With ties to Russia and major tax troubles, Trump-hating Lincoln Project founders tagged as ‘grifters’

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The more the liberal media celebrates the Lincoln Project, the shadier the group of alleged Republicans electioneering to defeat President Donald Trump appears.

Trump has labeled the Lincoln Project founders as “loser types,” and there appears to be some validity to his assertion considering those behind the organization have ties to Russia and questionable financial histories.

The political action committee formed by George Conway, husband of White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, Steve Schmidt, Rick Wilson and John Weaver has seen millions of dollars flow in.

According to its filing with the Federal Election Commission, the PAC raised $16.8 million alone in the second quarter of 2020.

The Hill reported that the organization’s most prominent donors are billionaire hedge fund manager Stephen Mandel, who gave $1 million, business magnate David Geffen, and Bain Capital chairman Joshua Bekenstein, who both gave $100,000.

Citing Justice Department filings, the New York Post reported Tuesday that Weaver registered as a Russian foreign agent last year on behalf of uranium conglomerate TENEX.

As the paper noted, there is a Clinton connection here:

TENEX’s parent company is Rosatom, a Russian state-owned corporation that also owns Uranium One — the company that paid Bill Clinton $500,000 in speaking fees and millions to the Clinton Foundation after then-President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signed off on the controversial merger in 2010.

 

Weaver denied receiving any funds from the six-figure deal in a tweet last year, saying he rejected the agreement, which he called a “mistake” and a “momentary distraction.”

Furthermore, while Weaver has called Trump a “tax fraud,” the Post reported that he has an outstanding $313,655 federal tax lien against his Austin, Texas, home.

He and his wife also face a lawsuit by an Austin shopping mall against the children’s clothing store they own.

Co-founder Rick Wilson, the rabid Never Trumper often featured on MSNBC, has an outstanding $389,420 federal tax lien against his Tallahassee, Florida, home, and his bank moved to foreclose on the property in 2016, the Post reported.

Taking shots online at the president for his taxes, and calling him “Brokeahantas” at one point, Wilson was taken to court in 2018 by American Express over his unpaid $25,729 credit card bill.

There are also questions about whether veteran Republican strategist Schmidt, who has worked with George W. Bush and John McCain, even votes.

Voter records in Utah list him as an “inactive voter,” though Schmidt disputes this, saying he voted by mail in 2016 and 2018, before registering as an Independent.

FEC data showed the super PAC reported $1,236,036.35 in “operating expenditures” in the period from November 5, 2019, to March 31, 2020, accounting for 89.3 percent of total disbursements in that period.

That’s some serious overhead.

“It’s very clear that this isn’t about Trump and Republicans,” a GOP source told the Post. “It’s about making money to help pay off their massive personal debts.”

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, slammed the “cabal” in a tweet last week, saying they are in it “for the money.”

“This cabal of political consultants is all in it for the money,” he tweeted. “If they actually cared about the country, they wouldn’t be working to advance the socialist, anarchist agenda of the radical left. Pathetic.”

The National Review’s Steve Stampley hit it out of the park with his column Monday detailing how the Lincoln Project’s goal is to prevent President Trump’s reelection by “persuading enough disaffected conservatives, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents in swing states” to vote against him.

“But the project is a scam — little more than the most brazen election-season grift in recent memory. And it is working,” Stampley wrote. “As the ragtag band of three otherwise unemployed strategists plus one lawyer hoped, the allure of Republican-on-Republican violence has proven irresistible to the MSNBC set.”

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