Political Action Committees are a great way to launder money, and SuperPACs even moreso. But even the smallest of PACs can have a diluting effect on the gifts from citizens hoping to support the candidate of their choice.

So a few days ago I got one of those many political fundraising SMS messages anyone who has ever made the decision to support a political cause has been seeing hundreds of this election season. But this one reminded me more of a phishing message:

Now, this wasn’t the first text I had gotten from them. The first two were chastising for not “endorsing” Kamala Harris. But this one, and the website it led to, sort of burnt my toast.

And it was tied to data from ActBlue, the organization that is central to Democratic fundraising efforts.

So I did what I usually do when something triggers my cybercrime research setting. I went digging to see who was behind this and exactly how much money was actually going to help political campaigns.

It turns out that very little of their fundraising so far this year actually went to help candidates’ campaigns. In October , the Alsobrooks Victory Fund got the only candidate-affiliated disbursement : $1000.

I checked out their FEC report for October. It was very enlightening. OpenSecrets has a good summary of their activity based on FEC reports for 2023-2024 as well.

So in this campaign cycle , UNITEDemocrats has brought in $618,292 in contributions. Of that, the PAC has donated…$6,833 to federal candidates. That’s basically a penny of every dollar raised-a percentage that would even make a Fraternal Order of Police fundraising company blush.

Where does all the money go? Well, a tiny bit goes to sustain their web presence on Squarespace. More goes to ActBlue for their “merchant account”, and to an SMS delivery company called Tatango. And then a bunch goes to a minority/woman owned fundraising messaging company called Momentum Campaigns LLC. And there’s the salaries of the PAC staff and the rent for their office on C Street NW in DC, right across the street from the Bureau of Federal Prisons.

But they aren’t the only organization at that suite number. There’s also BlueWave Politics, a consulting firm…for whom the treasurer of UNITEDemocrats works:

“Sue [Jackson] has 13 years of compliance, accounting and campaign finance reporting experience working on various Presidential, U.S. Senate, Congressional, PAC and non federal committees.  Prior to starting her second career in political compliance, she worked for 13 years in international business while living in Atlanta, GA. She has a B.A. in Government from The College of William and Mary.

Fun Fact: Sue has lived in 4 foreign countries and visited 27 others.

Recent Clients: Deborah Ross for Congress, Montanans for Bullock, North Carolina Democratic Party, Josh Harder for Congress, Citizens for Boyle”

So other than the treasurer, we don’t know who else from this consultancy is involved in UNITEDemocrats. I suspect I can find a bunch of other PACs sharing the same address.

It sure is an interesting business model. It reminds me of…pig butchering, but it’s legal.

So what about MAGA grifters?

Most of the Trump-aligned PACs I saw dumped about half of what they brought in directly into Donald J Trump For President 2024 Inc. — a total of $315 million over this election cycle. Almost all that money (aside from what was given back to angry or ineligible donors) was spent on Trump…but not necessarily for the campaign. There were over $1.3 million in American Express credit card payments which were not itemized.

Then there’s the more than $50,0000 in “travel reimbursements”to Southern Baptist minister and podcaster Michael Clary and other “influencers” who Donald J Trump For President 2024 Inc. directly paid to be at the convention and other events. And between DJTFP2024 and other contributing funds, just shy of $1 million went into Mar-A-Lago Club LLC.

Another Trump-aligned PAC, ULTRA MAGA PAC, spent 10 percent of its raised funds on contributions to candidates like Kari Lake. But most of the money went into direct mail and other fundrasing costs (and lawyers, and other players).