troublemaker adams

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Troublemaker Media LLC is owned by <a href="https://corp.delaware.gov/agents/a9000010.shtml">Corporation Trust Company</a>, a in Delaware holding company listed as being headquartered at 1209 North Orange Street. According to the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/business/how-delaware-thrives-as-a-corporate-tax-haven.html?r=0" target="blank">New York Times</a>,

that's actually a P.O. Box given as the address for nearly 300,000

corporations. At least two owners for these companies were convicted of

criminal activity. “Shells are the No. 1 vehicle for laundering illicit

money and criminal proceeds,” former Justice Department criminal

division chief Lanny Breuer told the Times.

Troublemaker Media’s <a href="http://www.teapartytribune.com/2012/08/16/troublemaker-fest-2012-imax-theatre-tampa-fl-august-26-30/">email </a>address,

on the other hand, is associated with the Troublemaker Fest -- a five

day Tea Party convention -- which Christine O’Donnell <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/08/christine-odonnell-to-stage-tea-party-vs-occupy-debate-in-tampa/">hosted </a>a

block away from the Republican National Convention in 2012. O’Donnell,

who had been a GOP Senate candidate in 2010 and is infamous for her <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/13/christine-odonnell-mitt-romney_n_1147392.html">“I’m not a witch… I’m you”</a> ad, <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/eating-well-christine-odonnells-tro">asked </a>the RNC for donations to the festival and linked <a href="https://secure.piryx.com/donate/anHpdmiO/ChristinePAC/emaildonate">payment </a>to her PAC, ChristinePAC. Last week, the Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/in-the-loop/wp/2015/01/06/remember-christine-odonnell-shes-getting-sued-by-the-fec/">reported </a>that,

in a rare case, the FEC is suing O’Donnell for using $20,000 of her

campaign funds to pay for her personal living expenses.

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Scott Walker, wearing a politician’s

standard pale blue shirt, red tie, and dark slacks, casually paced the

stage. In a midwestern accent that embraced the Tea Party activists

gathered for the <a href="http://www.iafreedomsummit.com/">Iowa Freedom Summit</a>, he gave an emotional <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmra5Xp_T10">speech</a> about how their prayers protected his family when it came under siege by <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/09/14/scott-walker-inaccurately-takes-credit-for-inspiring-the-occupy-movement-fact-checker-biography/">opponents</a> in the Occupy movement.

At one point, he said, the protesters reminded him of why he became

Wisconsin’s governor in the first place, spurring him to remember to “go

big and to go bold.”

Two months later, even before Walker announced his <a href="http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/scott-walker-has-an-unofficial-fan-club-is-that-a/article_e5abaa35-31e2-5241-8b60-658d0cf1cba2.html">presidential</a> bid, <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/lookup2.php?cycle=2016&strID=C00573147">Go Big Go Bold</a> became the official name of a super PAC supposedly backing him. Walker had an impassioned base of <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/s/73550/scott-walkers-tragedy-timing">grassroots backers</a>; when he did get into the race, almost 40 percent of his funds came from donors giving $200 or less. Go Big Go Bold exploited that support to reel in donations from people who likely thought they were helping Walker run for president; 65 percent of its funds came from $200-and-under donors.

This isn’t the first time that the group’s treasurer, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobadamswv">Bob Adams</a> — a 2008 West Virginia state Senate candidate (he lost that race in a <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Herb_Snyder">split-hair vote</a>) — has set up a super PAC that appears to pad <a href="https://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2015/03/30/partisanship-is-a-profit-center-for-founder-of-new-scott-walker-super-pac/">his pockets</a>. Go Big Go Bold might be considered the latest embodiment of Adams’ political hucksterism.

In 2015, Go Big Go Bold spent only $5,637.10 in ways that seemed to

directly support Walker’s campaign. All of that money went for…lapel

pins.

It did spend a pretty penny, however, on…other stuff.

Go Big Go Bold’s operating expenditures came to <a href="http://www.fec.gov/fecviewer/CandidateCommitteeDetail.do?candidateCommitteeId=C00573147&tabIndex=1">$153,639</a> in 2015, according to its Federal Election Commission reports. More than $100,000 of that went to Adams’ own company: <a href="http://apps.sos.wv.gov/business/corporations/organization.aspx?org=286565">Opinion Strategies LLC</a>.

That included $75,000 for “PAC Management” and $15,000 for “email list

rental.” The rest went to travel, food and accounting; some of it

($1,511 for meals) was paid to another Adams-controlled super PAC,

Revive America.

Another $15,000 went to a questionable Delaware-based media company, Troublemaker Media. (See sidebar.)

Meanwhile, Go Big Go Bold’s <a href="http://docquery.fec.gov/cgi-bin/fecimg/?C00550558">mailing</a> address puts it in the same building as anti-tax <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/08/13/nearly-all-the-gop-candidates-bow-down-to-grover-norquist/">powerhouse Grover Norquist</a>. Norquist’s <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending/detail.php?cycle=2014&cmte=Americans+for+Tax+Reform">Americans for Tax Reform</a>

provides office space — or at least an address where a receptionist

greets visitors and answers the phone — for a number of conservative

organizations (see, for example, the <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2015/11/wellspring-gives-big-boost-to-judicial-crisis-network-with-6-6-million-grant/">Judicial Crisis Network</a>).

After the big expenses, Adams spent about $10,000 on hotels and transportation.

Adams told OpenSecrets Blog that Opinion Strategies

“provided an exceptional service at fair market value” to Go Big Go

Bold. Its work included “fundraising, grassroots development,

copywriting, digital media, email distribution and list rentals,

compliance and overall PAC management,” he said in an email. Adams

maintained that Opinion Strategies built “a significant grassroots

infrastructure of conservative activists nationwide who supported”

Walker.

That’s a claim that is difficult to verify. Whatever the case,

Walker’s campaign seemed eager to put distance between him and Adams.

“Governor Walker and his campaign had absolutely zero connection to Go

Big Go Bold PAC at any time,” according to Joe Fadness, the campaign’s

current spokesman..

Adams’ targeting of Walker supporters is one illustration of a <a href="http://www.propublica.org/article/inside-game-creating-pacs-and-then-spending-their-money">growing problem</a> since the <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/news/reports/citizens_united.php">2010 Citizens United</a>

Supreme Court decision and other legal developments have led to a

proliferation of super PACs, most of which spend little or no money

supporting candidates. Many are simply jokes (see “Just Drink the

Koolaid,” for example).

The <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending/summ.php?chrt=V&type=S">big super PACs</a>

are big business. They can raise funds at $1 million or more a pop, and

spend a good percentage of their proceeds to benefit candidates. But

scam PACs, as we’ve <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2015/07/scam-pacs-keep-money-churning-but-not-to-candidates/">written</a>,

prey on small donors who may not be savvy about politics or campaign

finance, peppering them with mailers that play to their fears and make

urgent requests for money. These desperately needed contributions, they

write, will go toward supporting some candidate for office. Often,

though, the only people benefiting from the money are those who started

the group in the first place and others linked to them.

(Historically, they have lots of company. Scam artists have been using scare tactics since America’s <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/npr-history-dept/2015/02/12/385310877/how-scams-worked-in-the-1800s">earliest days</a>.)

All in all, by the end of 2015, Go Big Go Bold had raised $161,553 and spent $156,023. Walker himself <a href="http://2016.republican-candidates.org/Walker/">left </a>the presidential race in September, and a month later was asking supporters to chip in to help pay off an estimated <a href="http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/scott-walker-to-be-debate-spectator-and-appear-earlier-with-bush-rubio-b99611434z1-342004751.html">$1 million</a> in campaign debt.

As for Adams, he announced last <a href="http://www.heraldmailmedia.com/news/tri_state/west_virginia/campaign-filings-suggest-west-virginia-election-could-be-heavily-contested/article_a04c1516-753b-11e5-b080-a77fde5ae21d.html">July</a> that he’s <a href="https://www.facebook.com/BobAdamsWV/">running</a> to represent West Virginia’s <a href="http://www.bobforwv.com/">66th district</a>

in the state legislature. By the end of the year, though, he reported

raising no money whatsoever — other than a $15,000 loan he made to his

own campaign.<a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2016/01/scam-pac-treasurer-profited-from-walkers-presidential-bid">http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2016/01/scam-pac-treasurer-profited-from-walkers-presidential-bid</a>

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