If your campaign advisers have you convinced that you need to return a 5K donation from @AOC to win reelection- fire them promptly bc you’re already running a losing campaign https://t.co/umjcPflZCc
— Rachel Bitecofer 📈🔭🍌 (@RachelBitecofer) April 3, 2021
This
It appears that some Democrats in Name Only (DINO) are having conniptions when they discover that they have received campaign donations from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s PAC.
You just know that if it were Matt Gaetz making the donation, they would be completely fine with it.
The Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) is a profoundly and deeply f%$#ed up institution:
As the midterm campaign’s first fundraising deadline approached this week, several vulnerable House Democrats got an unwelcome surprise in their accounts: $5,000 from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
The New York Democrat sent the contributions to her colleagues to help keep the House majority ahead of a tough cycle without directly contributing to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, with which she’s publicly clashed. But Ocasio-Cortez’s largesse — and an oversight at the campaign headquarters — has instead raised awkward questions among her colleagues as some swing-district Democrats fret over whether to return her money before the GOP can turn it into an attack ad.
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While some are grateful for the infusion of cash, at least three Democrats have so far either declined the initial transfer or said they would return the money: Reps. Conor Lamb of Pennsylvania, Carolyn Bourdeaux of Georgia and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, according to multiple sources.
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Normally, swing-district Democrats are scrounging for every last dollar to help them secure their reelections, particularly in a first quarter that has been tougher than usual for candidates across the board. But the Ocasio-Cortez donation, these Democrats said, was unsolicited and came without warning. Many of their campaigns did not receive a heads-up from the DCCC about the donation until after it hit members’ accounts — a move that surprised senior aides and campaign consultants.
“The GOP has spent four years saying the frontliners are all socialists. Now they’ve got the receipts to prove it. Anyone telling themselves this won’t be in campaign ads is in denial,” said one Democratic consultant who works for swing-seat members.
In the political donation world, wire transfers are commonly used to quickly move large sums of money from one account to another, particularly in the final stretch of a fundraising quarter and during a pandemic. The Ocasio-Cortez transfers carried clear political risk for some members, however, and some sources pointed out that she could have alleviated the current anxiety by giving to the DCCC directly.
Yes, she should use an organization which has consistently gone after her and hers, and whose management shows a profound hostility to everything she professes to believe.
Yeah, right.
………
Still, other Democrats said they saw Ocasio-Cortez’s interest in helping endangered incumbents as a positive sign for party unity, even if they were stunned by the method. And privately, the liberal star already is personally close with some of the frontliners, many of whom were elected in the same blue wave that helped Democrats recapture the House in 2018.
She offered to make similar donations to frontline Democrats during the 2020 election cycle but only contributed to those who took her up on the offer, according to two sources familiar with her political operation.
The sophomore New York Democrat spent years at loggerheads with the campaign arm and is among several progressives who have refused to pay member dues to DCCC, in part because of its treatment of liberal primary challengers.
Her current round of donations alone — an intended total of $160,000 — amount to more than half of Ocasio-Cortez’s entire dues goal for the 2020 cycle, according to a dues report obtained by POLITICO.
Gee, massive donations from a candidate with national stature. Don’t throw me in that briar patch.
The Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) is craven and worthless.