Inside One of the GOP’s Newest Money Machines

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The Center for Public Integrity’s Peter Stone has a profile of David Carney—George H.W. Bush adviser, Rick Perry consultant, and GOP operative. Carney is the founder and puppetmaster of Americans for Job Security, a shadowy Republican-leaning 501(c)(6) group that’s spent $9 million on negative ads this season. (Reporter Andy Kroll and I visited AJS’s address recently, which turned out to be a mailbox at a UPS store.)

As a non-profit business league, AJS doesn’t have to disclose its donors, making it an ideal partner for wealthy Republican donors who want to unload their cash quietly. Stone reports that the group has offered help to donors looking to cover their tracks, and dabbled in legally dubious campaign activities in Colorado, Texas, and Alaska:

“If you have a candidate, a campaign or an election that needs some help, we can be of some assistance,” was Carney’s message, according to the GOP source, who said he has known Carney for two decades and spoke on condition of anonymity because of his broad political ties. “What he was suggesting is, if you give us some money, we’ll spend it for you.”

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