From the Wisconsin Citizens Media Cooperative: wcmcoop.com/...
“Documents obtained from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) website show that the Democratic Party of Wisconsin (DPW) has been used as a conduit to pass $207,000 from the Hillary Victory Fund (HVF) back to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) as a way to allow Clinton’s billionaire donors to skirt federal election limits.” Read the whole article here, with UPDATES as many important questions have still not been directly answered. wcmcoop.com/…
And: “….According to instructions on Hillary Clinton’s website, donors can give up to $356,100 distributed accordingly: The first $2,700 goes to Clinton’s campaign, the next $33,400 goes to the DNC, and what remains—up to $10,000 per state—is equally divided between the 32 state Democratic parties who signed agreements with the HVF.
In order for state parties to benefit from the fund, a donation of at least $36,132 needs to be made for a minimum $1 return to each of the state parties. These figures make sense of the upcoming April 16th Clinton fundraiser, where the price of admission is $33,400, and the cost of a seat at George Clooney’s table is $353,000….”
Also, “….The HVF is taking advantage of the stable of billionaire donors built up over the past 40 years by the Clinton fundraising organization. The same handful of Forbes World Billionaires repeatedly show up as top donors to the Clintons’ political and philanthropic organizations. People like Alice Walton, Haim and Cheryl Saban, J.B. Pritzker and George Soros have all contributed close to the maximum yearly limit for the HVF, in addition to pouring millions into outside spending groups on Clinton’s behalf...”
Here’s an Example:
Last December the Alaska Dispatch News reported that the state Democratic Party received $43,500 on behalf of the state party from the HVF, which turned around gave it back to the DNC on the same day:
In the same report, the Alaska Democratic Party said it transferred an equal amount of money, $43,500, to the Democratic National Committee — a move that, while legal, helps to effectively “obliterate” federal limits on donations to the national committee, according to one campaign finance expert.
“It just becomes a way to give more to the DNC to support the Clinton campaign,” said Paul S. Ryan, deputy executive director of the Campaign Legal Center, which advocates for campaign finance reform. “It’s effectively Hillary Clinton’s team soliciting Hillary Clinton’s supporters for much bigger checks than they can give to the campaign — knowing that every penny could be spent on the Clinton campaign.
Naked Capitalism’s Lambert Strether and Yves Smith are ALL over this. And IMO, do an excellent job of asking questions from the ‘financials’ aspect.
Cenk’s video explains just how much the DNC is in the bag for Hillary and how much the McCutcheon v. FEC decision totally allows Billionaires to BUY elections for candidates, and in this case Hillary.
Please read the whole article here, with updates. wcmcoop.com/…
More Updates: Seems Bernie’s Campaign is paying attention now, although I don't know how much good it will do as any wrongdoing probably won’t be ‘fixed’ till after the election when everything is said and done.
Seems that DWS is doing her master’s bidding:
“...In a letter to embattled DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Sanders campaign attorney Brad Deutsch questioned whether the Clinton campaign had "violated legal limits on donations" through activities associated with the Hillary Victory Fund. The HVF is a joint fundraising committee, which raises and spends money on behalf of Hillary for America (Clinton's official campaign committee), the DNC, and 33 state Democratic parties….” And:
”..."Bernie 2016 is particularly concerned that these extremely large-dollar individual contributions have been used by HVF to pay for more than $7.8 million in direct mail efforts and over $8.6 million in online advertising," Deutsch wrote in the letter….”
Terms like: Impermissible in-kind contributions, excessive contributions from high-dollar donors, and that Clinton may be using the joint fundraising committee to "subsidize" her campaign written by Bernies Campaign lawyer to the Clinton campaign.
“...The purpose of the joint committee's funds is to spend funds on behalf of the Democratic presidential nominees and downballot candidates in the general election, meaning that Sanders, too, would benefit from the committee's largesse should he defeat Clinton at the convention in July. But as Politico noted last week, the bulk of HFV's spending in the first three months of this year went to support Clinton….”
It’s too soon to tell, but we will see where this goes, if it goes anywhere. Read the latest article here: news.vice.com/…
Some good questions to be asking ourselves:
“….1) We understand about the joint fundraising agreement and how the DNC supports state parties. That’s presumably why the largest portion of donations to the HVF – $33,400 – goes to them before signatory states get their share. The information on Hillaryclinton.com says that any monies raised above the $33,400 + $2,700 to HRC’s campaign are divided equally amongst the signatory states. So the question is, why did the DPW give up control of its share of the funds?
2) If you are saying that the terms of the joint fundraising agreement explicitly state that the funds raised in the name of the state parties – any amount over the $33,400 + $2,700 – are to be redirected back to the DNC, why did the DPW agree to these terms and why isn’t the information on Hillaryclinton.com letting donors know that all of the funds raised in the name of the state parties go directly back to the DNC?
So the question still remains, why did the DPW give up control of its share of the joint fundraising monies? What specific items related to “work(ing) with the DNC” are paid for with the $207,000, and why do those items cost nearly exactly the same amount of money that was raised in the DPW’s name by the HVF?
Unless the DPW can give specific answers to these questions, the transfer of money, while legal, still has every appearance of being a scheme to help billionaire donors avoid the $33,400 donation limit to the DNC and the $2,700 limit to Clinton’s campaign, while delivering no specific value to the Democratic Party of Wisconsin….”