Originally published at Open Secrets.
by Alex Glorioso on January 21, 2016
Scott Walker, wearing a politician’s standard pale blue shirt, red tie, and dark slacks, casually paced the stage. In a midwestern accent that embraced the Tea Party activists gathered for the Iowa Freedom Summit, he gave an emotional speech about how their prayers protected his family when it came under siege by opponents in the Occupy movement. At one point, he said, the protesters reminded him of why he became Wisconsin’s governor in the first place, spurring him to remember to “go big and to go bold.”
Two months later, even before Walker announced his presidential bid, Go Big Go Bold became the official name of a super PAC supposedly backing him. Walker had an impassioned base of grassroots backers; when he did get into the race, almost 40 percent of his funds came from donors giving $200 or less. Go Big Go Bold exploited that support to reel in donations from people who likely thought they were helping Walker run for president; 65 percent of its funds came from $200-and-under donors.
This isn’t the first time that the group’s treasurer, Bob Adams — a 2008 West Virginia state Senate candidate (he lost that race in a split-hair vote) — has set up a super PAC that appears to pad his pockets. Go Big Go Bold might be considered the latest embodiment of Adams’ political hucksterism.
In 2015, Go Big Go Bold spent only $5,637.10 in ways that seemed to directly support Walker’s campaign. All of that money went for…lapel pins.
It did spend a pretty penny, however, on…other stuff.
Go Big Go Bold’s operating expenditures came to $153,639 in 2015, according to its Federal Election Commission reports. More than $100,000 of that went to Adams’ own company: Opinion Strategies LLC. That included $75,000 for “PAC Management” and $15,000 for “email list rental.” The rest went to travel, food and accounting; some of it ($1,511 for meals) was paid to another Adams-controlled super PAC, Revive America.
Another $15,000 went to a questionable Delaware-based media company, Troublemaker Media. (See sidebar.)
Meanwhile, Go Big Go Bold’s mailing address puts it in the same building as anti-tax powerhouse Grover Norquist. Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform provides office space — or at least an address where a receptionist greets visitors and answers the phone — for a number of conservative organizations (see, for example, the Judicial Crisis Network).
After the big expenses, Adams spent about $10,000 on hotels and transportation.
Adams told OpenSecrets Blog that Opinion Strategies “provided an exceptional service at fair market value” to Go Big Go Bold. Its work included “fundraising, grassroots development, copywriting, digital media, email distribution and list rentals, compliance and overall PAC management,” he said in an email. Adams maintained that Opinion Strategies built “a significant grassroots infrastructure of conservative activists nationwide who supported” Walker.
That’s a claim that is difficult to verify. Whatever the case, Walker’s campaign seemed eager to put distance between him and Adams. “Governor Walker and his campaign had absolutely zero connection to Go Big Go Bold PAC at any time,” according to Joe Fadness, the campaign’s current spokesman..
Adams’ targeting of Walker supporters is one illustration of a growing problem since the 2010 Citizens United Supreme Court decision and other legal developments have led to a proliferation of super PACs, most of which spend little or no money supporting candidates. Many are simply jokes (see “Just Drink the Koolaid,” for example).
The big super PACs are big business. They can raise funds at $1 million or more a pop, and spend a good percentage of their proceeds to benefit candidates. But scam PACs, as we’ve written, prey on small donors who may not be savvy about politics or campaign finance, peppering them with mailers that play to their fears and make urgent requests for money. These desperately needed contributions, they write, will go toward supporting some candidate for office. Often, though, the only people benefiting from the money are those who started the group in the first place and others linked to them.
(Historically, they have lots of company. Scam artists have been using scare tactics since America’s earliest days.)
All in all, by the end of 2015, Go Big Go Bold had raised $161,553 and spent $156,023. Walker himself left the presidential race in September, and a month later was asking supporters to chip in to help pay off an estimated $1 million in campaign debt.
As for Adams, he announced last July that he’s running to represent West Virginia’s 66th district in the state legislature. By the end of the year, though, he reported raising no money whatsoever — other than a $15,000 loan he made to his own campaign.