Sheldon Adelson $10 million pro-Romney donation

Sheldon Adelson shakes up race with $10 million pro-Romney donation

By Matea Gold / Tribune Washington Bureau
Thursday, June 14, 2012
WASHINGTON — The news that casino magnate Sheldon Adelson is pumping $10 million into a "super PAC" backing Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney underscores how swiftly this campaign’s state of play can be affected by a single wealthy donor.

The contribution by Adelson — reported Wednesday by the Wall Street Journal and confirmed by the Los Angeles Times/Tribune Washington Bureau — comes after he and his family pumped $21.5 million into a super PAC that supported former House Speaker Newt Gingrich during the GOP primaries. The Adelson family effectively subsidized the entire Gingrich super PAC — its
contributions made up 89 percent of all the money raised by Winning Our Future.

Now Adelson is poised play a similar role for the former Massachusetts governor. With his check to the pro-Romney Restore Our Future, he instantly skyrocketed to the top of that super PAC’s list of mega-donors, which includes Texas home builder Bob Perry ($3 million) and Florida energy entrepreneur William Koch and his companies ($2 million). In all, Restore Our Future had raised $56.5 million through the end of April, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Carl Forti, political director of Restore Our Future and a former Romney aide, declined to comment. A spokesman for Adelson did not return a call seeking comment.

Romney has courted the Las Vegas Sands chief executive since Gingrich dropped out, meeting with him privately last month during a fundraising trip to Nevada. Campaign finance reform advocates pounced on that, noting that candidates are not allowed to solicit more than $5,000 from donors to super PACs, which ostensibly operate independently of official campaigns and political parties.

"The ties between Romney’s campaign and super PAC are well documented and this example shows the fiction of contribution limits and the dominating role big money plays in our elections," said David Donnelly, executive director of Public Campaign Action Fund. "Romney personally knows big donors like Adelson and there is no question that they will expect a big return on their investment if he wins."

The Romney campaign declined to comment.

Adelson, whose net worth was estimated by Forbes in March at $24.9 billion, is expected to pour substantially more money into this year’s campaign. But it is unclear how many of his donations will be reported publicly, since many organizations financing campaign-related ads, such as the Karl Rove-founded Crossroads GPS, are organized as tax-exempt groups that do not disclose their donors.