The Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security is buying into races in New Jersey. Dems eye super PACs for state races

Shell-shocked by the dominance of Republican-controlled state legislatures, Democrats in Washington are fighting back with something they once deplored: super PACs.

The Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security, a Washington super PAC, is setting its sights on New Jersey, making the state a new frontier in the high-dollar, sharp-edged campaign finance wars that have roiled the political landscape since the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling in 2010.


With Gov. Chris Christie skating to reelection, the Democratic group is pouring big bucks into neck-and-neck races for the state Senate and Assembly, hoping to deny the Republican governor a GOP-led Legislature to push through his agenda ahead of an expected 2016 presidential run.

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The effort in this November’s Garden State elections could serve as a model for outside groups to dedicate huge resources to usually low-key state races to help their respective parties change the partisan makeup of legislatures across the country.

“We’ve never seen something to this scope that we’re talking about right now,” said Justin Richards, executive director of the Senate Republican Majority, a group supporting New Jersey GOP Senate candidates.

Most urgent for the Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security is the state Senate in New Jersey, where Republicans need to pick up just five seats to take control of the chamber for the first time in a decade. The group is already making its mark.

Just ask Niki Trunk.

A Republican who is challenging Democratic state Senate president Stephen Sweeney in his southern New Jersey district, Trunk is facing a barrage of attacks from the group, which is accusing her of raising property taxes while using loopholes to lower her own tax liability.

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Trunk spent about $30,000 on television ads through last week. But that’s quaint compared to the deluge of ads the Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security just took out to lambaste the Republican: $312,000 over three weeks.

Chris Russell, a spokesman for Trunk, dismissed the attacks.

“For starters, whoever is paying the bill for production on this ad should get their money back,” Russell said.

The group — which is run by some of Washington’s savviest Democratic operatives — is unsparing in its efforts to derail state GOP candidates.

It has sent trackers to follow GOP candidates in case they commit a verbal gaffe, accused a contender for a state Senate seat from Atlantic City of running a shoddy business and has already spent more than $500,000 on about half a dozen state legislative races. Far more cash is expected to be dumped into the effort as the election draws nearer.

( Also on POLITICO: Liberal groups lead in money race)

The Democratic embrace of super PACs in a state race is another sign of how the party has come to rely on the controversial outside groups — where individual donors, businesses and labor unions can donate unlimited sums — after demonizing them in the 2010 election cycle.

This past summer, the Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security won a key legal battle that upended state campaign finance law ahead of the 2013 election, winning the right to spend unlimited amounts of money in independent expenditures in the state.

Citing the Citizens United case, the group sued New Jersey, arguing that it didn’t have to abide by the state’s $7,200 contribution limit. A federal court agreed and ordered the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission to stop enforcing the contribution limit for independent groups. The two parties reached a settlement in July.

The group is run by some of the best-connected political hands in Washington.

Susan McCue, one of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s closest confidantes, is the organization’s president. Jonathan Levy, who has worked in state and federal races across the country, is running the day-to-day operations as the executive director. J.B. Poersch, a former executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, is the secretary-treasurer of the organization. And Marc Elias, who has long represented Washington Democrats in legal battles, led the court fight earlier this year that paved the way for the group’s involvement in New Jersey this election season.

In an interview last week, Levy said the group is working in the state to prevent Christie’s coattails from pulling GOP candidates across the finish line in November.

“The fund was created because there are serious signs that Republican strength at the top of the ticket in New Jersey will lead to real trouble down the ballot,” Levy said. “And we were created to make sure that we protect New Jersey’s Democrats in the Senate and the Assembly. We use a lot of the strategy that was successfully employed by the Senate Majority PAC, but we’re not an offshoot of it. We are an independent group.”

The Senate Majority PAC, a Washington Democratic group run by Reid associates, raised $42 million last cycle and is expected to do even better in 2014. It made its mark during the last election season by launching hard-hitting ads in states like North Dakota, Virginia and Wisconsin — helping supplement traditional party committees like the DSCC that have limits on contributions from donors.

Similarly, the Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security is telling donors it will define Republicans early in the cycle, employ an aggressive digital outreach program, deploy ground troops in key races and try to generate unflattering media coverage of Republican candidates, according to documents obtained by POLITICO.

Republican groups had the edge on outside spending in 2010, a cycle where Democrats lost major ground in state legislatures — not to mention control of the U.S. House. As a result, Democrats lost control of the redistricting progress that redraws the maps that determine control of Congress.

And Democrats watched as the resurgent GOP reversed some of their most prized policies.

In states like Michigan and Wisconsin, Republicans gutted laws friendly to labor unions. The first GOP-led Legislature in North Carolina since Reconstruction slashed unemployment benefits, loosened gun control laws and toughened abortion regulations.

Democrats fear the same would happen in New Jersey if they lose one or both chambers.

“If we don’t stand with the Democrats fighting for middle-class values, there could be no middle class left to fight for,” Levy said. “That is what is important here.”

Some Democrats see their success in the New Jersey races as essential to blunting Christie’s ability to put together an attractive legislative record. If he has a successful legislative season in 2015, it could give him momentum for his expected presidential run the following year. But if he’s in a constant fight with a Democratic-led Legislature, he may limp into 2016.

To keep Democratic turnout down, Christie’s opponents believe he scheduled a special U.S. Senate election to fill the seat of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg in October, rather than in November, which would coincide with the state races. Cory Booker, the Newark mayor and a favorite of Democrats, is expected to bring a huge turnout on a wave of Democratic support across the Garden State in the October special election.

In a June campaign finance report, the Fund for Jobs, Growth and Security said it raised $1.75 million, with almost all of the money coming from labor groups. One million dollars was provided by the super PAC of the state’s largest teacher union. An additional $500,000 came from the carpenters union and the federal building trade unions PAC kicked in $250,000.

Republicans are not sitting idly by. Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group, recently dropped $400,000 in New Jersey. But its ads are hardly as biting as those produced by the Democratic group.

Similarly, the Republican State Leadership Committee, which represents and defends Republican state officials across the country and raised $39 million in the 2012 cycle and spent $27 million in direct political expenditures, is prepared to fight back.

“There is clearly a trend that the Democrats realize the ground they’ve lost in the states and they are clearly determined to get some back,” said Chris Jankowski, president of the group. “We’re prepared to meet whatever challenge they bring.”