EXCLUSIVE — Republicans in Kansas plan to back a proposal to close an alleged loophole allowing foreign money to fund statewide ballot measures, the Washington Examiner has learned.
The introduction of the bill could come as early as January 2025, said GOP state Rep. Pat Proctor, the chairman of the Elections Committee and an assistant professor in the homeland security program at Wichita State University. It grew out of Republican-led concerns over the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a Democratic dark money group based in Washington, D.C., spending around $1.5 million in 2022 to oppose an abortion-related amendment to the state’s constitution.
The Sixteen Thirty Fund, which is part of a constellation of nonprofit organizations managed by a consulting firm called Arabella Advisors, has received hundreds of millions of dollars since 2016 from the Berger Action Fund, tax records show. Based in Washington, the Berger Action Fund is bankrolled by Hansjörg Wyss, a Swiss billionaire whose donations have landed him in the crosshairs of congressional and state investigations into foreign influence in the United States.
BILLIONAIRE HANSJÖRG WYSS AT CENTER OF GOP’S FOREIGN INFLUENCE ‘LOOPHOLE’ FIGHT
“There is nothing to prevent these dark money nonprofits from using foreign money to influence Kansas elections,” Proctor told the Washington Examiner. “I am of the mind that Kansas elections should be decided by Kansans and not some foreign billionaire.”
“We’ve got to get foreign money out of our elections,” Proctor said. “This is one of my top priorities.”
News of the GOP-led plans to thwart foreign influence comes after Republicans successfully passed a law in Ohio that banned foreign nationals from funding ballot measures. The Sixteen Thirty Fund routed more than $8 million last year to two political action committees behind a successful effort enshrining abortion rights in the state’s constitution, according to tax records.
Following the passage of the Ohio ban, the Sixteen Thirty Fund stopped funding a redistricting ballot amendment that failed in November. In Ohio, Republicans zeroed in on Wyss’s giving as a key example of the alleged funding loophole. His wealth is also routed through a private foundation in Washington that supports left-leaning organizations and conservation causes.
Wyss, 89, lives in Wyoming and founded the medical device manufacturer Synthes. Republicans in Congress, led by the House Administration Committee, have also increasingly scrutinized the Swiss billionaire’s influence and put forth a proposal earlier this year that would amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to further restrict donations from foreign nationals.
Wyss, a former member of the secretive Democracy Alliance club for left-wing billionaires, made six figures’ worth of illegal political donations from 1990 to 2006, which the Federal Election Commission declined to take action on because the statute of limitations had passed. The billionaire once told a newspaper he “never felt the need to become an American,” though, according to Wyss’s sister, Hedi, his goal is to “(re)interpret the American Constitution in the light of progressive politics.”
“We 100% need to stop this in our state,” Proctor said.
The Republican said he is working with Heritage Action for America, a conservative advocacy group connected to the Heritage Foundation think tank, on introducing the Kansas bill. Heritage Action notably supported the foreign influence ban in Ohio that became law. Its state advocacy director, Catherine Gunsalus, is the former Kansas assistant secretary of state and lives in Johnson County, Kansas.
“They’ve got a model policy that addresses this,” Proctor said.
The plans in Kansas underscore how more states are aiming to follow Ohio’s playbook and use Wyss as an example of how to clamp down on the alleged foreign funding loophole. Wyss’s influence is felt in other ways in Kansas, because the billionaire’s foundation helps fund the umbrella group for the left-leaning Kansas Reflector news outlet.
A 2023 poll sponsored by Honest Elections Project Action, a conservative advocacy group, found that 78% of people think foreign nationals should not be influencing elections.
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The Sixteen Thirty Fund did not respond to a request for comment.
“The Wyss Foundation and Berger Action Fund support organizations and policies that lower the cost of healthcare, promote economic opportunity, and conserve and expand access to our public lands,” said Marneé Banks, a spokeswoman for the Wyss-backed nonprofit groups. “Both organizations comply with laws and rules governing their activities and prohibit grants from being used to support or oppose political candidates or parties.”