GOP, eager to avoid picking fight with Trump, backs off calls to move on legislation to protect Mueller. Thom Tillis, cosponsor of bill, said “I don’t think there’s any imminent need to do it today or this week. Tillis aide tried to prevent us from asking https://t.co/4mV0T9w4m3
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) March 19, 2018
— David Dennison (@ShaqMalone) March 19, 2018
From North Carolina’s own WRAL, “Tillis may have benefited from Facebook data breach”:
The data firm accused of stealing the private information of more than 50 million Facebook users may have used that information to help U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis win his seat in 2014.
North Carolina voters were among the first in the U.S. to be targeted by Cambridge Analytica, which boasted that its cache of “psychographic data” could be used to build personality profiles of voters and target political ads at them to influence their behavior…
n 2014, Tillis’ campaign paid Cambridge Analytica $30,000, and the North Carolina Republican Party paid $150,000, making the GOP the company’s fourth-largest client that year. The party also paid the firm $65,000 in 2015.
Cambridge Analytica now features Tillis’ successful campaign to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan as a case study on its website…
Tillis defeated Hagan by fewer than 50,000 votes following a campaign marked by one negative ad after another on both sides.
Cambridge Analytica’s third-largest client in 2014, the John Bolton SuperPAC, was also highly active in the Tillis/Hagan race, spending nearly $1.5 million to benefit Tillis and damage Hagan. The super-PAC spent $341,000 with the company for messaging consulting.
Tillis didn’t respond Monday to repeated requests for comment on the allegations against Cambridge Analytica’s methods. Republican 10th District Congressman Patrick McHenry, whose campaign also spent $15,000 on Cambridge Analytica’s services in 2014, also didn’t respond to requests for comment…
Still, North Carolina Democratic Party Chairman Wayne Goodwin said the new revelations raise a lot of questions about what the GOP, Tillis or McHenry knew about Cambridge Analytica, what they asked the firm to do and when they found out about its connections to Russia…
Meanwhile, per the Daily Beast…
Billionaire heiress Rebekah Mercer is standing by embattled data firm Cambridge Analytica––at least for now. A person close to Mercer, who sits on the firm’s board, told The Daily Beast she has no immediate plans to leave her post there, despite a bombshell report alleging the company used Ukrainian sex workers to try to get compromising material about its clients’ political opponents.
“She is working to be part of the solution,” said the source, of one of American conservatism’s most powerful mega-donors.
“She has always worked to make sure she observes and abides by all established norms and legal mandates,” the source added.
The source said Robert Mercer, who co-founded America’s most lucrative hedge fund, is just a passive investor in Cambridge Analytica and has never been on its board. Rebekah Mercer is his daughter, and conducts broad business oversight as a board member…
The Mercers were among Trump’s most generous supporters, spending millions to support his campaign.
Wouldn’t it just be the rancid cherry on this shit sundae, if it turned out that Rebekah threw millions of Daddy’s money down a Russian rathole just for the chance to feel like she was a Serious Important Political Macher, someone “in the room where it happened”? And not just another dumb heiress like Ivanka?
By whatever means necessary. pic.twitter.com/OefpMsq18B
— Schooley (@Rschooley) March 19, 2018
Bet you are, Champ. pic.twitter.com/Li1UDLZEtb
— Schooley (@Rschooley) March 19, 2018