MN Republicans fighting over use of WinRed

[dflprincess]

Apparently just over half the $202K raised using WinRed went to a company named IMGE LLC for credit card processing fees.

I wouldn't be surprised if IMGE gets traced to the Trumps.

https://www.minnpost.com/glean/2021/04/minnesota-gop-embroiled-in-dispute-over-use-of-trump-endorsed-winred-fundraising-platform/

[SWBTATTReg]

1. It figures. The so called business experts, the republicans, got taken. Serves them right.

[TreasonousBastard]

2. I dunno. If it's these guys: imge.com it's a full service campaign organization...

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/winred-trump-minnesota-fundraising-fees_n_60663f7fc5b6aa24bc60960a

says credit card fees are not too far from what ActBlue takes.

Looks like they signed up for something more than they wanted.

[Midnight Writer]

3. I'm sure WinRed has a well paid "management board" made up of GOP family and friends.

Perhaps our free press should look into exactly who is getting this profit.

[Celerity]

5. here (it is one giant grift)

Of the $202,126 raised by the Minnesota Republican Party online, $103,607 went to WinRed, with most or all of it passed on to IMGE LLC, based in Alexandria, Virginia

https://imge.com/about-us/




and

here is the top dog at WinRed



The $1 million upside for an RNC digital guru (2017)

The GOP's top digital officer in 2016 has profited handsomely from a firm he co-founded that collected online campaign contributions on behalf of Donald Trump and the Republican Party.

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/04/republican-digital-guru-upside-237311

The Republican Party’s top digital strategist in 2016 got a nearly $1 million payout from a firm he co-founded that collected online contributions to the party and its nominee, Donald Trump — despite earlier claims that the strategist had severed his ties to the company.

Gerrit Lansing’s joint roles, while legal, have raised questions of cronyism and profit-making at the Republican National Committee — and now sparked an internal review “to prevent a situation like this from happening again,” the RNC told POLITICO in a statement.

Republican operatives representing multiple GOP presidential and Senate campaigns said that Lansing pushed them to use the company he co-founded, Revv, to collect their online donations after he was hired for the top RNC job — and that he used the fact that the RNC was using his platform as a selling point. Lansing was subsequently named to a top role in Trump’s White House.

[Midnight Writer]

7. Thank you. Just when I was thinking I'm getting too cynical.

[uponit7771]

9. WOW !!!

[Blue Owl]

4. I call dibs on LoseRed

[Silent3]

6. I automatically assumed all along that most of Trump fundraising was going to grift

Trump himself doing the grifting, other people jumping in on the grifting bandwagon, people grifting Trump and the Republican party... lots of lying, cheating, skimming, and backstabbing all around.

[tanyev]

8. A time honored Republican tradition. From 2010:

Notorious GOP Firm Still Fleecing Longshot Candidates

BMW Direct, the GOP fundraising firm known for taking long-shot candidates for a ride while raking in big bucks off their campaigns, has re-emerged under a new name — but with a similar modus operandi. And this time around, even some Republicans are crying foul, with one consultant accusing the firm of engaging in “sub-prime fundraising.”

One 2010 client of BMW Direct — now rechristened as Base Connect — is William Russell, the retired lieutenant colonel who is running for the Pennsylvania Congressional seat of the late John Murtha. Russell’s campaign raised over $895,000 in the fourth quarter of last year, according to federal disclosure records. But it paid over $719,000 of that amount — about 80 percent — to Base Connect, and other companies associated with it, which ran the company’s direct-mail fundraising program. For the year as a whole, Russell’s campaign raised over $2.8 million, but spent over $2.6 million — much of it again going to Base Connect — leaving it with cash on hand of just $211,000.Those numbers were first noted last week in a blog post by Bill Pascoe, a veteran Republican consultant, who declared, very slightly inflating Base Connect’s take: “Keeping 82 cents out of every dollar you gross isn’t fundraising, it’s highway robbery. You might as well call it subprime fundraising.”

Three GOP consultants who spoke to TPMmuckraker agreed that the percentage of dollars raised that Base Connect and its affiliated companies keep is far more than standard. One said most direct-mail fundraising firms take no more than a third. “Anything more than half doesn’t pass the laugh test,” he said, adding of Base Connect: “They have an awful reputation.” Another put the standard rate at no more than 20 percent. “They’re not serving the interests of the candidate,” he said. A third, choosing his words carefully, said that Base Connect’s approach is “not a business practice that I endorse.” Base Connect’s president and CEO, Kimberly Bellissimo, did not respond to a request for comment.

But its inflated compensation for fundraising isn’t the only Base Connect business practice that’s causing concern in Republican circles. Scott Mackenzie is listed on federal disclosure reports as the treasurer for Russell’s campaign — as he has been for several other Base Connect clients in the past. In fact, as we reported in 2008, Base Connect’s website lists Mackenzie as a staffer with the firm, and also lists his own firm, Mackenzie and Company — which works out of the same Washington building — as a Base Connect “strategic partner.” The arrangement effectively allowing Mackenzie to oversee campaign accounts that cut checks to his colleagues. Another “strategic partner,” Legacy List Marketing, is run out of the same Washington office as Base Connect, as is an officially independent PAC, Freedom’s Defense Fund, which recently commissioned a Zogby poll that showed Russell leading his GOP primary. As one Republican consultant put it to TPMmuckraker last week: “The issue is: how many sides of the table are they on?”

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/notorious-gop-firm-still-fleecing-longshot-candidates