Georgia runoff: Warnock gets massive boost from Soros-funded PAC tied to dark money group
Gabe Kaminsky
Video Embed
Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) has received another major boost ahead of the December Senate runoff election from a George Soros-funded political action committee linked to a dark money nonprofit organization, records show.
Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker, a former NFL player, will square off Tuesday in the run-off — which is the most expensive midterm elections contest. Black Voters Matter Action PAC, which previously spent over $141,000 to support Warnock on Nov. 4, has poured in hundreds of thousands of dollars to further boost the church pastor, according to new Federal Election Commission filings.
WARNOCK BOOSTED BY SOROS-FUNDED PAC LINKED TO LIBERAL DARK MONEY GROUP, RECORDS SHOW
Between Nov. 21 and Dec. 3, the super PAC dished out roughly $387,000 to several entities for print, vehicle, digital, and TV ads, as well as texting and video production, filings show. The largest disbursement was almost $160,000 on Dec. 3 to the Georgia-based Plateau Event Productions for vehicle ads, according to a filing.
“Unlike Raphael Warnock, campaign finance reports can’t lie,” Danielle Repass, a spokeswoman for the Georgia GOP, told the Washington Examiner. “Despite playing the moderate, Warnock’s acceptance of dark-money donations from radical groups speaks for itself and we again encourage Georgians to look into his disastrous record.”
BVM Action PAC launched in 2020 with a helping hand from Soros, receiving $1.25 million from Democracy PAC, a group the billionaire founded and largely financed. LaTosha Brown and Cliff Alright, the co-founders of BVM Action PAC, also helm a 501(c)(3) charity called the BVM Capacity Building Institute and a 501(c)(4) BVM Fund.
Both nonprofit groups focus on voter turnout and election-related issues and backed Warnock in his successful runoff in 2021 against Republican businesswoman Kelly Loeffler. While 501(c)(4) nonprofit organizations are often called “dark money” groups because they do not legally have to disclose their donors to the IRS, BVM Fund’s 149 donors are listed on its 2020 tax forms, the Washington Examiner reported.
Those donors included the New Venture Fund and the Windward Fund, which are two nonprofit groups managed by Arabella Advisors, the largest dark money network in the United States. They also included the Ford Foundation, the Tides Foundation, and the Libra Foundation, three major liberal grant-makers.
https://twitter.com/MsLaToshaBrown/status/1598667748317478916?s=20&t=L-N3sXEMrOgbw_fBUU5LRw
Between December 2020 and November 2022, BVM Action PAC has raised over $2 million and spent over $2.4 million, filings show. The vast majority of that $2.4 million has gone toward independent expenditures to boost Democratic Senate candidates, such as Warnock, Mandela Barnes (WI), Rep. Val Demings (FL), and Cheri Beasley (NC).
It is unclear how much BVM Fund has spent so far during the Georgia runoff, but Albright previously said his group planned to spend roughly $1.7 million backing Warnock.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Warnock, a senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church, has spent roughly $1 million in campaign money on security despite being endorsed by groups that have supported defunding police, the Washington Examiner reported. His church has come under heavy scrutiny for owning a low-income apartment building called Columbia Tower at MLK Village, which has moved to evict residents for having as little as $28.55 in past-due rent.
BVM Action PAC and Warnock’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment.