How Much Money Has Tom Reed Gotten From Nra?
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Investigation
The Mystery Business firm That Became the NRA's Top Election Consultant
Since 2014, the gun rights grouping has paid millions of dollars to a little known contractor for ads in primal Senate races. Did it pause campaign finance laws in the process?
Heading into the 2014 midterm elections, polls showed the Republican Political party had an opportunity to retake command of the Senate. Such a change would severely limit President Barack Obama'south legislative agenda during his final 2 years in office, an consequence that was peculiarly attractive to the National Burglarize Association. In the wake of devastating events like the 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Claw Uncomplicated Schoolhouse, the president had become an ambitious promoter of new gun regulations.
To get its message out, the NRA turned to an unknown consulting firm, Starboard Strategic, paying it $19 million. More than a third of that coin was invested in must-win Senate seats in Colorado, Northward Carolina and Arkansas — 3 of the most expensive in the land — paying for a host of television, radio and cyberspace ads.
It was not unusual for the NRA to spend large sums of cash in an election cycle. What was odd was where the money was going. Earlier 2013, Starboard Strategic had never appeared in Federal Election Commission reports. Someone curious about the house would have found a skeletal website that listed no staff, clients, address, phone number or previous work. There was just some generic branding language ("Good advertising and skillful ground operations starting time with adept strategy") and a bones email address: [email protected]. Nonetheless at a moment when the stakes were high—Republicans needed six seats to claim a majority—the firm had come out of nowhere to become the NRA's top ballot contractor.
Acquiring concern of this magnitude would be an incredible feat for a firm with no reputation. The question is whether information technology was really accomplished past Starboard, or some other outfit called OnMessage.
Well-established and well-connected, OnMessage is equally transparent as Starboard is opaque. What the Federal Election Committee and the public do non know is that the two entities appear to be functionally one and the same.
In 2014, amongst OnMessage's most prominent clients were three Republican challengers vying for Senate seats in the same races where the NRA would pay Starboard some of its biggest outlays of the cycle: Thom Tillis, in North Carolina; Cory Gardner, in Colorado; and Tom Cotton fiber, in Arkansas. All of these candidates would defeat Democratic incumbents, cementing the upshot for which GOP leaders and the NRA had mobilized: a Republican bulk in the upper chamber to lucifer the one in the House. Each challenger paid OnMessage $5 million to $eight million, far more than they paid any other vendors.
Campaign-finance rules prohibit coordination between official campaigns and exterior groups, such equally the NRA, who back up the same candidate. Those restrictions, in turn, give force to a cardinal police force governing political spending. Outside groups can independently disburse unlimited sums to influence elections. Simply they can give no more $five,000 when giving straight to a candidate.
Official campaigns and the outside groups supporting them may use a common vendor, such as a political ad firm. However, the rules mandate the vendor ensure employees and partners working for each client don't share data. In that location is no evidence of any meaningful distinction between Starboard Strategic and OnMessage. Public records show the two entities share corporate officers and identical role addresses—ane in Alexandria, Virginia, and the other in Annapolis, Maryland. Internal emails betoken executives toggled between roles for both firms. A former OnMessage employee who worked out of the Alexandria location in 2014 says Starboard had no separate defended presence there. "Across some Starboard-labeled thumb-drives lying around, I don't call back annihilation within our office that was called or associated with Starboard," said the former employee who requested anonymity to avoid retribution.
Two quondam FEC chairs, ane Republican and the other Democrat, reviewed the findings of Politico Mag and The Trace, and said they constitute them troubling. "This evidence raises substantial questions nearly whether OnMessage and Starboard Strategic were used equally conduits for coordination between the NRA and the candidates information technology was supporting," Trevor Potter, the Republican, said. "It's pretty serious," added Ann Ravel, the Democrat. "It doesn't seem right." Both former chairs independently came to the same determination: "The FEC should investigate."
In a shut race, coordination can provide a candidate with crucial advantages. "When a grouping like the NRA is operating independently, there's a potential for its messaging to conflict with that of the candidate it's supporting," Brendan Fischer, the director of the Federal Reform Program at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan watchdog group, said. "There's also a skilful run a risk inefficiencies will arise. The NRA could target the wrong fix of voters, or the same voters as the candidate, which would make its spending redundant." Sharing information, Fischer went on, allows an exterior group and an official campaign to unfairly operate in harmony. "Then if candidates are spending a lot of money betwixt 7 a.chiliad. and 9 a.m., for case, and so mayhap the NRA's coin is meliorate spent between 5 p.thou. and vi p.m."
Typically, a firm serving equally a mutual vendor to campaigns and outside groups seeks to prevent its employees from inappropriately sharing information by requiring them to read and sign what's known as a firewall policy. The text amounts to an agreement to comply with the law, and makes articulate the penalties for failing to exercise so. It is not known if, or how, OnMessage enforced firewalls in races where Starboard was active on behalf of the NRA. Neither the NRA, nor OnMessage, nor its partners responded to multiple requests for comment that included written sets of detailed questions most whether Starboard is a fully operational visitor or a shell company that exists principally on paper.
The FEC is widely considered a toothless agency, paralyzed past partisan infighting, and campaign-finance laws are ofttimes honored in the breach. Only list a shell company in FEC filings, according to Brett Kappel, a entrada-finance expert, "would exist a violation of the reporting requirements." The filer "should have identified whoever was actually performing the work." Indeed, according to a 2016 FEC Full general Counsel study, "The Committee has determined that merely reporting the firsthand recipient of a committee's payment will not satisfy the requirements ... when the facts point that the immediate recipient is merely a conduit for the intended recipient of the funds."
In May, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit issued an opinion that is consequent with the assay of the FEC's superlative lawyer, and even goes a step farther. According to the ruling, using the proper noun of a vanquish company to report the recipient of money spent past a political committee could violate a criminal statute that prohibits the falsification of records to deceive a federal agency. Such a crime could result in a 20-twelvemonth prison sentence.
Meanwhile, the NRA's relationship with Starboard continues. The gun group paid Starboard more than $xl million in 2016, a sum that surpassed by more than than $10 million, the total federal ballot payments made to OnMessage in the same year by all candidates and groups, according to entrada finance data. During that ballot cycle, Sen. Ron Johnson, the Republican incumbent in Wisconsin, was defending his seat in a tight race. Johnson's entrada hired OnMessage. Later, the NRA, listing Starboard as its vendor, paid for ads boosting his candidacy. Johnson won his race past fewer than 100,000 votes.
This year, at least i of the contests that will determine control of the Senate features a candidate who has tapped OnMessage while benefitting from the firm'southward work on behalf of the NRA, according to the former OnMessage employee. In Florida, Governor Rick Scott is challenging Senator Bill Nelson, the Autonomous incumbent. In his terminal gubernatorial campaign, Scott hired OnMessage. The NRA, the former employee says, tapped the firm for pro-Scott work. Merely in Florida campaign-finance records, which practice not require filers to disclose the races in which money is spent, it'southward Starboard that appears as a vendor. Scott'south chief political adviser is Brusk Anderson, a partner at both OnMessage and Starboard, and Scott's Senate campaign has signed upward OnMessage as a contractor. The NRA, which bashed the gun control package Scott signed in March later on the Parkland school shooting, has still to wade into the race, merely its federal agenda depends on preserving a Republican majority in the Senate. The Florida race is likely to be the most competitive, and most expensive, of 2018, making whatsoever edge for either candidate potentially decisive.
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OnMessage was founded in 2005 by three veteran Republican operatives: Curtis and Wesley Anderson, who are brothers, and Bradley Todd. Later, they added three more than partners—GOP strategists Timmy Teepell, Guy Harrison and Graham Shafer—and now have roughly a dozen employees. "If you want to talk about institution Republican consulting firms, OnMessage is definitely 1 of the more prominent ones," Rick Wilson, a GOP strategist, said. "They've had a lot of wins over the last few years. They piece of work the system in D.C. very effectively for their purposes."
A full-service political consulting shop, OnMessage is peculiarly known for its award-winning, often cinematic ads. Its sizzle reel features a pounding soundtrack over snippets of emotionally charged entrada spots that alternately play for the center or the gut. Candidates that OnMessage is retained to assist elect are depicted jamming on a guitar or jawing with their dad on the family subcontract. Those information technology is hired to oppose may be portrayed by actors in elaborate scenarios, or more straightforwardly pummeled with unflattering juxtapositions and biting language. One of OnMessage'south many industry accolades is for a merciless 2014 ad against Charlie Crist, Scott'due south opponent. The spot earned a Reed Honour for "Best Blank-Knuckled Street Fight TV Advertisement."
Of all of the OnMessage partners, Todd has the nearly public profile. He pens editorials for major network news sites, such equally a recent piece on Play a joke on Opinion that takes NFL players to task for kneeling during the national anthem. On Twitter, he derides the "loony left," and appears on cablevision news shows to explain the conservative electorate to a media that he views as out of touch and uncomprehending. In the summer of 2016, during an advent on MSNBC, he famously stated, "The voters have Donald Trump seriously every bit a candidate, just they don't have him literally. The press takes Donald Trump literally, just they don't take him seriously." In May, Todd and Salena Zito, a syndicated columnist, co-authored The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics. The book examines the mindset of Trump's supporters, and has been enthusiastically endorsed by the president, who said, information technology "does much to tell the story of our great ballot victory."
Over the years, OnMessage has built an impressive roster of clients. In improver to Tillis, Gardner, Cotton, Johnson and Scott, the firm has worked with the National Republican Senatorial Committee; the National Republican Congressional Commission; the Republican National Commission; and former Senators Scott Brown and Thad Cochran, among many others. Another high-contour customer has been the NRA.
Todd and the NRA's peak lobbyist, Chris Cox, both attended Rhodes College in Tennessee and graduated together in 1992. "They're buddies," said a former employee of Cox'due south, who worked in the grouping'south lobbying wing, the Institute for Legislative Activity (ILA), and spoke on the condition of anonymity out of business for professional consequences. "I'd occasionally see Brad around the office, and sometimes, before sending out an email to NRA members, Chris would have me run the linguistic communication past Brad." A 2nd onetime ILA staffer, who requested anonymity for the same reason, said, "Brad was definitely effectually the office, non regularly, but when he was, he was in the executive suite. There was consulting with Brad over loftier-end issues that were deemed controversial. It was, 'How do we say this?' Or, 'What language practise we use?'" (Cox did not respond to asking for comment.)
In 2010, the NRA for the first time listed OnMessage as a vendor in its FEC filings. That year, the gun rights group paid the firm about $3.19 meg for its services, including the production of ads in support of Republican Senate candidates such every bit Roy Blunt and Patrick Toomey. The following cycle, in 2012, the NRA's expenditures linked to OnMessage greatly increased, totaling $11.25 million, making the business firm the NRA'southward summit federal ballot vendor by more than $5 million. Big portions of the money went toward ads attacking President Obama, who was up for reelection. During those two ballot cycles, OnMessage besides produced ads and other messaging for candidates' campaigns, but never in races where information technology was working for the NRA.
In January 2013, co-ordinate to a website registration certificate, Wesley Anderson registered starboardstrategicinc.com. The certificate provides an address for the "admin contact" and the "tech contact," which begins "OnMessage Inc. ATTN STARBOARDSTRATEGIC.COM." The site has never included any details well-nigh the new visitor. But some of the language it does employ is nearly identical to linguistic communication that can be constitute on the website of OnMessage. For example, each site has a tab for "Crisis Management." OnMessage's reads, "The political environment is constantly irresolute. Being prepared to answer to that change is an important function of any campaign and we are prepared to do it." On the Starboard site, the give-and-take "campaign" is replaced with "fight."
Two months later, in March 2013, corporate documents prove that the partners at OnMessage — with the exception of Harrison, whose name would exist added to filings in the years to come — incorporated Starboard Strategic Inc., and, as subsequent annual reports demonstrate, would function as its principals. OnMessage would never appear in the NRA's FEC reports once more.
The post-obit year, during the fall of 2014, every bit the midterm ballot season was well underway, the NRA paid Starboard millions of dollars for ads supporting Tillis, Gardner and Cotton. In the same catamenia, coin flowed from these candidates to OnMessage.
"With respect to the work being done for these detail campaigns, certain partners — not but employees — would have had to have been firewalled off from each other," Fischer, the director of the Federal Reform Program at the Entrada Legal Center, said. Kappel, the campaign-finance practiced, explained, "One style to guarantee separation is to keep employees working for the outside group at 1 role, and those working for the campaign at some other."
In the iii large 2014 Senate races, all expenditures made to Starboard carried ane of two addresses where OnMessage maintains workspace. For Tillis and Cotton, the two companies supporting the same candidates would frequently appear in FEC reports at identical locations in Annapolis. Gardner's campaign sent piece of work to OnMessage in Alexandria, where, shortly before Ballot Twenty-four hours, information technology overlapped with an NRA payment to Starboard of more than $525,000. Representatives of Cotton wool, Tillis, Gardner, Johnson and Scott did not respond to requests for annotate for this article.
After the three candidates won their races in November, and Republicans regained control of the Senate, the Onmessageinc.com biography folio belonging to Todd — the partner who is friends with NRA lobbyist Chris Cox and well known to Cox's employees—was updated. It now says, "Todd's 2014 clients defeated 3 incumbent Autonomous U.S. Senators in a single election bicycle, a feat unmatched by any Republican media consultant in 34 years."
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Despite Starboard'southward impressive run in 2014, at that place appeared to be no attempt to market the new company to other prospective clients. In fact, according to FEC reports, other than a small sum it received from the National Republican Congressional Committee—business worth less than $twenty,000—it has never had another federal election client too the NRA. Moreover, none of Starboard's partners has publicly affiliated himself with the company; four of them have LinkedIn pages, for instance, and their profiles only mention OnMessage. One of them is Todd, who used the email address [e-mail protected] to offer the former OnMessage employee a job.
There is likewise no indication that Starboard has a singled-out team of employees working within the offices of OnMessage. As with the partners, there are no staff members who publicly list themselves as working for Starboard, though a second email shows acknowledgment of double duty. Vicki Tomchik is OnMessage'south longtime primary financial officer; the chore is the only one she lists on her LinkedIn page. But in 2014, when the former OnMessage employee received an electronic mail from Tomchik, in that location were two references beneath her signature. One was OnMessage, and the other was Starboard. (Tomchik did not respond to a request for comment.)
That same year, the NRA invested heavily in Scott'due south gubernatorial reelection attempt in Florida, a race that the incumbent eventually won by a single percentage point. In the NRA's state campaign-finance filings, more than $1 million of contained expenditures are attributed to Starboard, but none to OnMessage, which was working for Scott's campaign. Unlike the federal regulations, Florida law does not require outside groups to disclose whether money was spent to support or oppose a detail candidate. But an ad the NRA published online in the fall can exist traced back to OnMessage by the former OnMessage employee. The ad tied Scott's Autonomous opponent, Charlie Crist, to Michael Bloomberg, and defendant the candidate of supporting the former New York City mayor'south "gun control agenda." (Bloomberg provides funding to Everytown for Gun Safety, whose 501c3 arm makes grants to The Trace.)
"I call up seeing people from OnMessage work on this ad," the former OnMessage employee said. Still none of the NRA's 2014 Florida expenditures was attributed to OnMessage. (Information technology is non clear whether there was any coordination in this race, but in Florida, coordination is generally permissible.)
In 2016, the NRA's federal election payments to Starboard ballooned to $twoscore million, a massive portion of the gun rights group's total contained spending for the year, which came to almost $53 million. That bicycle, when Johnson was defending his Wisconsin Senate seat for the first time, his entrada paid OnMessage almost $4 million. The payments stopped in Baronial. Just over two months subsequently, the NRA aided in the reelection endeavour, and tapped Starboard for nearly $200,000 in advertising.
The sum the NRA paid to Starboard in 2016 was split between the group'south Political Victory Fund and its Institute for Legislative Activity. The transactions paid by the ILA accounted for roughly $23.4 million. Different the Victory Fund, a freestanding organisation affiliated with the gun group, the ILA is a component of the NRA'southward nonprofit corporation, which ways its financial records are discipline to oversight by the Internal Acquirement Service. In the NRA's tax filings, it is required to disclose its top five contained contractors for any given year, and that includes contractors retained by its divisions, such as the ILA. In 2016, Starboard was non included on the listing, even though, based on what it received from ILA, it would accept ranked as the NRA's second highest-earning contractor.
"If Starboard was paid by the Institute for Legislative Action for services, then Starboard was a contractor, and if Starboard was one of the NRA's largest contractors, then it should exist listed on the NRA's 990," Marcus Owens, the former head of the IRS division overseeing taxation exempt enterprises, said.
As far every bit the FEC and the public know, OnMessage did no campaign work for the NRA in 2016 — the firm is nowhere mentioned in the group's filings. More than one-half of the coin the NRA paid Starboard that yr, about $25.7 million, was spent in the service of electing Donald Trump to the presidency. Subsequently the Republican candidate defeated Hillary Clinton, however, OnMessage celebrated the work it produced for the NRA.
On Jan xx, 2017, the day of Trump's inauguration, Brad Todd wrote a blog post on OnMessage'due south website. "When no other exterior group on the Republican side of the alley believed in this race, the NRA made its biggest investment in whatever Presidential election," he wrote. "They went in early and they went in big." Todd added, "OnMessage Inc. was proud to partner with the NRA and produce their ads in this election."
A month afterwards, OnMessage received a Reed Award for an NRA spot information technology had created the previous year. The category was "Best Ad For Independent Expenditure Campaign — Presidential," and the winning entry features a woman in bed who is awoken past a burglar. In 1 hand she grips a phone, and with the other she opens a gun safe, which suddenly disappears before her eyes. "Don't let Hillary leave yous protected with zero but a phone," a narrator warns. Currently, the advertising can be viewed on OnMessage's website, by clicking the tab labeled "Our Work."
Source: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/07/13/mystery-firm-nra-consultant-219004
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