[Liz]

AOC’s Chief Of Staff Ran $1M Slush Fund By Diverting Campaign Cash To His Own Companies

Washington Examiner
by Alana Goodman
March 04, 2019 03:34 PM

Excerpt:

Two political action committees founded by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s top aide funneled over $1 million in political donations into two of his own private companies, according to a complaint filed with the Federal Election Commission on Monday.

The cash transfers from the PACs — overseen by Saikat Chakrabarti, the freshman socialist Democrat's chief of staff — run counter to her pledges to increase transparency and reduce the influence of "dark money" in politics.

Chakrabarti's companies appear to have been set up for the sole purpose of obscuring how the political donations were used.
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The arrangement skirted reporting requirements and may have violated the $5,000 limit on contributions from federal PACs to candidates, according to the complaint filed by the National Legal and Policy Center, a government watchdog group.

Campaign finance attorneys described the arrangement as “really weird” and an indication "there’s something amiss." They said there was no way of telling where the political donations went — meaning they could have been pocketed or used by the company to pay for off-the-books campaign operations.

PACs are required to disclose how and when funds are spent, including for expenditures such as advertisements, fundraising emails, donations to candidates, and payments for events and to vendors.

The private companies to which Chakrabarti transferred the money from the PACs are not subject to these requirements.

The complaint names Ocasio-Cortez and Chakrabarti as respondents. It asks the FEC to investigate and audit the two PACs, saying they were engaged in an "an elaborate scheme to avoid proper disclosure of campaign expenditures."

Tom Anderson, director of the National Legal and Policy Center's Government Integrity Project, said: "It appears Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her associates ran an off-the-books operation to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars, thus violating the foundation of all campaign finance laws: transparency."

Chakrabarti, 33, is a Harvard graduate and technology entrepreneur who became an organizer for Bernie Sanders during the socialist's 2016 presidential campaign.

He founded a PAC called Brand New Congress in 2016 and another called Justice Democrats in 2017, with the stated goal of helping elect progressive candidates to Congress. One of those candidates was Ocasio-Cortez, who, last November, age 29, became the youngest woman ever elected to Congress.

*snip*

Full Story

[gravelrash]

Which only adds fuel to the debate whether the Brooklyn Bimbo is a true believer or a plant.

[NH Populist]

Man, it didn't take this freshman politician long to adapt to the ways of a Democrat, eh?

[Ben Cranklin]

You folks just aren't getting her big-time perspective...THIS IS ABOUT SYSTEMIC CHANGE, NOT INDIVIDUAL INTEGRITY.

[Noclevermoniker]

NH Populist, on 04 March 2019 - 07:26 PM, said:

Man, it didn't take this freshman politician long to adapt to the ways of a Democrat, eh?

Rust never sleeps.

[Liz]

The big question for me is what, if anything, will come of this. Since she's a democrat, I guess nothing.

[Hieronymous]

gravelrash, on 04 March 2019 - 07:22 PM, said:

Which only adds fuel to the debate whether the Brooklyn Bimbo is a true believer or a plant.

I swear I read somewhere that some big money guy had a casting call in order to find someone to take that house seat, and she responded to it.

[Rock N' Roll Right Winger]

NH Populist, on 04 March 2019 - 07:26 PM, said:

Man, it didn't take this freshman politician long to adapt to the ways of a Democrat, eh?

:exactly:

Liz, on 04 March 2019 - 07:32 PM, said:

The big question for me is what, if anything, will come of this. Since she's a democrat, I guess nothing.

:exactly:

[Ticked@TinselTown]

Liz, on 04 March 2019 - 07:32 PM, said:

The big question for me is what, if anything, will come of this. Since she's a democrat, I guess nothing.

I guess we now know how she managed to get herself an apartment...

[firecoco]

Hieronymous, on 04 March 2019 - 08:42 PM, said:

I swear I read somewhere that some big money guy had a casting call in order to find someone to take that house seat, and she responded to it.

Someone posted a video yesterday that broke it all down...AOC wasn’t the only one that was recruited...There were 5 of them

[Howsithangin]

$5 to the first person who spots this story in one of the Big Media outlets <_<

[Liz]

gravelrash, on 04 March 2019 - 07:22 PM, said:

Which only adds fuel to the debate whether the Brooklyn Bimbo is a true believer or a plant.

I just noticed this and as a native Brooklynite, I'd like to set the record straight. As she was born in the Bronx, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is actually a Bronx bimbo.

[zurg]

Hey mueller! FBI! THIS is what collusion looks like!

[erp]

Hieronymous, on 04 March 2019 - 08:42 PM, said:

I swear I read somewhere that some big money guy had a casting call in order to find someone to take that house seat, and she responded to it.

The group is the Justice Democrat’s.

[Taggart Transcontinental]

gravelrash, on 04 March 2019 - 07:22 PM, said:

Which only adds fuel to the debate whether the Brooklyn Bimbo is a true believer or a plant.

I think a potted plant has more intellect than she does.

[Junto]

firecoco, on 04 March 2019 - 09:46 PM, said:

Someone posted a video yesterday that broke it all down...AOC wasn’t the only one that was recruited...There were 5 of them

(2:45)

This post has been edited by Junto: 05 March 2019 - 12:33 AM

[firecoco]

Junto, on 05 March 2019 - 12:32 AM, said:

(2:45)

It's a little long but well worth watching....Thanks for posting that

[JerryL]

Junto, on 05 March 2019 - 12:32 AM, said:

(2:45)

I watched this yesterday and I have to say that actual conservatives could learn from this. Who says that candidates have to come from the two corrupt political parties? Who says that candidates can't be recruited en masse?

A conservative group organizes and raises funds to elect actual conservatives to Congress. They go outside of the Republican party to primary people who don't owe the Republican party their careers and their allegiance. If the person wins the primary, they run as the Republican Candidate reaching people in that constituency fed up with Republicans and wanting to change direction from the inside.

You see any of those nutjobs brought on by JusticeDemocrats bowing to the establishment "elite?"

Maybe the same tactics used to shove the Democrats off the leftist cliff could be used to push the Republican establishment back towards conservatism.

[zurg]

JerryL, on 05 March 2019 - 07:18 AM, said:

I watched this yesterday and I have to say that actual conservatives could learn from this. Who says that candidates have to come from the two corrupt political parties? Who says that candidates can't be recruited en masse?

A conservative group organizes and raises funds to elect actual conservatives to Congress. They go outside of the Republican party to primary people who don't owe the Republican party their careers and their allegiance. If the person wins the primary, they run as the Republican Candidate reaching people in that constituency fed up with Republicans and wanting to change direction from the inside.

You see any of those nutjobs brought on by JusticeDemocrats bowing to the establishment "elite?"

Maybe the same tactics used to shove the Democrats off the leftist cliff could be used to push the Republican establishment back towards conservatism.

Great point.

(Guess what the narrative in the MSM would be? “Right pushes more extreme” and “The right widens the divide”....: while ignoring the budding communists on the left.)

[RedSoloCup]

Some_one is fine and dandy with this.

gravelrash, on 04 March 2019 - 07:22 PM, said:

Which only adds fuel to the debate whether the Brooklyn Bimbo is a true believer or a plant.

:yes: