News: Haley’s fuzzy math, and other FEC finds

Sunday, April 16, 2023

Haley’s fuzzy math, and other FEC finds

Apr 16, 2023

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By Ryan Lizza, Rachael Bade and Eugene Daniels

Presented by

With help from Eli Okun and Garrett Ross

Nikki Haley may win the prize for most bogus pre-report spin. | Meg Kinnard, File/AP Photo

DRIVING THE DAY

The first-quarter FEC fundraising deadline was yesterday. Campaigns often leak the raw totals they raised, but it’s not until the filings are released that we can get under the hood and see the details. Who fudged their totals? What big donors have switched sides in the GOP presidential primary? What weird stuff are campaigns spending money on? Who has the most problematic or surprising donations?

This morning, we’re going to run through the latest about these first-quarter numbers.

HALEY’S FUZZY MATH — Steve Shepard reports that NIKKI HALEY may win the prize for most bogus pre-report spin:

“The former U.N. ambassador’s campaign said it had raised $11 million between her mid-February launch and the end of the quarter on March 31. It got that figure by saying Haley’s campaign had $5.1 million in receipts, along with $4.4 million for Team Stand for America, a joint fundraising committee, and $1.2 million for Stand for America PAC, a Haley-launched leadership PAC.

“But after Haley filed her first-quarter report to the Federal Election Commission late Saturday, an altogether different story has emerged. Her campaign’s math didn’t add up.

“What Haley’s campaign and two affiliated groups actually raised was about $8.3 million. The discrepancy between the Haley campaign’s public statements and the numbers on the filings appear to be a case of double-counting.”

Haley got to $11 million by counting $2.7 million twice — once when it was taken in by her joint fundraising committee and again when it was transferred to two of the other committees.

As Steve points out, if DONALD TRUMP’s campaign had used this method, it could have reported that its two main committees raised $32 million, rather than the actual $19 million the campaign (accurately) touted.

But where did Haley get this novel count-what-you-raise-and-what you-transfer accounting idea? Well, it could have been from Trump:

“Ahead of the last quarterly deadline, in January, some media outlets reported the Trump campaign claimed it raised $9.5 million from the launch of his third bid for the presidency — even though the actual number after the filings should have been closer to $5 million, since it also included transfers from joint fundraising committee into other committees.”

NOT A LIE: SANTOS FUNDRAISING TANKS — WSJ’s Jimmy Vielkind: “Rep. GEORGE SANTOS’s campaign refunded more contributions than it took in during the first three months of the year, disclosure reports show, raising questions about whether he intends to see through a re-election campaign. …

“Mr. Santos, who has filed paperwork to run for another term in 2024, received only $5,333 in mostly small, unitemized donations and paid out $8,353 in refunds to contributors, according to a report filed Saturday with the Federal Election Commission. Mr. Santos didn’t spend other campaign funds, meaning he paid no staff or other operational expenses, and didn’t pay back any of the $715,000 in personal loans he previously made to his campaign. He reported about $25,000 on hand.”

FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: MTG EMERGES AS BOOGEYWOMAN — In Arizona, ANDREI CHERNY, an author, entrepreneur and former assistant state AG, is running to take on Rep. DAVID SCHWEIKERT. The House district is one of only 18 won by JOE BIDEN that are now held by Republicans, and it is one of only nine GOP-held seats currently ranked as tossups by The Cook Political Report. (In his reelection in November, Democratic Sen. MARK KELLY won the district by 7 points.)

Cherny is well-known not just in Arizona but among national Democrats because of his time spent in D.C. earlier in his career, and has been aggressive out of the gate. He was the first Democratic candidate to feature Trump’s arraignment in a video and raised $100,000 on his first day in the race.

Now, he is seizing on a Schweikert connection to Rep. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-Ga.) that was revealed in the new FEC reports. Schweikert accepted a $2,000 contribution from MTG’s committee.

Cherny tells Playbook exclusively that tomorrow, he will be calling on Schweikert to give the money back. There are certainly lots of issues he could cite, but he’s seizing on MTG’s defense of JACK TEIXEIRA, the man arrested for leaking secret Pentagon documents. And he plans to release quite a statement:

“As a former Navy intelligence officer, I understand how damaging this breach is to our national security. Marjorie Taylor Greene's statement is not just her usual outrageousness, it is defending actions that are treasonous. David Schweikert has a very simple decision to make: stand with those supporting a traitor or give back Marjorie Taylor Greene's campaign cash.”

We’ll be watching to see whether other Dem campaigns try to leverage an association with MTG against their GOP rivals — and whether the voters care.

DINGING DONALD FOR DONORS — At the RNC donor retreat in Nashville, plenty of anti-Trump voices made the rounds arguing against allowing the former president another chance, including former VP MIKE PENCE.

Natalie Allison reports: “Pence decried ‘the politics of personality’ and ‘lure of populism unmoored to timeless conservative values,’ according to a copy of his prepared remarks. And Trump’s former running-mate described the presidential primary as not just a contest between the candidates involved, but a ‘conflict of visions’ with existential implications.

“Pence went after Trump directly on a number of policy areas, from defense and intervention in Ukraine to a ballooning national debt and Trump’s opposition to reforming entitlement programs, referring to him as ‘our former president.’ He criticized Republicans’ waning interest in waging war against marriage equality, and the reticence some now appear to have about further restricting abortion rights — two areas where he finds himself at odds with his former boss.”

More from the donor retreat:

— Georgia Gov. BRIAN KEMP: “Voters wanted to hear about what Republicans were doing to help them fight through 40-year high inflation. Not months and months of debate over whether the 2020 election was stolen.”

— New Hampshire Gov. CHRIS SUNUNU: “I don’t think he can win in 2024. You don’t have to be angry about it. You don’t have to be negative about it. I think you just have to be willing to talk about it and bring real solutions to the table.”

— A Republican donor at the event: “How in God’s name could Donald Trump be portrayed as a victim? But it’s being done. … [Trump] would lose even against Biden, which is tragic in its own sense.”

DeSANTIS’ DONOR DIFFICULTIES — FT’s Madison Darbyshire scoops some on-the-record concern from the billionaire class that — until now — has only whispered its skepticism about Florida Gov. RON DeSANTIS:

“Top Republican donor THOMAS PETERFFY is halting plans to help finance the US presidential bid of Florida governor Ron DeSantis due to his extreme positions on social issues.

“‘I have put myself on hold,’ the billionaire told the Financial Times. ‘Because of his stance on abortion and book banning . . . myself, and a bunch of friends, are holding our powder dry.’ …

“Peterffy said he no longer believed that DeSantis had the same odds to unseat Trump in the Republican primary than he did at the start of the year. ‘DeSantis seems to have lost some momentum.’”

INSIDE THE FEC REPORTS — A few things that caught our eye:

— SYLVESTER STALLONE donated $11,600 to Sen. KYRSTEN SINEMA’s (I-Ariz.) leadership fund.

— KANYE WEST’s presidential campaign reported a disbursement of $30,297 to white nationalist and noted antisemite NICK FUENTES.

— Trump’s campaign subscribed to New York magazine shortly before his interview with Olivia Nuzzi was published.

Good Sunday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.

A message from Airlines for America:

Did you know? Every day more than 780,000 workers in America make our industry go. Last year alone, airlines helped 50,000 new careers take flight. That's thousands of new jobs – pilots, flight attendants, mechanics and others – every month. In fact, job growth in the U.S. passenger airline industry is significantly outpacing overall U.S. job growth – and we are still hiring. Learn more: www.airlines.org/jobs.

SUNDAY BEST …

— Sen. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-S.C.) on the impact of the intelligence leak, on ABC’s “This Week”: “I’ve been to Saudi Arabia, I’m in Israel. I can promise you, it’s been very damaging. … Everybody in the region’s really worried, because who wants to share information with the United States if you’re going to read about it in the paper or find it on the internet? So this has done a lot of damage to us in the region.”

— Sen. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND (D-N.Y.) on whether Sen. DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D-Calif.) should resign, on CNN’s “State of the Union”: “I sit with her on the Intelligence Committee. She asks some of the most searing, pointed questions of anyone on that committee. Her legacy and her depth of experience is valuable. … A senator should be able to make their own judgments about when they’re retiring and when they’re not, and they all deserve a chance to get better and come back to work.”

— Rep. NANCY MACE (R-S.C.) on getting criticized by Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America on abortion, on “Fox News Sunday”: “I find it ironic that Susan B. Anthony would attack me. I’m a victim of rape, I advocate for women who have been raped, and that organization will no longer talk to my office about pro-life legislation, because I’m talking about birth control. I mean, some of these groups have gotten so over the top and extreme. … I’m a pro-life legislator, I’m at 15 to 20 weeks. And so there’s a lot of middle ground. I think it’s important in how we talk about these issues and offer solutions.”

— Sen. BILL CASSIDY (R-La.) on whether the mifepristone ruling could upend the FDA and wreak broader havoc in the pharmaceutical world, on NBC’s “Meet the Press”: “I think that’s totally alarmist. It’s totally alarmist. And by the way, when did the FDA [think] they could go above the law?”

TOP-EDS: A roundup of the week’s must-read opinion pieces.

Jonathan Chait in N.Y. Mag: “Why Liberals Should Hope DeSantis Beats Trump”

Robert Gates in WaPo: “The U.S. needs to relearn how to tell its story to the world”

Jeff Kosseff in the NYT: “What Protects Fox News Also Protects Our Democracy”

Annie Lowrey in The Atlantic: “The Problem With the Retirement Age Is That It’s Too High”

David French in the NYT: “How Tennessee Illustrates the Three Rules of MAGA”

J. Michael Luttig in The Atlantic: “The Court Is Likely to Reject the Independent State Legislature Theory”

Richard Weissbourd and Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) in Time: “We Have Put Individualism Ahead of the Common Good for Too Long”

Brenda Hafera in The American Conservative: “Wokeness at Colonial Williamsburg”

Robin Abcarian in the L.A. Times: “After abortion, birth control is the next fight”

Gabriel Sanchez and Carly Bennett for Brookings: “New Mexico’s early childhood education amendment is a model for economic mobility other states should consider”

Peggy Noonan in the WSJ: “Evan Gershkovich Is Not a Spy”

Joshua Zeitz in POLITICO Magazine: “Can the 19th Century Law That Banned Walt Whitman Also Ban Abortion by Mail?”

Matthew Desmond in the N.Y. Review of Books: “The High Cost of Being Poor”

A message from Airlines for America:

Did you know? Every day more than 780,000 workers in America make our industry go. Last year, airlines helped 50,000 new careers take flight. Learn more: www.airlines.org/jobs.

BIDEN’S SUNDAY — The Bidens will leave Rehoboth Beach, Del., at 8 p.m. to return to the White House, arriving at 8:55 p.m.

VP KAMALA HARRIS’ SUNDAY — The VP has nothing on her public schedule.

GO INSIDE THE 2023 MILKEN INSTITUTE GLOBAL CONFERENCE: POLITICO is proud to partner with the Milken Institute to produce a special edition "Global Insider" newsletter featuring exclusive coverage, insider nuggets and unparalleled insights from the 2023 Global Conference, which will convene leaders in health, finance, politics, philanthropy and entertainment from April 30-May 3. This year’s theme, Advancing a Thriving World, will challenge and inspire attendees to lean into building an optimistic coalition capable of tackling the issues and inequities we collectively face. Don’t miss a thing — subscribe today for a front row seat.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

VP Kamala Harris greets LA Mayor Karen Bass at a March for Reproductive Rights in LA yesterday. | Mario Tama/Getty Images

PLAYBOOK READS

9 THINGS FOR YOUR RADAR

1. JACK THE DRIPPER: A pair of new stories from WSJ’s Yaroslav Trofimov, Shane Shifflett, Byron Tau and Lisa Schwartz and NYT’s Dave Philipps, Jenna Russell, Jacey Fortin and Haley Willis delves into Teixeira, the airman arrested for the massive U.S. intelligence leak. The Times reports that in high school, Teixeira evinced “a passion for the military and weapons — at times to an unnerving extent.” And the Journal looks at the online spaces Teixeira inhabited, where people posted bigoted statements and jokes against just about everybody — except Russians. “Members of that small community, hosted on the social-media app Discord, admired President VLADIMIR PUTIN’s regime and its war on Ukraine.”

Suspected to have little strong ideological reason for posting the documents, though, Teixeira “is an example of a growing phenomenon that experts have termed ‘digital generation insider threat,’” WaPo’s Marc Fisher reports. That is, “the almost-inevitable emergence of a class of leakers who seek not to cause political chaos but rather to live life online as transparently as they can, with little regard to rules they consider old-fashioned or outdated.”

The impact: The leak isn’t significantly changing the war in Ukraine, NYT’s Anton Troianovski, Andrew E. Kramer, Erika Solomon and Eric Schmitt report: In Kyiv, some hope that its admission of Ukrainian battlefield weaknesses will spur benefactors to step up aid. As for how much U.S. allies will be miffed or distrustful, look to Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKEN’s G-7 meetings beginning today in Japan for an answer, per AP’s Matthew Lee.

The latest revelations from the docs: “Taiwan highly vulnerable to Chinese air attack, leaked documents show,” by WaPo’s Ellen Nakashima, Christian Shepherd and Cate Cadell … “Document Leaks Indicate Extent of U.S. Electronic Snooping,” by WSJ’s Warren Strobel

2. LEDE OF THE DAY: “Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can’t count on family support to take on Biden,” by CNN’s Isaac Dovere: “The Kennedys have been through a lot. They don’t want to go through this. … They’re frustrated, sad and completely opposed. They say they love him. They use words like ‘heartbroken’ and ‘tragic.’”

3. ANOTHER THOMAS SHOE DROPS: “Clarence Thomas has for years claimed income from a defunct real estate firm,” by WaPo’s Shawn Boburg and Emma Brown: “The previously unreported misstatement might be dismissed as a paperwork error. But it is among a series of errors and omissions that [Justice CLARENCE] THOMAS has made on required annual financial disclosure forms over the past several decades, a review of those records shows. Together, they have raised questions about how seriously Thomas views his responsibility to accurately report details about his finances to the public.”

4. WHO’S AT DEFAULT: “With as little as seven weeks left, GOP races to ready debt ceiling bill,” by WaPo’s Tony Romm and Leigh Ann Caldwell: “House Republicans are finalizing a proposal that would raise the debt ceiling for roughly one year while slashing federal spending and unwinding some of President Biden’s top priorities, including student debt cancellation … The emerging GOP framework could raise the debt ceiling into 2024, covering roughly $2 trillion in spending … [T]hat proposal would reduce spending at federal health-care, education, science and labor agencies to levels adopted in the 2022 fiscal year, amounting potentially to a roughly $130 billion cut. Those agencies also would be subject to new spending caps.”

Related: Rep. CHIP ROY (R-Texas) on the Problem Solvers Caucus, to WSJ’s Natalie Andrews: “If these sons-of-bitches want to try to end-run us, game on.”

A message from Airlines for America:

U.S. airlines are helping thousands of new careers take off every month. Learn more: www.airlines.org/jobs.

5. WILL MINNESOTA GO RANKED-CHOICE?: “The Hottest Political Reform of the Moment Gains Ground,” by James Traub in POLITICO Magazine: “Should the bill pass this year — hardly a certainty — [JEANNE] MASSEY and FairVote and their statehouse allies will lift ranked choice voting from a darling of democracy nerds to the most potent of the proposed reforms to the American electoral system. … Massey’s sense of urgency is palpable; yet the cause she champions is threatened both by the bitter partisanship she has targeted and by the resistance of legislators who feel threatened by change.”

6. THE TRUMP PROBES: “A top Trump lawyer has recused himself from Mar-a-Lago documents case,” by WaPo’s Jacqueline Alemany, Josh Dawsey and Spencer Hsu: “EVAN CORCORAN is still representing Trump in other cases … [L]egal ethics rules — including those in Maryland and D.C. — generally bar lawyers from acting as advocates at trial when they are likely to be essential witnesses.”

7. FASCINATING BACKSTORY: “How a Campaign Against Transgender Rights Mobilized Conservatives,” by NYT’s Adam Nagourney and Jeremy Peters: “When the Supreme Court declared a constitutional right to same-sex marriage nearly eight years ago, social conservatives were set adrift. … And it left them searching for a cause that — like opposing gay marriage — would rally the base and raise the movement’s profile on the national stage.

“‘We knew we needed to find an issue that the candidates were comfortable talking about,’ said TERRY SCHILLING, the president of American Principles Project, a social conservative advocacy group. ‘And we threw everything at the wall.’ What has stuck, somewhat unexpectedly, is the issue of transgender identity, particularly among young people.”

8. ABORTION PILL FALLOUT: “The controversial article Matthew Kacsmaryk did not disclose to the Senate,” by WaPo’s Caroline Kitchener, Robert Barnes and Ann Marimow: “The judge who delivered a high-stakes abortion pills ruling last week removed his name from a law review article during his judicial nomination process, emails show.”

9. AD WARS: “DeSantis super PAC strafes Trump in first TV ad,” by Axios’ Mike Allen: “The super PAC backing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis today debuts its first TV ad, charging straight at former President Trump with the loaded question: ‘What happened to Donald Trump?’ … The pro-DeSantis ad shows the governor saying in March: ‘We’re not going to mess with Social Security as Republicans.’ … ‘Trump should fight Democrats, not lie about Governor DeSantis,’ the ad says.” Watch the 30-second ad

STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today.

PLAYBOOKERS

Tom Cotton is not inclined to help Democrats replace Dianne Feinstein on Senate Judiciary.

Cassie Baloue, digital press secretary for Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), was crowned Miss District of Columbia USA last night and will compete in Miss USA. Pic

Bruce Springsteen is getting an official holiday in New Jersey.

Kamala Harris made a surprise appearance at an abortion rights rally in LA.

Nikki Haley’s daughter got married.

David Mandel, Frank Rich, Woody Harrelson, Justin Theroux, and Lena Headey appear in HBO’s White House Plumbers podcast, hosted by Olivia Nuzzi, according to a trailer that just dropped.

ENGAGED — Elizabeth Burgess, scheduler for Rep. Mike Bost (R-Ill.), and Michael Torounian, account executive at Bloomberg Government, got engaged at the Wharf on Friday. They met at Santa Rosa three-and-a-half years ago and ended the first date at Capitol Lounge. Pic

BIRTHWEEK (was yesterday): Troy Endicott … Goldman Sachs’ John F.W. Rogers

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Secretary of State Antony Blinken … Rep. Frank Mrvan (D-Ind.) … Ann Romney … Doug Heye … Prime Policy Group’s Scott Pastrick … Morgan Jones … NEA’s Ramona Oliver … Matt Duckworth … Sally-Shannon Birkel of the U.S. Chamber … Deborah Zabarenko … Reuters’ Andy Sullivan … Spencer Brown … POLITICO’s Dan Ashwood and Blake Jones … Chris Eddowes of Atlas Crossing (32) … Bradley Beychok … Katie Oppenheim … ExxonMobil’s Nick McGee ... Tori O’Neal … S&P Global’s Josh Goldstein … Virginia Coyne … Fox News’ Mary Grace Lucas (4-0) … AP’s Ted Anthony … Brett Coughlin … NBC’s Mosheh Gains … Frances Lanzone of Amazon … Howard Bauleke … former Alaska Gov. Bill Walker … former Reps. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) and John Delaney (D-Md.) (6-0) … former VA Secretary Anthony Principi … Fred Graefe … BCW’s Ella Burton … Matt Saunders … DNC’s Spencer Coker

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A message from Airlines for America:

Did you know? U.S. passenger airlines currently employ their largest workforce in 20 years – and we aren’t stopping there. Our carriers know that the miracle of aviation is not possible without the more than 780,000 employees that make our industry go. We understand the importance of securing a pipeline of employees – including pilots, flight attendants, mechanics and others – to accommodate growing demand for air travel across the country and around the globe. This is why U.S. airlines are investing heavily in our employees – new and old – and offering quality jobs with wages above the U.S. private sector average. In fact, in 2022, airlines helped 50,000 new careers take off – and we are still hiring.

Learn more about U.S. airline employment and hiring initiatives at www.airlines.org/jobs.