Dark, powerful money? The left has a monopoly here, too, via the creation of a new “sponsor” model. Take Arabella Advisers, also the subject of a Capital Research Center report. Arabella is a for-profit, privately held entity. It manages four generously funded liberal nonprofits, which according to tax filings between 2013 and 2017 received $1.6 billion in donations. Those four entities in turn collectively “sponsor” dozens of political outfits. The beauty of this arrangement, for the left, is that the “projects” don’t have to disclose any information—salaries, vendors, original funders, boards, nothing. They are black holes.
And they are influential. Just one of these recent “pop-up” groups is Demand Justice, a “project” of Arabella’s Sixteen Thirty Fund. The outfit got rolling in early 2018, with the express purpose of combating Republican judicial nominees, and was a major player in the drive-by hit on Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Almost nothing is known about Demand Justice beyond that it is run by former Hillary Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon. Where are all those media sleuths when you need them to sniff out “dark money”?
The history of campaign-finance laws is largely a history of groups getting around them. As the power of liberal charities grows, so too will the calls for new rules or investigations. Conservatives would be wiser to educate themselves about this rapidly changing money environment, and get in the game. Elections are increasingly about identifying voters, engaging them, and getting them to the polls. One person at a time.
Conservatives can also start fighting more aggressively the nonsense media and Democratic claims that wealthy networks of conservative or corporate donors run the country. The reality is completely opposite, and the money Goliath is the left.