the senator’s advocacy on Melgen’s behalf, according to the Washington Post.

Even if nothing comes of these probes, the whole affair has been an embarrassment for Menendez. You can bet other politicians with even the faintest connection to Melgen will be distancing themselves from the donor so as to avoid any future stories like Tuesday’s Politico item.

Mother Jones
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Scandal-Plagued Menendez Donor Feted Obama and Chauffeured Harry Reid on His Jet

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Billionaire Clean Energy Advocate Pledges to Spend Big in Mass.

by trasze2aja Posted on March 19, 2013

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A group of young activists is pairing up with a billionaire philanthropist to try to make the Keystone XL pipeline, and climate change, a central issue in the Democratic primary in Massachusetts.

Tom Steyer, a former hedge fund manager and clean energy evangelist, has spent more than $37 million to pass and defend climate and energy initiatives in California. Now he’s forming a super-PAC to spend on the April 30 Democratic primary for the special election to fill Massachusetts’ empty Senate seat.

Steyer and young environmentalists are targeting Dem Rep. Steve Lynch for his support of the Keystone XL pipeline. Lynch voted for a House bill last year that called for the Obama administration to approve the controversial pipeline. Lynch’s opponent in the primary, Rep. Ed Markey, has the support of a number of environmental groups and opposes the pipeline.

Steyer joined with Craig S. Altemose of the Better Future Project and three other Massachusetts college students to write a open letter to Lynch on Monday demanding he change his position on the pipeline:

Because climate change is such a serious issue, and because it is on the ballot as never before, we are asking you, Congressman Lynch, today to do one of two things by high noon on Friday, March 22. Either act like a real Democrat and oppose Keystone’s dirty energy. Or, get a sworn, binding statement – with securities law enforcement – from TransCanada and the refiners that all of the Keystone-shipped oil will stay here.

If Lynch doesn’t change his tune, they wrote, Steyer will then “immediately launch an aggressive public education campaign” against Lynch. In an interview with Mother Jones, Chris Lehane, a spokesman for Steyer, declined to say how much they would spend on such a campaign, but said it would include paid media, get out the vote work, and field campaigns.

Steyer became involved in the Massachusetts race after Altemose and the other young activists reached out. â&#128;&#139;Altemose said their effort is “less of an endorsement of Markey and more a repudiation of Lynch’s actions.” The campaign, he said, is designed to “make sure there’s political consequences for disregarding future generations.”

“For someone to believe they can represent Massachusetts and be supporting policies that take us backward to the dirty energy past is just mind boggling,” Altemose said.

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Billionaire Clean Energy Advocate Pledges to Spend Big in Mass.

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Mitch McConnell Will Fundraise With Billionaires After Saying the GOP Is Not The Party of Billionaires

by Seraphinakbj Posted on March 18, 2013

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On Friday, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) took a turn on the main stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), the groupthinky annual confab for the young and old of the conservative movement. Dressed in a red tie and white-collared blue dress shirt, McConnell attempted to debunk one of the more pernicious myths about the Republican Party. “Don’t tell me Republicans are the party of millionaires and billionaires,” he said, “when Obama’s campaign arm is charging a half-million dollars for a meeting over near the White House.” The GOP, he later added, is “not beholden to any special interests.”

We’re not the party of the rich, McConnell insisted; we’re you.

You won’t find any objections here to McConnell’s jab at “Obama’s campaign arm”—a reference, more specifically, to Organizing for Action (OFA), the big-money nonprofit formed out of Obama’s reelection campaign. I’ve written plenty about OFA and its fundraising tactics, namely, reportedly offering donors and fundraisers access to the president and top administration officials in exchange for big bucks.

But let’s go back to McConnell’s claim that the GOP is not the party of millionaires or billionaires. For a thorough debunking, I defer to none other than Mitch McConnell.

Next week, McConnell and his wife, former Labor secretary Elaine Chao, will fly to Palm Beach, Florida, for a fundraiser at the home of millionaire John Castle, according to the Palm Beach Daily News. Then, after the Castles’ fundraiser, Wilbur Ross (net worth $2.6 billion) and his wife, Hilary, will wine and dine McConnell at their house, which is so extravagant that it has its own name, Windsong. (So does the guest house: Windsong Too.) Tickets range from $1,000 to $5,000 for the night’s events; to co-chair the event, you’ve got to pony up $15,000 to $30,000.

McConnell, of course, is in full campaign mode—even though Election Day 2014 is 18 months away and Kentucky Democrats have yet to settle on a challenger. (More on that here.) Indeed, McConnell’s fundraising blitz began the very day the 2012 campaign season ended, with a $2,500-a-head dinner hosted by the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Since then, he’s raised money at the home of another billionaire—New York City mayoral candidate John Catsimatidis, in January—raised money at lobbying firms, and raised money at an event sponsored by the political action committees for Koch Industries, Home Depot, Capitol One, Amgen, and Delta Airlines—all multibillion-dollar corporations.

Fundraising is McConnell’s specialty. As former Sen. Alan Simpson once observed, “When he asked for money, his eyes would shine like diamonds. He obviously loved it.” Don’t think for a moment McConnell will let his defense of the GOP get in the way of his chase for millionaires’ and billionaires’ money.

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Mitch McConnell Will Fundraise With Billionaires After Saying the GOP Is Not The Party of Billionaires

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Creating PACs and Spending Their Money

by kastijoo8753 Posted on March 16, 2013

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This story originally appeared on the ProPublica website.

In August 2008, as the right wing of the Republican Party grew increasingly disenchanted with the party’s direction, the men from Russo, Marsh and Associates sensed opportunity: They created a political action committee, Our Country Deserves Better, and in time launched the Tea Party Express.

Russo, Marsh—an established California outfit of Republican consultants—was just getting started. The firm formed a second political committee, this one with a pro-military agenda. And eventually, seizing on the President’s unpopularity in certain circles, they opened a third, the Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama.

Throughout the 2012 election cycle, the committees were relentless. In email after email, they pleaded for small donations to run ads supporting candidates who would defeat President Obama’s “socialist” agenda. And it worked: They collected more than $14 million in donations—from all over the country, and from donors who gave as little as $10 to elect Ted Cruz as a Republican senator from Texas or to put Mitt Romney in the White House.

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Creating PACs and Spending Their Money

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