Saturday, August 13, 2011
Not even a week since Perry announced he would announce
That he was running for president and Gov. Good Hair has already stirred up questions about his campaign financing. It seems that in the rush to set up SuperPACs, the financing committees independent of the candidate, they forgot about the independent part.
There are currently seven Super PACs -- independent political committees that can accept unlimited contributions from individuals, corporations and unions -- supporting Perry's bid. The most recently formed is Make Us Great Again, which is, perhaps, the most emblematic of the veil of independence worn by these candidate-centric committees.The only way they could get closer would be to have Ricky;s wife or kids run one. Then they could really brawl over who's SuperPAC is the real Rick Perry SuperPAC.
The committee was founded by former Perry chief of staff and longtime associate Mike Toomey. Toomey is so close to the Perry inner circle he even co-owns a private island in New Hampshire with Perry's campaign manager Dave Carney. Toomey was also listed in a Texas Tribune report on the "folks" behind Perry.
The other pro-Perry Super PACs are no better in presenting themselves as independent.
Jobs for Vets Fund and Veterans for Rick Perry were started by former Perry legislative director Dan Shelley. Veterans for Rick Perry even made a revealing error on their initial statement of organization by checking a box stating that the committee supported one candidate and listing Rick Perry as that candidate. Super PACs are forbidden from explicitly supporting one candidate. An amended statement was filed to correct this error. Shelley has set a $1 million fundraising target for campaign efforts in the early primary states Iowa and South Carolina.
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