Celebrities come out to back Grimes' Senate campaign

Tom Loftus | The (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal

FRANKFORT, Ky. — Ben Affleck, Nicolas Cage, Leonardo DiCaprio, Steven Spielberg and a host of other Hollywood celebrities have helped make California the Golden State for Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes' U.S. Senate campaign.

Each of those celebrities gave the maximum allowed $5,200 contribution to the Grimes campaign and were part of a $700,000 windfall that Grimes received from Californians between July 1 and Sept. 30.

That is more than a quarter of the $2.5 million Grimes raised during the first three month of her campaign, according to a report filed recently with the Federal Election Commission.

By comparison, Kentuckians gave Grimes just more than $500,000 for that period, according to the report.

U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell's campaign says Grimes' Hollywood money shows she is out of step with the conservative values of Kentuckians.

"Her report is chock full of liberal, out-of-state donors that are huge cheerleaders for the Obama agenda and believe things that are in stark contrast to what the vast majority of Kentuckians believe and are in the best interest of Kentucky," said Jesse Benton, manager of McConnell's re-election campaign.

But California contributors have been generous as well to McConnell, with his campaign finance report showing he raised $282,700 from the Golden State between July 1 and Sept. 30.

And his political committees have raised more than $1.1 million from California since his last re-election in 2008, an analysis by The Courier-Journal shows. McConnell's California take includes $5,000 from actor Clint Eastwood but also contributions from many others, including executives of such large corporations as Chevron, Amgen and Capital Group Companies.

"It's obviously hypocritical for Sen. McConnell to say she (Grimes) shouldn't go to California when he's gone to California," said Jonathan Hurst, Grimes' political adviser.

Campaign finance experts and advocates for campaign finance reform say they are not surprised that either candidate has raised so much from outside Kentucky.

"Our current system requires that the candidates ... act like the infamous bank robber Willie Sutton — they go where the money is," said David Donnelly, executive director of Public Campaign Action Fund.

"It's disappointing, but unfortunately not surprising, that we're now fully engaged in a money election where all candidates are out raising egregious amounts," agreed Richard Beliles, chairman of Common Cause of Kentucky. "It puts the candidates more in touch with the wealthy givers and less in touch with the average citizens."

Grimes' campaign declined to make her available to comment for this story.

Follow the money

The race is expected to be one of the most expensive in America. Chris Cillizza of The Washington Post wrote recently that more than $100 million may be spent by the candidates and many outside groups supporting one of them.

And Grimes made national news last month when she reported she had outraised McConnell during the first three months of her campaign — $2.5 million to $2.3 million.

Grimes, Kentucky's secretary of state, announced her candidacy for the U.S. Senate in early July. Her campaign's first finance report was posted on the FEC website last week.

But McConnell political committees have been soliciting contributions since his 2008 election, so far raising about $19 million and giving him a significant fund-raising advantage.

As of Sept. 30, McConnell's main committee reported it had nearly $9.8 million on hand. Grimes reported she had nearly $2 million on hand as of that date.

And despite the California windfall, a much higher percentage of Grimes' contributions that required listing addresses — 24 percent — come from within Kentucky than do McConnell's, which has received 13 percent from in state, according to The Courier-Journal analysis.

Campaign reports also show that McConnell got a much larger portion of his contributions — 21 percent, or $518,000 — from political action committees during the quarter, compared to Grimes' 8.5 percent, or $212,200.

"For the most part PACs, especially corporate PACs, give to people who are in power because they are looking for help right now on issues before Congress. They don't make many speculative investments in politicians," said Bill Allison, of the Washington-based Sunlight Foundation, a nonprofit group that advocates for openness in government.

California gold

Federal law requires that the names and addresses of donors of $200 or more be disclosed by campaigns. Grimes reported roughly $1.9 million in such contributions plus the PAC donations.

Grimes' report lists contributions from givers in 45 states and the District of Columbia.

And of the approximately $2.1 million in Grimes contributions from people and PACs where the addresses of the givers are listed, $707,560 — or 34 percent — came from California, according to an analysis of the report by The Courier-Journal.

Kentucky contributors gave $510,038, or just over 24 percent of the contributions where the home state of the donor is disclosed, according to the analysis.

The District of Columbia was third at $182,297 and New York was fourth at $180,307.

The largest group of California contributions came from persons affiliated with the movie studio DreamWorks Animation, who gave at least $77,950 to Grimes.

An analysis of the report also shows that several officials of other entertainment companies in Southern California — Warner Brothers, Live Nation and William Morris Endeavor — also gave significant amounts to Grimes.

News outlets from Politico to The Hollywood Reporter reported in early September that DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg helped organize the fundraising for Grimes in Hollywood, and Katzenberg also contributed $5,200.

Hurst declined to comment on Katzenberg's role or other details about the Hollywood fundraising. However, Grimes' campaign finance report shows her campaign owes $8,928 to the swank Spago Beverly Hills restaurant for food and beverages, and paid $2,587 to three other Southern California restaurants in September.

"Alison Grimes' report shows — as President (Barack) Obama found out in 2012 versus his 2008 campaign — that Hollywood has become one of the biggest sources of contributions for a lot of Democratic candidates," Allison said.

Small contributors

Grimes' report also showed she received a much larger amount of fundraising in small contributions than did McConnell in the quarter.

Her slightly more than $415,000 in total donations of under $200 each represented 17 percent of her total contributions for the period, while McConnell's campaign raised about $145,000 in contributions of less than $200 — only 6 percent of his total.

And while only a small fraction of the contributions in the Senate race so far have come from Kentucky, Allison said it's likely to get even smaller.

"I think the closer you get to the election, the more you are going to see outside money pouring in," he said. "Not just money flowing to the campaigns, but spending by outside groups with very little interest in Kentucky politics but a huge interest in national politics will be flooding the state with ads."