President (To Win Colorado) See Full Big Line

(D) Joe Biden*

(R) Donald Trump

80%

20%↓

CO-01 (Denver) See Full Big Line

(D) Diana DeGette*

90%

CO-02 (Boulder-ish) See Full Big Line

(D) Joe Neguse*

90%

CO-03 (West & Southern CO) See Full Big Line

(D) Adam Frisch

(R) Jeff Hurd

(R) Ron Hanks

40%

30%

20%

CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado) See Full Big Line

(R) Lauren Boebert

(R) J. Sonnenberg

(R) Ted Harvey

20%↑

15%↑

10%

CO-05 (Colorado Springs) See Full Big Line

(R) Dave Williams

(R) Jeff Crank

(R) Doug Bruce

20%

20%

20%

CO-06 (Aurora) See Full Big Line

(D) Jason Crow*

90%

CO-07 (Jefferson County) See Full Big Line

(D) Brittany Pettersen

85%↑

 

CO-08 (Northern Colo.) See Full Big Line

(D) Yadira Caraveo

(R) Gabe Evans

(R) Janak Joshi

60%↑

40%↑

20%↑

State Senate Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

80%

20%

State House Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

95%

5%

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
January 26, 2015 03:12 PM UTC

Former GOP Sen. Ted Harvey--"Scam PAC" Artist?

  • 10 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

We've had a couple of occasions to note the activity of a federally registered political action committee (PAC) chaired by former GOP Colorado Sen. Ted Harvey of Highlands Ranch. The Stop Hillary PAC has been raising cash off the possibility of a presidential run by Hillary Clinton in 2016 for a couple of years now, often employing such (to put it charitably) lowbrow imagery as this to pry open conservative wallets:

stophillarystewie

Former Sen. Ted Harvey (R).
Former Sen. Ted Harvey (R).

Very classy stuff. Just last week, Sen. Harvey wrote to Stop Hillary PAC members, urging them to donate before Clinton's presumed forthcoming presidential campaign announcement:

Testing has shown that when I write to potential new supporters, their response nearly doubles if we can promise that their contribution will be matched — doubled or even TRIPLED.

But to recruit those new members we must fully fund our Matching Grant Challenge. 

If I could again offer to match all new contributions with a $100,000 special Matching Grant, we will more than double our recruitment efforts.

AND the day Hillary announces, you and I could double down our efforts with $200,000 and another 10,000 supporters. 

That is why I sincerely hope you will support our Matching Grant Challenge so we can offer a compelling reason for new members to join us BEFORE Hillary announces.

Got it? If you donate to Ted Harvey's Stop Hillary PAC, you donation could be matched–doubled or even TRIPLED–by others matching your donation. Or maybe you're the one matching somebody else's donation? That's not really clear from Harvey's email, but it's absolutely clear that the one thing you need to do, conservative donor, is give generously to the Stop Hillary PAC. Right now, before you have a chance to think!

Unfortunately for Sen. Harvey, there may be a very large fall in store for this by-all-accounts successful anti-Hillary fundraising operation. As Politico's Kenneth Vogel reports, the Stop Hillary PAC chaired by Ted Harvey was started by a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer named Dan Backer. And there appear to be some troubling questions brewing about Dan Backer and his PACs:

In 2014, Backer’s PACs — a roster including Draft Newt (created to coax the former House speaker into the Virginia Senate race), the Tea Party Leadership Fund (which urged Sarah Palin to run for Senate), Stop Hillary (to oppose the former secretary of state’s expected presidential campaign) [Pols emphasis] and Stop Pelosi (which the Federal Election Commission called out for using the House Democratic leader’s name) — spent more than 87 percent of the $8 million they raised on operating expenses, including $419,000 to Backer’s own law firm, DB Capitol Strategies. By contrast, the amount the PACs spent on donations and ads was about $955,000 — or less than 12 percent of their total fundraising haul. [Pols emphasis]

Something tells us that if Ted Harvey admitted in the above fundraising email that almost 88% of the Stop Hillary PAC's money has gone to "operating expenses" instead of, you know, stopping Hillary, he would raise a lot less money. This is the sort of "overhead" that attracts the attention of the Attorney General in the case of most charities. As in charity fraud.

But apparently for out of work Republican lawmakers, it's how you beat the high cost of living.

Comments

10 thoughts on “Former GOP Sen. Ted Harvey–“Scam PAC” Artist?

  1. Poor little Teddy — the Kochs just announced a commitment of $900B for 2016. Shows how much influence this pathetic small-time lump will be having . . . 

      1. First of all, numbnutz, since it's from the Koch brothers, chances are pretty good it's a steaming pile of horse pudding, like everything else they broadcast . . .

        . . . but should it prove to be even partially true that post Citizens United, that corporate oligarchs  can single-handedly by a government, then it's democracy that's screwed, you mental midget.

    1. Actually, Mod, Republicans seem uniquely susceptible to poor ROI on their PAC investments. It's something of an institutional thing with GOP fundraisers, it seems. The list of GOP Representatives who've paid 70+% in overhead on their fundraising outsourcing over the past decade is astoundingly large.

    2. By all means, lets go down this road. People operating these scam PACs ought to be exposed, no matter what their political stance.

       

      Fortunately, these matters have recently gotten some exposure. Politico has an article today about this sort of thing. http://www.politico.com/story/2015/01/super-pac-scams-114581_full.html

       

      No less a personage than Erik Erickson, himself an operator of a scam PAC, are calling out other "conservatives" for their con jobs.

       

      While I might like to see the box of rocks wing of the Republican party waste their limited resources, those who take advantage of them ought to be exposed. The Politico article notes that the Democrats have largely avoided this problem up to now. However, it notes that this may change as the presidential elections close in.

       

      So these PACs are sort of like Nigerian letters. We should anathematize those who run these things. While we can have sympathy for those conned, they ultimately got what they deserved. 

  2. This is beyond lowbrow.  In a state that has an incredibly high rate of suicides by firearms (490 in 2013), it is incredibly tasteless and revolting.  As a Senator, Harvey ALWAYS voted against anything to limit easy access to guns, and sponsored bills to loosen gun laws  (Let's make it easy for those tykes to get their hands on lethal weapons!).

     

     

Leave a Comment

Recent Comments


Posts about

Donald Trump
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Lauren Boebert
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Yadira Caraveo
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado House
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado Senate
SEE MORE

207 readers online now

Newsletter

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to stay in the loop with regular updates!