Meet the GOP Mega-Donors of the 2016 Election

By Tim Dickinson, Rolling Stone

12 March 16

Republican money machine is keeping Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio in the race

he big money coursing through American politics in the current primary contest is shattering all records. Through March 10, more than $245 million in Super PAC money had been spent on the 2016 presidential race, compared to less than $80 million at the same point in 2012.

"What's going on in the 2016 election is completely unprecedented," says Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, a top campaign-finance watchdog. "Citizens United has turned our political system into a sandbox for the wealthiest people in the country to play in — and that's what they're doing."

The influx of cash warped the Republican race from the beginning. Super PACs stocked with mega-donor millionaires put a stamp of credibility on GOP candidates as they jockeyed for early momentum. "A smaller and smaller slice of the population has a major say in who runs, who they listen to," says Noah Bookbinder, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "It's very alarming."  

Unlimited Super PAC donations are now sustaining a pair of contenders in the race, Sens. Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio — who in other elections would have been knocked out by the supernova Trump campaign, fueled by can't-turn-away media coverage and massive personal wealth. (Acting as his own mega-donor, Trump has steered more than $17 million into his campaign.)

Who are the millionaires and billionaires pouring cash into Super PAC coffers? Below, we examine the nine individuals and families who have spent at least $2 million to support Cruz or Rubio, according to Federal Election Commission data crunched by the Center for Responsive Politics. (The fourth Republican still standing, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, is also supported by a Super PAC, but its top donation maxes out at $1 million.)

Looking at the mega-donors aligned behind the candidates, clear themes emerge: Rubio is backed by staunch supporters of the nation of Israel, as well as hedge-fund titans who would gain from his plan to end taxation of investment income. Cruz depends on a smaller, more ideological cadre of donors. But their pet causes — eliminating the IRS, accelerating fracking, opposing gay rights — find loud expression in the candidate's stump speeches and policy proposals.

Despite the record sums being spent, big names are surprisingly absent from the donor rolls. Casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson — who spent at least $98 million on the 2012 presidential race — has not donated to a Super PAC in 2016. Cash from the Koch brothers is also MIA this primary season. And representatives of both Adelson and the Kochs tell Rolling Stone they are not behind a top "dark-money" group spending millions to elect Rubio.

Money alone can't buy the GOP nomination, of course. Jeb Bush's Super PAC Right to Rise USA raised nearly $120 million for a campaign that netted Bush just four convention delegates. But the flood of cash from the super-rich, says Wertheimer, "creates the opportunity to corrupt government decisions for those who happen to invest in the winner" — decisions, he cautions, that "invariably come at the expense of the American people."

Meet the mega-donors trying to buy their guy into the White House.