Sen. Dean Heller paid son at least $52,500 in campaign cash for social media consulting

U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., paid his son’s company at least $52,500 in campaign funds over the past two years, according to a Reno Gazette Journal review of election filings.

Reports filed by Nevada’s senior senator show Heller Enterprises LLC — a little-known music production company started by Harrison Heller in 2013 — was the Heller campaign’s second-highest-paid social and digital media consultant since July 2016.

The Utah-based business has no other employees. It is not listed as a paid vendor for any other federal election campaign.

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Yet an RGJ analysis of thousands of campaign finance disclosures reveals the company was among the 20 best-paid social media consultants hired by a federal campaign committee over the past decade. It was the fourth-highest-paid such vendor across 11 Western states over the same time period.

Those payments raised eyebrows among good-government watchdogs, who pointed out that federal law bars candidates from overpaying family members for campaign services.

Candidates' habit of hiring family members, while fairly common, has long been criticized by reformers who say it smacks of nepotism and self-dealing.

“Unfortunately, as a matter of policy, it doesn’t look unusual,” said Meredith McGehee, executive director at Issue One, a nonprofit, nonpartisan group that advocates for stronger ethics and campaign finance rules. “I say unfortunately because it lends itself, certainly, to the appearance that there is self-enrichment going on.

“I think it’s bad policy. … But all the candidates love it, including current members of Congress. Politically, the powers that be see (campaign) money as their own personal stash.”

In an email, Harrison Heller said he was being paid below market rate for his work on the campaign, though he said he wasn’t doing it for the money.

“My father is my role model,” he said. “He has done amazing work for Nevada and it is an honor to be a part of telling his story.”

The 29-year-old said his campaign duties included "driving content" for Instagram, taking hundreds of photos and shooting hundreds of hours of video.

He provided more than two dozen examples of that work for the campaign, including video interviews with constituents and recording B-roll from the campaign trail. The work portfolio also included two brief videos relaying family members' birthday wishes to Dean Heller.

Harrison Heller cited Gap, Coca-Cola and Marriott among his non-campaign clients, and pointed to childhood experiences working to get his dad elected as his only past campaign experience.

Dean Heller's campaign defended the hire in a statement.

"Harris Heller produces quality content at a cheap discount to the campaign," the statement read. "He creates social and digital media for Fortune 500 companies. He is an important part of our team and we are lucky to have him."

Campaign spokesman Keith Schipper said Harrison Heller was paid a $2,500 monthly retainer for his services.

The cost of a professionally produced campaign video can vary greatly, according to a February article in Campaigns & Elections magazine. The industry trade publication found some campaigns spend as much $25,000 to produce fewer than five campaign videos.

Other firms paid

Harrison Heller is perhaps best known for a series of YouTube videos produced alongside his wife, singer Kenzie Nimmo. A LinkedIn profile page describes him as a musician and social media influencer, as well as the president of Heller Enterprises. It does not disclose any prior political consulting or campaign work experience.

“If I’m not playing guitar, Snapchatting or streaming on Twitch, you should probably call the police,” the LinkedIn profile quips.

Three among the most viewed videos posted to Harrison Heller’s YouTube profile are entitled “Chapstick challenge with consequences,” “I’m doing a nude scene in Grey’s Anatomy,” and “Emmy’s butt receipt.”

Photos published last year on the former BYU student’s social media accounts document a pair of trips to Paris and Thailand, each posted within two weeks of receiving a four-figure check from Heller’s camp.

State business filings show Heller Enterprises LLC operated under an expired business license for at least part of the time it worked for the campaign. That license was reinstated in September 2017. The company has no discernible presence on social media.

Election filings show Dean Heller's campaign has since hired two other companies to help handle social and digital media consulting tasks. Tagged Digital, based in Las Vegas, and Bask Digital Media, in San Diego, both maintain an extensive online footprint.

The latter boasts a six-person team dedicated to building campaign websites, targeting digital ads and crafting email blasts. The former is a company affiliated with Heidi Tagliaferri, a digital messaging guru with experience on several Republican campaigns. She is now a paid Heller campaign staffer.

Bask was hired in May 2017. It has been paid roughly $54,000 for its social and digital media consulting efforts — or about $2,000 more than Heller Enterprises was paid since July 2016.

Tagged, like Heller Enterprises, was first hired in July 2016. It was paid a little more than $19,000 for its social media consulting work, almost three times less than the company run by Heller’s son.

'A red flag'

This year could be the toughest test of Dean Heller’s political life.

Heller, the only Senate Republican up for re-election in a state won by Hillary Clinton, has worked hard to repair his relationship with President Donald Trump after distancing himself from the president on the 2016 campaign trail.

Opponents have also battered the GOP senator over his well-publicized waffling on health care. He last year opposed a Trump-backed effort to repeal and replace Obamacare, only to turn around and support a narrower version of the repeal effort.

The former congressman and Nevada secretary of state can breathe a little easier after insurgent candidate Danny Tarkanian dropped his bid for the GOP Senate nomination at Trump’s request.

Heller is now considered a heavy favorite to beat five little-known GOP hopefuls in a primary election scheduled for June 12, setting the stage for a closely-watched November showdown with likely Democratic foe U.S. Rep. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev.

Both candidates can expect heightened scrutiny of their campaign spending as that race draws closer.

Election reform advocates said payments to Heller’s son are no exception.

“Any payment to a candidate’s family member that seems unusually high is a red flag for me,” said Paul S. Ryan, vice president for policy and litigation at Common Cause, a liberal-leaning nonprofit watchdog group. “Candidates should exercise an abundance of caution in this area and should be prepared to publicly justify such expenses to the public, the press and, most importantly, to the FEC.”