New: A top aide to Tom Steyer in Iowa has privately offered local politicians campaign contributions in exchange for endorsing his White House bid. Multiple current & former lawmakers told me Pat Murphy, Steyer’s IA sr adviser, made the offer. https://t.co/kfZHogqets
— Alexandra Jaffe (@ajjaffe) November 7, 2019
Maybe Steyer had no idea what his top advisor was doing behind his back! Quite possibly he didn’t know his deputy SC state director was going to steal the Kamala Harris campaign’s volunteer data, either. Which means that Steyer isn’t sufficiently in charge of his own campaign to keep his paid employees honest… and that some of those employees are desperate enough to ‘cut corners’ even this early. TAKE THE HINT, Tom… Get out while you can still save your reputation, and spend your millions on something that might actually accomplish something more useful than getting your emu-oid face on TV.
… The overtures from Pat Murphy, a former state House speaker who is serving as a top adviser on Steyer’s Iowa campaign, aren’t illegal — though payments for endorsements would violate campaign finance laws if not disclosed. There’s no evidence that any Iowans accepted the offer or received contributions from Steyer’s campaign as compensation for their backing.
But the proposals could revive criticism that the billionaire Steyer is trying to buy his way into the White House. Several state lawmakers and political candidates said they were surprised Steyer’s campaign would think he could purchase their support…
As Steyer met with voters in Bluffton, South Carolina, on Thursday, the first question posed to him was about the AP report. He said that he learned about the allegations while driving to the event and that no payments had gone to officials in Iowa.
“We haven’t given any money to anyone in Iowa, nor are we planning to,” he said. “There’s no way we would ever do that.”…
Steyer has largely self-funded his presidential campaign, spending $47.6 million of his own money in the first three months since launching his bid, much of that on online fundraising and advertising. Steyer has qualified for the November debate, but he remains at the back of the pack in early-state and national polls…
Election 2020 Open Thread: Steyer REALLY Needs to Go Away, NowPost + Comments (22)