House Democratic Leadership (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

The House Democrats’ official campaign arm is attracting controversy by rejecting political consulting firms and individuals that work with insurgent primary challengers.

But several of those firms are still getting business from progressive House primary candidates and even presidential contestants.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee maintains a policy to “blacklist” these consultants by denying them sought-after contracts in an attempt to shield its members from the type of primary challenges that rattled entrenched Democrats during last year’s midterms. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez scored the biggest upset when she took down longtime Rep. Joe Crowley, an ascendant Democrat and a major fundraiser for the DCCC.

The policy has been in place since March, and its effect on primary challengers is clear. Often lacking in cash, these candidates already make for an unattractive client for political consultants, given that their campaigns offer little-to-no profit. The DCCC policy scares off more firms, leaving the candidates with even fewer options.

How the policy affects firms that work with primary challengers isn’t as straightforward. The DCCC offers millions of dollars in lucrative contracts every election cycle, but several “blacklisted” firms told OpenSecrets they didn’t expect to get contracts with the party anyway. Others said they aren’t interested in working with the DCCC, irregardless of the controversial policy.

On the other hand, vendors said the policy could be scaring some House incumbents away, especially those in competitive races who are expected to work closely with the DCCC, while artificially elevating firms that adhere to the controversial policy.

Keegan Goudiss, CEO of Revolution Messaging, the digital fundraising firm that helped power Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign, said it was impossible to know whether the blacklist was costing the firm clients, as candidates won’t cite the policy as a reason. But it appeared to make a difference.

“I think we’ve lost more business than we’ve gained because of it,” Goudiss said. “We get the sense that we aren’t being recommended as much as we used to.”

The firm is helping Democrat Alp Basaran launch his campaign to unseat longtime Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.). But after working with dozens of House Democrats in 2018, Revolution Messaging was paid by just one major House candidate — Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) — after the DCCC blacklist went into effect.

Meanwhile, the policy doesn’t appear to influence candidates for Senate and president. Revolution Messaging was paid by 2020 presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren, Tulsi Gabbard, Amy Klobuchar, Marianne Williamson and Sanders. It also received more than $14,000 by the DCCC’s equivalent in the Senate, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, after the blacklist policy went into effect.

The policy doesn’t stop some progressive firms from making plenty of money elsewhere. Middle Seat, run by alumni of Bernie Sanders’ 2016 campaign, is the top recipient of campaign funds among “blacklisted” firms, taking in more than $2.7 million to start the year.

The digital consulting firm received more than $1 million from Beto O’Rourke’s presidential campaign for digital advertising while also working with Ocasio-Cortez and some progressive primary challengers. Those include Lindsey Boylan, who is challenging House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) and Jessica Cisneros, who is challenging her former boss, Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas).

Kenneth Pennington, the firm’s co-founder and digital director for Sanders’ 2016 campaign, said the decision to back Cisneros was an easy one, even with the attached risk that DCCC-backed House candidates choose to avoid his firm.

“Middle Seat does it because we believe in the cause and I think [Cisneros] specifically is the better candidate and I want her to win … and it kind of has nothing to do with money for me,” Pennington said. “But obviously that’s cutting off potential vendors because not everyone is going to operate a business that way.”

Pennington said the DCCC policy stifles competition, both among Democratic candidates and among vendors, making the party weaker as a whole. Goudiss said he doesn’t agree with the stigma around primaries, contending that they are healthy for the party.

The DCCC has stood by its policy, arguing that it has an obligation to protect members who helped Democrats take the House in 2018 while also recruiting new candidates who will help the party expand its majority.

Help us keep government accountable by making a donation today.

Cuellar, the Texas representative who has come under fire for his conservative positions and for accepting money from the National Rifle Association, has defended the policy by noting he has raised serious cash for the DCCC. Cuellar transferred $455,000 to the DCCC in 2018 and another $50,000 to start the 2020 cycle.

“I just raised about 330-something thousand dollars for the DCCC, so why are we going to reward companies that are going to be going after folks that have paid their dues?” Cuellar told the Washington Post.

Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.), who also faces a serious primary challenge, hasn’t been as generous. The anti-abortion rights Democrat hasn’t given to the DCCC since 2016, but then again, the DCCC declined to endorse Lipinski during his 2018 primary against challenger Marie Newman.

Newman lost by just 2 points in last year’s midterms and is back for another round in 2020. She has lambasted the DCCC’s vendor policy, telling NBC News that much of her team left her campaign after it went into effect.

Still, Newman has found a major digital consultant in Do Big Things. She reported paying the firm $37,250 for digital fundraising strategy in the second quarter.

Do Big Things has found success through the first half of 2019, receiving nearly $1.4 million from Cory Booker’s presidential campaign for advertising and consulting services. The firm also took in more than $660,000 from John Hickenlooper’s short-lived presidential campaign and leadership PAC.

The DCCC vendor policy is widely panned by progressive consulting firms. One progressive fundraiser, who insisted on speaking on background, bemoaned the policy as a giveaway to “lazy and ineffective” firms that haven’t modernized their strategy but get by with longstanding ties with the Democratic party.

The DCCC spent $297 million during the 2018 midterm cycle and paid out big sums to hundreds of companies and individual consultants. Boasting strong fundraising numbers to start the 2020 cycle, the committee raised $69 million and spent $45.8 million through the first half of 2019.

The policy doesn’t apply to all campaign-related companies. ActBlue, the digital fundraising company credited with helping Democratic candidates outraise Republicans with small-dollar donors, doesn’t adhere to the policy. The same goes for technology provider NGP VAN. Both companies have a policy of working with all Democratic candidates, including those primarying Democratic incumbents.

In response to the DCCC policy, Middle Seat, Revolution Messaging and the Ocasio-Cortez-allied Justice Democrats group joined a number of other progressive organizations in creating a website to recruit firms willing to work with primary challengers. The Justice Democrats and their affiliated group Brand New Congress are helping primary challengers launch their campaigns. Cori Bush, who is challenging Rep.William Clay Jr. (D-Mo.), contracted the group’s executive director Isra Allison as her campaign manager.

Some Democrats have said the policy will make life more difficult for women and nonwhite candidates. Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) tweeted that it risked “undermining an entire universe of potential candidates and vendors – especially women and people of color – whose ideas, energy, and innovation need a place in our party.”

The DCCC employs diversity standards for its vendors, and the campaign arm recently underwent a staff shakeup to address concerns from black and Hispanic lawmakers that its leadership was not diverse enough.

Republicans have attempted to capitalize on internal battles within the Democratic party, launching a website that tracks whether incumbent Democrats have “socialist” challengers yet. The website even links to donate pages for those primary challengers.

But Republicans groups have had their own internal conflicts. The National Republican Senatorial Committee announced they would blackball any firm that works with primary challengers after Politico reported the Club for Growth was attempting to push a congressman to primary Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).

Republican consultants took issue with the Republican National Committee’s attempt to pressure Republican candidates into using its online fundraising service WinRed. Around the time of WinRed’s launch, the party sent a cease-and-desist letter to the creator of Anedot, a fundraising service used by hundreds of Republican candidates.

Edit 8/28/19: Story was corrected to note that Cori Bush is challenging William Clay Jr., not Steny Hoyer.



For permission to reprint for commercial uses, such as textbooks, contact the Center: Feel free to distribute or cite this material, but please credit the Center for Responsive Politics.For permission to reprint for commercial uses, such as textbooks, contact the Center: [email protected]





Support Accountability Journalism At OpenSecrets.org we offer in-depth, money-in-politics stories in the public interest. Whether you’re reading about 2020 presidential fundraising, conflicts of interest or “dark money” influence, we produce this content with a small, but dedicated team. Every donation we receive from users like you goes directly into promoting high-quality data analysis and investigative journalism that you can trust.Please support our work and keep this resource free. Thank you. Support OpenSecrets ➜