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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBillionaires Flooded Republicans' Coffers Just Before the Tax Cuts Passed
Billionaires Flooded Republicans Coffers Just Before the Tax Cuts Passed
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/02/billionaires-flooded-republicans-coffers-just-before-the-tax-cuts-passed/
In late June 2017, Texas political mega-donor Doug Deason had a stern message for Republicans seeking campaign donations: The Dallas piggy bank was closed until they repealed Obamacare and passed major tax cuts. Deason said he had urged about two dozen of his wealthy Texas friends to do the same. The billionaire Koch brothers Charles and David also hinted at withholding money.
Just weeks later, the GOP effort to repeal Obamacare collapsed. Tax reform, which one Republican senator said would make repealing Obamacare look like a piece of cake, ominously loomed as the next item on the GOP agenda, and time was running out. Panic set in. By November, as Congress struggled to push a massive tax cut bill forward, Rep. Chris Collins from New York summed up the stakes: My donors are basically saying: Get it done or dont ever call me again.'
Lawmakers got it done. Just days before the holiday break, relieved Republicans delivered those wealthy donors what they wanted: one of the biggest tax cuts in history, one that would almost exclusively benefit the wealthy.
From the looks of it, GOP politicians got what they wanted, too. From the time the tax bill was first introduced on Nov. 2, 2017, until the end of the year, a 60-day period, dozens of billionaires and millionaires dramatically boosted their political contributions unlike they had in past years, giving a total of $31.1 million in that two months, a Center for Public Integrity analysis of data from the Center for Responsive Politics found.
The Centers analysis found that 144 wealthy donors, some household names and some behind-the-scenes, contributed at least $50,000 to Republicans and conservative groups in that time frame. For 87 of those, three out of five, the surge of giving at years end reflected a marked change in their giving behavior. These well-heeled donors increased the share of their annual giving in the last two months of 2017 compared with previous off-year elections going back to 2009.
Most telling, say campaign finance experts, is that 25 wealthy donors gave all their 2017 money in the final two months of the year, the first time they did so during the previous four off-election years2009, 2011, 2013, 2015, according to the Centers analysis of data collected by the Center for Responsive Politics. The contributions the Center analyzed do not include the hundreds of millions of dollars given to dark money groups, which are not required to identify donors.
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IADEMO2004
(5,554 posts)SWBTATTReg
(22,112 posts)But for donors. WEALTHY donors who really don't need this money (or they are in a hissy fit about paying anything in taxes even thought they can vastly afford it).
Voting rights need to be enhanced and expanded, and protected more permanently. Campaign money needs to be taken out of the equation. The elections need to be fair and balanced, without the filthy taint of this dirty money.