http://www.nysun.com/article/39763
Mystery Donor Funnels $250K To Edwards
BY JOSH GERSTEIN - Staff Reporter of the Sun
September 15, 2006
URL:
http://www.nysun.com/article/39763
A mysterious $250,000 donation used to bankroll a political committee controlled by a potential candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, John Edwards, highlights a gap in federal laws requiring reporting of political contributions.
In June, a closely held company gave a quarter of a million dollars to the One America Committee, a so-called 527 organization affiliated with Mr. Edwards, who became the Democrats' vice presidential nominee in 2004 after making a spirited but ultimately unsuccessful bid for the presidential nomination.
A report that the committee filed with the Internal Revenue Service identified the donor as Oak Spring Farms, LLC, and listed an address of 160 Central Park South, which is the location of the Jumeirah Essex House Hotel. The firm's "occupation" was described as "investments/savings." No other details about the company were made public.
However, a search of Federal Election Commission records linked the firm to a Manhattan trust attorney, Alexander Forger. Reached at his midtown office Wednesday, the lawyer told The New York Sun that he was not a principal in Oak Spring Farms.
"I'm simply acting on behalf of somebody else," Mr. Forger said. He declined to identify the owners of the company or to discuss its other activities.
Corporations and labor unions are not permitted to give to traditional federal political action committees, while donations from individuals are capped at $5,000 each election cycle.
The 527 organizations, which get that label from the tax code section under which they operate, have none of those restrictions. The groups, which gathered hundreds of millions of dollars in the 2004 presidential race, are free to accept unlimited donations from individuals. Those that observe certain advertising limits can also take gifts in any amount from unions and companies, including opaque entities such as Oak Spring Farms.
An advocate for tighter campaign finance regulations, Meredith McGehee, said 527 groups and politicians like Mr. Edwards should not be permitted to take untraceable donations from companies.
"It's a chance to hide where the money's coming from," the policy director for the Campaign Legal Center, Ms. McGehee, said. "That's not a good, transparent process for candidates who are out there saying they want to run for president. They should be accountable for their donors."
A spokeswoman for Mr. Edwards, Kimberly Rubey, did not respond to a request for more details about the $250,000 donation, which accounted for more than half the money raised by the One America 527 this year. Mr. Edwards also raised about $900,000 through a traditional PAC.
Several clues uncovered by the Sun suggest that Oak Spring Farms may be a company tied to members of the family of a famous industrialist, Andrew Mellon. His son, Paul Mellon, who died in 1999, had a home in Virginia known as Oak Spring Farms. In addition, according to New York City property records, Mr. Forger, holds a power of attorney for Paul Mellon's wife, Rachel Lambert Mellon, 96.
A campaign finance law passed in 2002, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, limited the use of 527 groups by federal officeholders and candidates. As a result, many of the likely presidential candidates for 2008 cannot run a 527. As a former senator, Mr. Edwards is immune from that restriction. Other potential candidates with 527 groups include Governor Vilsack, a Democrat of Iowa, and Governor Huckabee, a Republican of Arkansas.
Two other contenders, Governor Romney, a Republican of Massachusetts, and Governor Richardson, a Democrat of New Mexico, chair the governors' associations for their respective parties. Those groups are organized under section 527 and can take individual and corporate donations in unlimited amounts.
In the 2004 presidential contest, 527 groups dominated the airwaves. Organizations such as Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ran ads attacking the Democratic nominee, Senator Kerry of Massachusetts, while others, like the Media Fund, savaged President Bush. According to a Washington research group, the Center for Public Integrity, 527s involved in federal elections in 2004 raised about $246 million.
The role 527 groups will play in this year's congressional contests is still uncertain. Some of the major groups on both sides have shut down or ceased fund-raising. The Progress for America Voter Fund, which raised $45 million in 2004 and ran ads supportive of Mr. Bush, received only $25 in contributions during the first half of 2006.
On Monday, several prominent Democrat activists filed papers with the IRS to establish a new 527 group, the September Fund. The fund, whose creation was first reported yesterday by the New York Times, is the brainchild of a veteran political strategist, Harold Ickes. In 2004, he worked with groups that spent about $140 million on independent advertising and get out the vote efforts.
Mr. Ickes, who served as a deputy chief of staff to President Clinton and is a key political counselor to Senator Clinton, did not return calls seeking comment for this article. However, another top adviser to Mrs. Clinton, Howard Wolfson, confirmed to the Sun yesterday that he was involved in discussions about the September Fund and will aid the effort.
"I'll be helping out. I don't know exactly how," Mr. Wolfson said. He stressed that the new group had no connection to Mrs. Clinton.
One of those behind the September Fund said it was established out of concern that official Republican Party committees had amassed a substantial financial advantage over the corresponding fund-raising groups on the Democratic side. Some Democrats are also worried that the dormant Republican 527 groups could suddenly come alive in the next few weeks and ambush Democratic candidates.
Most of the decline in the nationally oriented 527s is due to a natural drop in interest for a midterm election. However, political insiders and campaign lawyers said legal concerns have also changed some groups' behavior and intimidated some donors. A lawsuit seeking to force contribution limits on 527 groups is advancing in federal court in Washington. The Federal Election Commission has also become somewhat more aggressive, sending subpoenas to some major donors from 2004 and signaling that overtly political fund-raising pitches could cause 527 groups to lose the right to take unlimited donations.
"I do think the legal landscape has more uncertainty," a campaign finance lawyer, Jan Baran, said.
A new ad from Progress for America warns that "many … would cut and run" in the war on terror, but the ad does not say explicitly who it is criticizing, nor does it directly praise Mr. Bush or Republicans. The ad is being paid for out of a 501(c)(4) entity, which can take donations from anywhere and not have to disclose its donors.
A billionaire investor and philanthropist who bankrolled several Democratic 527s in 2004, George Soros, will do less this year, according to his spokesman, Michael Vachon. "George is not spending $26.7 million as he did in the '04 cycle. He was always about the presidential election," Mr. Vachon said.
The spokesman said Mr. Soros has pledged about $3 million to a Democratic 527 coordinating get-out-the-vote efforts, America Votes. Mr. Vachon did not respond to an inquiry last night about whether Mr. Soros would support the September Fund.
ol' Rule 8 posting: posted as I found the article interesting and indicative of hypocrisy of the left.
your thoughts?
so its ok for the George Soros & the Mellons to do as long as it supports Left wing group/candidates?
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