AOC & JustDems Paid $13M To DNC Consulting Firms Since 2019

Justice Democrats claimed to be the antidote to corrupt corporate democrats, turns out they are just democrats.

In politics we've learned following the money that goes to a politician is one of the best indicators of how that politician will conduct themselves. The biggest issue in politics is the disproportionate influence the wealthy and corporations have over policy as a result of legalized bribes. It's a shared belief by most people in this country that politicians rigged the system to serve the rich. The Justice Democrats in congress raised millions riding the popular wave of anti-corruption sentiment promising not to take the same corporate money that corrupts other politicians. In this case, if you look at how they spend their money it will be a better explanation of their subservience to the problematic party leadership than just focusing on where their money comes from.

After going through FEC filings on Open Secrets and totaling money that went directly to consultants I found Justice democrats Pramila Jayapal, Ro Khanna, Ilhan Omar and AOC gave $13 million to DNC consultants over the last 3 years. The politicians who solicited millions in donations explicitly promising to dismantle the corporate influence in the democratic party plan to do it by dumping $13 million into the nexus of corporate influence, consulting firms. The fact that they are willing to invest this amount of money into the shady infrastructure of the party answers a major question: If they aren't funded by corporations why won't they ever challenge leadership to advance the policies they ran on? The JustDems used our political donations as their buy-in to the corrupt but always profitable political machine. It's clear they had no intention of following through on the promise to root out the corruption in the party since they are participating it in themselves by greasing the palms of the power brokers in the democratic party.

Political Consultants Are The Swamp

To understand the gravity of this revelation, you must first understand the role of the consultant class. I previously mentioned how corporate money bought democratic politicians through campaign contributions. All that money has to go somewhere. Along with politicians, the most direct beneficiary on the receiving end of the legalized bribes are consultants. According to data from the Center For Responsive Politics, during the 2018 midterm elections Super PACs and Hybrid PACs gave $550 million to the 10 highest paid consultants. This is a billion dollar industry that produces nothing of substance but will remain lucrative because the role they play in laundering political bribes. The political consultant class is a prime example of the revolving door between what's suppose to be public service and obscenely over paid jobs subsidized by corporate money until you choose to go back into public service. Former Whitehouse Communications Director under Obama, Anita Dunn is now the managing director at the consultant firm SKDKnickerbocker who received nearly $70 million for their services in the 2020 election cycle alone. Paul Begala, former Bill Clinton staffer who dabbles in corporate consulting is also a consultant on the board of the Democratic Majority For Israel Pac. Even Bernie's old staff is in on the grift. Kenneth Pennington, Digital Director of Bernie's 2016 campaign and former senate staffer started his own consulting firm that was paid $26 million dollars in 2020 receiving millions from several justice democrats and even from Beto O'Rourke and Biden.

The only way to be part of the consultant class is by being in the professional or personal orbit of wealthy powerful people much like lobbyists: another above board and completely ethical profession. When regulators join corporate boards after public service a mere glance at their record in government will prove they weren't nearly as tough on that industry as they should have been. Similarly, political consultants are insiders who have played by the rules of the system never rocking the boat and pose no threat to status quo in hopes of one day finally cashing in on their good standing with sources of big money in the political machine.

Consultants cover a wide range of services, one more dubious than the next. They'll advise your campaign to follow the objectively horrible losing strategy of appearing more moderate and spend most of your money on ineffective ads maintaining the status quo for corporate donors and using well funded campaigns as cash cows regardless of their results. Due to the intentionally opaque nature of the political machine we don't know the full extent of the work that the consultancy firms do, but we know enough to be certain that they will not be facilitating any political revolution. So then why are politicians allegedly leading an anti-establishment revolution giving them $13 million in movement money?

Spending This Much Makes No Sense

With no name recognition in 2018 AOC managed to blowout the 4th highest ranking democrat in their primary election with less than $500,000, a 10:1 fundraising disadvantage and the opposition of the entire NY Democratic machine. There were no million dollar ad campaigns to credit for this unprecedented win. The free exposure she got from new media hosts online helped, but showing up and convincing people in the district that she would actually do something to improve their lives was the deciding factor. Now that she is one of the most popular politicians in the country the power of incumbency and over 10 million followers on twitter alone you would think she could get the job done with a lot less money than before. A look at AOC's recent campaign expenditures suggests the opposite and will raise eyebrows to say the least. During the 2020 election cycle the NY congresswomen spent $5.6 million dollars on Facebook ads alone. More than 10 times the amount she needed to fund an entire insurgent campaign against one of the most powerful democrats in the country. Did she spend all that money on Facebook ads in her district? What was the result of spending $5.6m on Facebook ads? Did it advance the policy agenda of the left at all?

An equally bizarre and indefensible expenditure is the $1.4 million given to a DNC marketing firm to run her online stores where she sells merchandise with slogans like "Tax The Rich" which she had slapped on to the dress she wore to the Met Gala. Is that obscene investment in a clothing brand going to get us single payer or secure AOC's seat in the next election cycle? Poor people gave her millions of dollars to secure her seat. They gave her that money because she said she was going to bust up the establishment on their behalf. I'm struggling to see how giving $1.4m to a DNC marketing firm does any of those thing. The kindest interpretation is that just like spending millions on Facebook ads, this is a vulgar display of self promotion that serves no purpose other than to further her celebrity image. The outrageous venture into the retail market looks tame compared to the $2.5 million her campaign paid to Middle Seat, the consulting firm run by a former Bernie staffer.

Pramila Jayapal created a Medicare For All PAC in the 2020 cycle. From that PAC $619,331 went Mothership Strategies another DNC consulting firm. She also paid them $124,000 from her own campaign. Their biggest cash cow was the Jamie Harrison campaign that paid them $16.5 million just to lose to a vulnerable odious Lindsey Graham. What stage of the political revolution is it when you pay unholy amounts of money to a DNC consulting firm to get healthcare for everyone?

Ro Khanna, like every other justice democrat gave money to the consulting firm Middle Seat. In 2020 his payments totaled $888,340. Ro paid an addition $380,000 to at least two other DNC firms. Perhaps the most ethically dubious of them all is Ilhan Omar who gave $2.9 million in campaign donations to a DNC media consulting group that her husband created. At the end of 2020 she cancelled her contract with the firm with no explanation given. Again one of the most popular politicians in the country, millions of followers, and incumbent with no serious challenge. Why the need to spend astronomical numbers on ads?

This obsession with huge campaign ad spending was arguably a grift from consultants to begin with. The best spin I could put on this phenomena is that the ad buys are a cheap trick for uninspiring corporate politicians to manipulate just enough constituents into voting for them by bombarding the public with their name. But you don't build a movement through commercials. Like AOC showed in her upset win against Crowley, you need to connect with people on a personal level with policy proposals that help them to convince a person that you'll fight for them. That's how you recruit more people to advance a policy agenda. They could have used that money to organize events and direct actions in their communities. It is once again very telling how the alleged representatives of the working class choose to use their resources. Instead of building up community organizing they are feeding the same machine like every other politician does.

Chicanery With DNC Consultants Isn’t New

Don't believe me? I'm not the only one who thinks there's something foul going on between the democratic party and their political operatives who run these consulting firms. Nomiki Konst who was part of the DNC reform commission and got an inside look at the extraordinary sums of money that were being given to a handful of well consultants. The peak of her popularity online was when a clip was being circulated of her lambasting other members of the DNC for the brazen corruption.

In 2016 between $700m-$800m was spent on 5 consulting firms just to ultimately lose the house, senate and Whitehouse to Trump and Republicans. During the golden era of high priced consultants democrats lost over 1,200 seats at all levels of government. There was never a price to pay for poor results. In fact those same consultants are still being paid millions of dollars to advise campaigns. Which brings me to the explanation I believe this all provides about the subservience JustDems have to the party leadership.

Considering all the advantages these incumbents have that I've gone over before, I have a hard time believing AOC spent $1.4m on a clothing line because she thought that will protect her seat from a challenger. I'm unconvinced that Ilhan Omar really believes $2.9m to her husbands media consulting firm is what will keep her in congress fighting the good fight. If Pramila Jayapal believes giving a DNC consulting firm $900k to run medicare for all ads moved the needle at all on single payer I have a bridge to sell her. If the old adage that money is power is true, then the overpaid consultant class of the democratic party are second only to the donors in maintaining the corporate capture of the party.

These might be some of the most illuminating examples of just how much these charlatan revolutionaries are willing to play the corrupt insider game. They used our money as their buy-in. They aren't all as brazen as Ilhan. We may not see how they directly benefit right now, but if there's one thing we know is if you play ball with the powers that be in either party you will be paid back with lucrative careers for yourself and everyone in your circle. They aren't dumping millions of dollars into sketchy consulting firms of DNC insiders as charity. At some point they are expecting a return on their investment. For me this is confirmation that they aren't too dumb or weak to advance our policy agenda. They are intentionally avoiding conflict with leadership because they're paving a path for themselves to be the new establishment, revolving door included.

Everything makes sense now. They were never going to block the corporate heist CARES act to fight for a real peoples bailout. There was no way they weren't going to lie and do a little jig to get Biden elected. They were never going to use their veto power to force Pelosi out as Speaker and force a vote on single payer in a pandemic. Despite their ability to summon millions of followers into the streets they will never lead the charge for direct action which is quite literally the only way to advance our policy agenda at this point. As common sense as those ideas may seem if you're looking at politics from the perspective of someone who wants to actually implement left policies, to someone who's priority is appeasing their party masters at all cost any of those actions would be deemed career suicide and a way to guarantee they get cut off from ever getting a chance to feed on the teat of the corporate funded democratic party and their donors.

I don’t know how anyone with a conscious can keep telling poor people to continue giving their money to these politicians as they’ve become part of the establishment using our money as their buy in. Your money is best spent on mutual aid in your community, organizing direct action and funding adversarial media. That’s what will improve lives and advance our policy agenda. We’re in the middle of several unprecedented crises. A climate apocalypse, unprecedented unemployment, historic eviction/homelessness with the back drop of a once in a century pandemic. People need help now. JustDems won’t invest resources in growing power outside the duopoly. They’re committed to not rocking the boat to secure lucrative careers in the orbit of the corrupt democratic party. All their resources are going into a rotten duopoly that’s left us for dead. It’s time we stop expecting they act any different than the rest of the self serving politicians in DC.