A leftist dark money group bankrolled by a foreign billionaire provided millions of dollars to failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams’s effort to revamp America’s ballot laws.
Sacramento-based dark money group Fund for a Better Future in 2020 offered more than $3 million to Abrams’s Fair Fight Action, its tax forms reveal. Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss is without a doubt Fund for a Better Future’s leading donor– his advocacy group, Berger Action Fund, offered the dark money group more than $45 million from 2016 to 2020.
The large contribution marks yet another effort from Wyss to meddle in America’s elections. Abrams’s Fair Fight has actually invested in a huge way on advertisements prompting Congress to pass the For individuals Act, Democrats’ huge election overhaul bill that would provide the federal government unmatched power to manage the American ballot. Wyss has actually likewise contributed countless dollars to redraw electoral maps in Democrats’ favor and lobby for the Biden administration’s alternative energy efforts.
Fund for a Better Future’s generous assistance of Fair Fight likewise offers Wyss a back-door method to make favor and impact with Abrams, who is running for Governor of Georgia versus Republican incumbent Brian Kemp. Foreign nationals can not contribute to U.S. political candidates however can fund not-for-profit companies. Wyss in 2014 exposed he only possesses a Swiss passport and does not have a U.S. green card. In a 2021 SEC filing, Wyss called himself a “citizen of Switzerland.”
A minimum of one guard dog group thinks Wyss’s liberal philanthropy breaches U.S. law. In May 2021, Americans for Public Trust submitted a grievance with the Federal Election Commission declaring that Wyss “indirectly funded federal electoral advocacy through his nonprofit organizations.” Wyss has actually contributed 10s of countless dollars to liberal dark cash groups that assist choose Democrats– U.S. law, the grievance notes, “prohibits foreign nationals from making contributions to political committees whether directly or indirectly.”
“The intended recipient of these funds was ultimately a variety of organizations whose primary purpose is to engage in electoral advocacy,” the complaint states.
The FEC has actually stopped working to act upon that grievance in 2021, triggering Americans for Public Trust in April to take legal action against the federal agency looking for a choice.
“Until the FEC takes action, we won’t know the full extent of [Wyss’s] foreign interference in our electoral process,” Americans for Public Trust executive director Caitlin Sutherland stated in a declaration.
In addition to his extravagant leftist advocacy expenses, Wyss sits on the board of the Center for American Progress, a leftist think tank. He has actually contributed hundreds of millions of dollars to left-wing groups over the last 20 years.
Fair Fight Action did not return requests for comments. Fund for a Better Future could not be reached for comment.
H/T The Washington Free Beacon