John, you’ve probably heard about George Santos by now.

You know, the NY GOP Congressman who claimed to be a Broadway producer (lie!), graduated at the top of his class (didn’t even graduate!), worked at Goldman Sachs (lie!), and even founded an animal charity (also lie!).

Bit by bit, the truth about Santos’s past has come out – and we’ve all had our fair share of laughs at his impressive and nearly-entirely false resume. But there’s one important thing that we’re still totally in the dark about: where did he get the money to run in the first place?

George Santos at first claimed he loaned $700,000 of his own money to his campaign, and then later walked that back without specifying where the money came from. [1] He also received $25,000 from Redstone Strategies – a “dark money” group whose donors are totally anonymous. [2]

Unsurprisingly, federal regulators aren’t buying his claims – and have sent him multiple requests for explanation of why his numbers simply don’t add up.

But here’s the problem: in its current defanged state, our Federal Election Commission can’t do much more than send letters!

That should concern you – because the successful scheme to gut our country’s campaign finance rules – from the Citizens United ruling to stacking the FEC with members who oppose basic transparency & limits on big donors – is a huge invitation for political corruption.

Without a campaign finance watchdog on the case, Santos and others like him are free to work for their secret funders rather than the people who elected them to office.

It means that the uber-wealthy who can fund their own campaigns stand a much stronger chance of winning an election than someone that doesn’t come from money – barring us from achieving a truly diverse and representative democracy.

That’s where Common Cause comes in. For over 50 years, we’ve successfully fought and won certain victories to get big money out of politics at the local, state, and national levels. We’ve advocated for solutions that empower small-dollar donors to make a bigger impact in campaigns, require disclosure of all campaign money raised and spent, remove the financial barriers stopping everyday people from running for office, and hold elected officials and wealthy special interests accountable to voters.

I know that with your support, we can reform and improve our campaign finance system even in the face of Citizens United and a gutted FEC – with laws that amplify the voices of everyday Americans, require strong disclosure, and make sure everyone plays by the same common sense rules.

George Santos’ notoriety is bringing much-needed attention to the issue of campaign finance laws in the U.S. But we can’t let the sideshow and daily drama of each new lie exposed distract us from fixing what’s broken.

I need your help right now to ramp up our strategy to get big money out of politics. Can I count on you to chip in $3 or more today and put everyday Americans before big money donors?

YES, I’LL CHIP IN $3

Thank you,

Aaron Scherb, Senior Director of Legislative Affairs
and the team at Common Cause

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