May, 15 2019, 12:00am EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Alan Zibel azibel@citizen.org 202-588-7730
Mike Stankiewicz, mstankiewicz@citizen.org, (202) 588-7779
Financial Sector Plutocrats Power Midterm Election Super PAC Spending
Top 100 Donors to Outside Spending Groups Dropped $690 Million on 2018 Elections
WASHINGTON
Hedge fund billionaires and other wealthy individual donors gave nearly $690 million to outside groups that poured money into influencing the 2018 midterm elections, according to a report by Public Citizen.
The analysis by Public Citizen examined contributions by the top 100 wealthy individuals who funded outside political organizations that reported their donors for the 2017-2018 election cycle, including super PACs and other nonprofits.
Of about $690 million in donations from these individuals, about $344 million, or nearly half, came from 36 donors with fortunes tied to private equity, hedge funds, investing and banking.
The vast majority of the individual donors examined -74 out of the top 100 - were men. Eighteen were women and eight were couples. Remarkably, 97 of 100 were white.
"By lavishing spending on both Republicans and Democrats, the ultrawealthy receive access and influence to block the aggressive, progressive policy agenda that Americans favor by overwhelming margins," said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen. "Our democracy can't function if the plutocrat class maintains an iron grip on American election campaigns."
The financial industry represented 74% of funding for pro-Democrat outside spending efforts compared with 25% of funding for pro-Republican efforts. Outside the financial industry, gambling, technology and industrial supply companies and inheritance were the most significant sources of wealth for the top 100 individual funders of outside spending efforts.
Political donors from only four states - New York, California, Nevada and Illinois - made up more than three-quarters of individual donations to outside spending groups.
This high concentration of bipartisan donors from the financial industry - and - particularly from founders of hedge funds, private equity firms and of high-speed trading firms - may hinder efforts to enact important reforms to the industry.
Public Citizen has long called for a Wall Street sales tax on financial transactions like stock, bond and derivative trades. This tax would raise substantial revenue, largely from high-volume traders and would have little impact on individual investors. Yet this sort of sensible policy change is far less likely if wealthy traders are the biggest political benefactors.
Read the full report.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
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Rep. Ilhan Omar on Wednesday condemned her Republican colleagues for proposing a budget resolution that includes massive cuts to key aid programs while backing an extension of giveaways for the wealthy and large corporations.
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The House Budget Committee advanced the GOP resolution in a party-line vote on Wednesday, with all of the panel's Democrats voting no.
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"This budget resolution is a dark vision for America," said Boyle, "one that favors the wealthy and well-connected over working families, one that makes massive cuts to the critical programs Americans rely on, and one that doubles down on the extreme demands that are driving our nation towards a shutdown."
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Boyle said Wednesday that Democrats will remain opposed to the GOP's push for extreme cuts.
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In a Wednesday letter to McCarthy arguing that "the time has come to end partisan posturing and put forward a viable path to funding our government," 92 members of the CPC noted that the GOP has pushed for betraying the debt ceiling deal.
"We stand ready to support a bipartisan funding vehicle free of poison pill policy riders that is consistent with the agreement you struck with President Biden and which was ratified by bipartisan majorities in both the House and Senate," they wrote. "If you choose not to pass a bipartisan government funding bill consistent with the Fiscal Responsibility Act, you are deliberately choosing to shut down the government."
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The CPC was far from alone in calling out the GOP on Wednesday. The Biden White House said in a lengthy statement that "extreme House Republicans are consumed by chaos and marching our country toward a government shutdown that would damage our communities, economy, and national security."
The White House highlighted impacts of the looming shutdown, from endangering disaster response and delaying infrastructure projects to undermining medical research, food safety, and environmental and public health protections.
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The current GOP-caused chaos on Capitol Hill was arguably predicable. As Chris Lehmann
wrote Tuesday for The Nation:
Today's shutdown battle involves little in the way of clear policy objectives beyond McCarthy's rapid capitulation to far-right House demands to launch Biden impeachment inquiries and the perennial demand for more draconian measures to police the U.S. southern border. "In many ways, the shutdown is the goal," says Princeton University historian Julian Zelizer... "Meaning, to create chaos and dysfunction has become an animating goal for the GOP, which makes negotiation much harder to achieve even within the party."
[...]
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Given those conditions, "small groups of centrist Democrats are holding secret talks with several of McCarthy's close GOP allies about a last-ditch deal to fund the government," Politicoreported Wednesday, citing over a half-dozen people familiar with the discussions.
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In the meantime, Punchbowl News' John Bresnahan reported after House Republicans' Wednesday afternoon meeting that "the current thinking in House GOP leadership" is that the chamber should focus on a defense bill Thursday and Friday, then pass a new CR Saturday.
Then, the Senate could take up the CR, amend it, and send it back to House, which "will take several days" and "sets up shutdown drama for [the] following weekend," he explained, stressing that "this is all very fluid."
On the Senate side, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Wednesday that "House Republicans rejected their own extremist bill, and by rejecting it, that's a dead giveaway they're not serious about avoiding a shutdown."
"Speaker McCarthy says he wants to avoid a shutdown, he says nobody wins in a shutdown," Schumer added. "Well, then he should reach across the aisle to find an agreement that actually has the votes to pass both chambers. That's the only way—the only way—this crisis gets resolved."
This post has been updated with comment from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and the Groundwork Collaborative.
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