• Home
  • Independent Voter News
  • Quizzes
  • Election Dissection
  • Sections
  • Events
  • Directory
  • About Us
  • Glossary
  • Opinion
  • Campaign Finance
  • Redistricting
  • Civic Ed
  • Voting
  • Fact Check
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Campaign Finance>
  3. government ethics>

House GOP Retirees Turned War Chests Into Slush Funds, Watchdog Alleges

Our Staff
March 13, 2019

Two once-powerful House Republicans drained their campaign bank accounts on creature comforts after retiring, the watchdog group Campaign Legal Center argues in a pair of complaints to the Federal Election Commission.

One complaint says that after his eighth and final term representing Jacksonville ended in 2017, senior Appropriations Committee member Ander Crenshaw took $60,000 remaining in his political war chest and created a political action committee. But instead of donating to candidates, the PAC spent virtually all the money on telephone services, expensive meals, Apple products and even a $5,000 trip to Disney World.

The other alleges similar behavior by John Linder of suburban Atlanta, who ran the House GOP campaign organization during a nine-term career that ended in 2011. He eventually converted $431,000 in unspent contributions to a PAC. The center said the committee spent lavishly on meals and entertainment and paid Linder's children $72,000 for fundraising consulting, even though it didn't raise any funds and gave very little to other candidates.


"I don't know if these former officeholders thought they could get around the personal-use ban by laundering their personal committee funds to a multicandidate committee," Brendan Fischer, the center's director of federal reform, told The Tampa Bay Times, which has reported extensively on the behavior of so-called zombie campaigns. "Their theory is flawed."

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Personal use of campaign funds is against federal law , but PACs have much more leeway – a loophole that would be closed if HR 1, the political overhaul package passed by the House last week, were to become law.

The paper's requests for comment were not returned by the former congressmen or their PAC treasurers. Crenshaw treasurer Benjamin Ottenhoff is a former chief financial officer of the Republican National Committee and a consultant for several other PACs.

Related Articles Around the Web
  • John Linder, former Representative for Georgia's 7th Congressional ... ›
  • Trump taps former Congressman John Linder for ambassadorship ... ›
  • A zombie campaign spent thousands on dinners and a trip to Disney ... ›
  • Ander Crenshaw (@AnderCrenshaw) | Twitter ›
government ethics
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

The U.S. has been seeking the center since the days of Teddy Roosevelt

Dave Anderson

Imperfection and perseverance

Jeff Clements

We’ve expanded the Supreme Court before. It’s time to do so again.

Anushka Sarkar

The ‘great replacement theory’ is nonsense

Debilyn Molineaux

Inflation will hit health of low-income Americans hardest

Robert Pearl

Caught in a draft

Lawrence Goldstone
latest News

The state of voting: May 23, 2022

Our Staff
7h

Trump looms large over Tuesday’s primaries

Richard Perrins
8h

Podcast: Abortion politics take center stage

Our Staff
13h

Your Take: Inspiring sports memories

Our Staff
20 May

GOP split: Far right gains ground in East, while losing out West

Steven Rosenfeld
20 May

Podcast: Women in and out of politics

Our Staff
20 May
Videos

Video: Helping loved ones divided by politics

Our Staff

Video: What happened in Virginia?

Our Staff

Video: Infrastructure past, present, and future

Our Staff

Video: Beyond the headlines SCOTUS 2021 - 2022

Our Staff

Video: Should we even have a debt limit

Our Staff

Video: #ListenFirstFriday Yap Politics

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Did economists move the Democrats to the right?

Our Staff
02 May

Podcast: The future of depolarization

Our Staff
11 February

Podcast: Sore losers are bad for democracy

Our Staff
20 January

Deconstructed Podcast from IVN

Our Staff
08 November 2021
Recommended
State of voting - election law changes

The state of voting: May 23, 2022

Voting
Mo Brooks and Donald Trump

Trump looms large over Tuesday’s primaries

Voting
Podcast: Abortion politics take center stage

Podcast: Abortion politics take center stage

Leadership
Theodore Roosevelt

The U.S. has been seeking the center since the days of Teddy Roosevelt

Leveraging big ideas
Your Take: Inspiring sports memories

Your Take: Inspiring sports memories

Your Take
Doug Mastriano

GOP split: Far right gains ground in East, while losing out West

Leveraging big ideas