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Bill Berkowitz
October 26, 2006

The power of Bob Perry's 'Swift-Boating' money

Perry, the Houston-based homebuilder and the primary funder behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, is pumping millions into this year's congressional races

In New Mexico, according to Federal Election Commission records, Americans for Honesty on Issues has spent $165,000 in support of the campaign of Republican Rep. Heather Wilson, who is hoping to hold onto her seat against her Democratic challenger, Attorney General Patricia Madrid. In Iowa, the same group has purchased $159,572 in ads against Democrat Bruce Braley, who is running against Republican Mike Whalen. In Kentucky, Americans for Honesty is sponsoring ads targeting Democratic Party candidate Ken Lucas, who is running for a House seat against Republican Rep. Geoff Davis.

The money for these, and several other congressional races, comes from Bob Perry, the Houston, Texas-based homebuilder who heads Perry Homes (website) and who gained national notoriety when he funded the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" ad campaign that questioned Democratic Party nominee John Kerry's Vietnam War record during the 2004 presidential campaign.

A Los Angeles Times article dated August 15, 2004, pointed out the Perry guarded his privacy, lived fairly modestly considering his wealth, and willingly donated huge sums of money to the Republican Party. Interestingly enough, although he has given millions to many political candidates "the vast majority of those people have never laid eyes on him," Court Koenning, executive director of the Republican Party in Harris County, told the Los Angeles Times.

(The Swift Boat advertisements that ran in such key battleground states as Wisconsin, Ohio, and West Virginia, were "part of a multimedia campaign questioning Kerry's fitness as a leader and commander in chief." The Center for Responsive Politics documented the fact that Perry gave the group, which subsequently changed its name to Swift Vets and POWs for Truth, $4.45 million in 2004.)

''Bob Perry is a very generous guy with his political donations," Koenning said. ''His primary interest is good government...Everybody agrees that John Kerry's service to this country is admirable. But if he lied about it, that speaks to his character."

At the time, Charles Soechting, chairman of the Texas Democratic Party, noted that Perry "pulls the strings and never gets his hands dirty. But even by his standards, this latest deal is just over the top." Perry, who worked with Karl Rove for years, declined to comment through his spokesman, Bill Miller, an Austin political consultant.

This electoral season Perry has already contributed at least $8 million to a host of Republican congressional candidates around the country. According to Congressional Quarterly's PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks how money is spent in politics, Perry is ranked the No. 1 donor this year. (For more on Perry's donations, see CampaignMoney.com, which describes itself as "a unique website that lets you see for yourself the hidden world of American political campaigns.")

Americans for Honesty on Issues

In mid-October, the Houston Chronicle reported that Perry had given $2 million to Americans for Honesty on Issues, "a new group that is buying television ads aimed at helping Republicans facing tight House races in Iowa, Colorado, Indiana, Arizona, North Carolina, Kentucky and New Mexico, according to the group's latest report to the Federal Election Commission."

Americans for Honesty on Issues "is spending more than $1 million on...ads, which accuse Democratic candidates of carpetbagging, coddling illegal immigrants, being soft on crime and advocating cutting off money for troops in Iraq," the New York Times' John Broder reported earlier this month.

Sue Walden, a Houston-based political consultant who is reported to have close ties to the ethically-challenged former Republican Congressman Tom DeLay, is president of the organization. According to the New York Times, Walden "has also raised money for President Bush and served as an adviser to Kenneth L. Lay, the former chief executive of Enron who died in July."

The Houston Chronicle also reported that "Earlier this election cycle, Perry contributed $5 million to the Economic Freedom Fund, which targeted Democratic congressional candidates in competitive races in Georgia, Indiana, Iowa and West Virginia.

The Free Enterprise Fund

"Perry kicked in another $1 million to the Washington, DC-based Free Enterprise Fund (website), which is airing ads attacking MoveOn.org, a liberal group that has been active in elections, and Democrats running for the U.S. Senate in Montana and Connecticut." The $1 million made up the vast majority of funds recently received by the group, according to Political Money Line.

The Free Enterprise Fund's "Stop MoveOn.org" campaign "is running television ads attacking the online organization" and tying the group "to 'radical billionaire George Soros,' who appears in the spots looking like a crazed burglar," The Nation magazine recently reported.

In mid-September, TPMMuckraker.com's Paul Kiel reported that Perry's Free Enterprise Fund is again "working with" Stevens, Reed, Curcio, and Potholm (SRCP), the same group that produced the Swift Boat ads. Stevens, Reed, Curcio and Potholm has worked for the National Republican Campaign Committee as well as a number of top-shelf Republicans including Sen. George Allen (R-VA), Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN), and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).

Kiel pointed out that "This July, the group got in hot water for an ad it ran against Ohio Senate candidate Sherrod Brown...which hit Brown for being weak on national security, [and] featured a doctored image of the twin towers with photogenic smoke hovering around them."

"According to documents and local television managers in Georgia and Iowa, SRCP has been responsible for buying the airtime for the Economic Freedom Fund's television ads -- attacks against Reps. Alan Mollohan (D-WV), Leonard Boswell (D-IA), Jim Marshall (D-GA), and John Barrow (D-GA)," TPMMuckraker.com reported. "It's not clear if the firm actually produced the ads, or was merely working with Meridian Pacific, the well-connected California consulting firm that works with the group, to get the ads placed. Neither SRCP or Meridian Pacific returned my calls to explain their involvement."

The groups that Perry is funding are -- like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth -- "527s", "named after a provision in the federal tax code," the Chronicle's Kristen Mack pointed out. "Donations Perry and others make to those groups are not subject to the same limits as donations directly benefiting federal candidates or political parties."

"Direct donations from any individual to a single federal candidate are limited to $2,100 in an election cycle."

"Expenditures by 527s may not be directed to specific candidates. The money often buys advertising that is strongly favorable or negative to a candidate or cause, without specifically soliciting a vote."

In early October, the Austin Chronicle pointed out that Perry and San Antonio hospital-bed tycoon James Leininger "remain unmatched in the amount of dollars they give to political candidates and committees...In a review of contributions made during the first 18 months of the 2006 election cycle, watchdog group Texans for Public Justice (TPJ) found [that]...Perry and Leininger still rank No. 1 and No. 2 on TPJ's latest megadonor report."

While mostly known for his political donations, Perry has also given $1 million to the League City YMCA, $1 million to the University of Houston Center for Mexican American Studies, $100,000 to the Harris County Hurricane Relief Fund, and $100,000 to the Jefferson County Hurricane Relief Fund, according to Perry spokesman Anthony Holm.

Texas' home builders lobby lands blow on housing buyers

As a major home builder Perry appears to have played a significant role in lobbying for the creation of the decidedly anti-consumer Texas Residential Construction Commission. Last summer, the Texas Monthly wrote about the birth of this new agency:

In the good old days, if you scrimped and saved and bought your dream home in Texas, you could sleep easy at night knowing that the roof over your head was protected by a common-sense legal doctrine. Known as an implied warranty of habitability, in layman's terms it meant that -- whether or not anything was put in writing -- the courts would hold the builder to a guarantee that your home was fit to live in and constructed with care. If your foundation sagged or your windows leaked or your roof caved in, you could demand that the builder fix the defect and take him to court if he didn't.

That option is no longer available. In 2003, after spreading around $9 million in campaign contributions, the powerful home builders' lobby got the Legislature to agree with its contention that implied warranties were too darn vague and that the lawsuits they produced were too damaging to the industry. Instead, it asked lawmakers to create a new state agency to protect builders from legal retribution. It was one of the most blatant power plays in recent years, made possible by an anti-lawsuit fervor that swept through the new Republican-controlled Legislature and by the influence of two politically active builders: the biggest individual contributor, Bob Perry (no relation to Governor Rick Perry but lots of political ties), and the co-founder of Texans for Lawsuit Reform, Dick Weekley. Thus was born the Texas Residential Construction Commission (TRCC), which in its short life has served as the classic case study of what can happen when a public agency is captured by the industry it is supposed to regulate.

Free Enterprise Fund launches anti-Ford ads in Tennessee

On October 19, the Scripps Howard News Service reported that in the hotly contested Senate race in Tennessee between Democratic Congressman Harold Ford Jr. and Republican Bob Corker, the Free Enterprise Fund "began airing ads in Middle and West Tennessee on Tuesday [October 17] that attack Democrat Harold Ford Jr. for 'living it up on campaign cash but pushing higher taxes for Tennessee families.'"

Michael Powell, senior advisor to the Ford campaign, said the organization was "not a group that is interested in telling the truth. This is a group interested in scaring voters and slandering Congressman Ford."

The ad, which dubs the Democrat "fancy Ford" for his allegedly "lavish spending from campaign funds. The three examples cited in the ad are 'luxurious five-star hotels,' 'fancy designer Armani suit' and 'fine Davidoff cigars,'" Scripps Howard reported.

"Swift boat politics has no place in Tennessee," said Powell. "By embracing this kind of stuff, Bob Corker proves yet again that truth is not important to him."

As the Bush campaign did in 2004, a spokesperson for the Corker campaign denied that it had any "contact or control with the Free Enterprise Fund" and it claimed it hadn't seen the ad until it ran on October the 17th. But, added Corker spokesperson Todd Womack, the ads "facts appear to be accurate."