Note: David Nir had this linked up at the Elections Digest, but the stink from this is so much it merits its own diary.
Several employees at a Canton, Ohio-based conglomerate have followed the lead of their boss, Benjamin Suarez, and opened their wallets for Congressman Jim Renacci and Senate candidate Josh Mandel. In fact, several of them have already given the maximum $5,000 donation after never even donating to a campaign before. Nothing wrong with that--except many of them have jobs that make you wonder where they got the money.
Among the employees who gave, many of them are managers, directors, or executives, according to federal election filings. Some of them, however, list their occupation as "writer," "copywriter," or merely "marketing."
Campaign finance experts said it was especially surprising to see individuals with those titles giving such large amounts.
"A $5,000 contribution from someone who makes $300,000 a year is completely normal," said Paul S. Ryan, an attorney with the Campaign Legal Center in Washington. "A $5,000 campaign contribution from someone who makes $30,000 a year strikes me as unordinary."
If Suarez gave them raises or bonuses to make up the difference, he'd be violating federal law.
Even more suspicious--more than half of the employees who gave own homes valued between $66,000 and $183,000. Makes you wonder--they're paying mortgages upwards of $500-800, and they somehow can scrounge up $5,000 at one go? By comparison, I only gave a total of $200 during the entire 2008 cycle--a quarter of which was a couple of $25 donations to Obama.
Company spokeswoman Lauren Capo says her employees are very tightly knit. That may be good and well, but how does that explain people with such modest incomes dropping this kind of money all at once. Somehow, the stink from this reaches all the way from Ohio to North Carolina.