Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) is the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), the national party’s organization that is supposed to take the lead in getting Republicans elected to the upper house in Congress.
Scott is also an inveterate crook (see post previous to this one).
So it should come as no surprise that people are wondering what has happened to the NRSC’s record fundraising haul now that the organization is cancelling ad buys and saying it has little money this close to an election.
The NRSC’s retreat came after months of touting record fundraising, topping $173 million so far this election cycle, according to Federal Election Commission disclosures. But the committee has burned through nearly all of it, with the NRSC’s cash on hand dwindling to $28.4 million by the end of June.
As of that month, the committee disclosed spending just $23 million on ads, with more than $21 million going into text messages and more than $12 million to American Express credit card payments, whose ultimate purpose isn’t clear from the filings. The committee also spent at least $13 million on consultants, $9 million on debt payments and more than $7.9 million renting mailing lists, campaign finance data show.
“If they were a corporation, the CEO would be fired and investigated,” said a national Republican consultant working on Senate races. “The way this money has been burned, there needs to be an audit or investigation because we’re not gonna take the Senate now and this money has been squandered. It’s a rip-off.”
The NRSC’s chairman, Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, has already taken heat from fellow Republicans for running ads featuring him on camera and releasing his own policy agenda that became a Democratic punching bag — leading to jokes that “NRSC” stood for “National Rick Scott Committee” in a bid to fuel his own presumed presidential ambitions.
Other spending decisions, such as putting about $1 million total into reliably blue Colorado and Washington earlier this month sparked fresh questions after the committee turned around and canceled buys in core battlegrounds.
$12 million on unnamed American Express transacations?
This kind of thing has Scott’s fingerprints all over it.
You can read the rest of the WaPo article at this link.
It would actually be hilarious if the GOP’s hope of taking over the Senate were partially dashed because they chose one of its shadiest members to lead the effort.