New Evidence from FACT Substantiates Claim that Democratic Candidate from North Carolina Illegally Coordinated Ads with VoteVets.Org Action Fund
Washington, D.C.—February 12, 2020— The non-partisan ethics watchdog, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT), today, filed a second complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) against VoteVets.Org Action Fund (a 501 (c)(4) political action committee), Cal Cunningham (U.S. Senate candidate), and his campaign committee, Cal for NC, for violating the Federal Election Campaign Act. This request for investigation comes three weeks after FACT filed its original complaint against Cunningham for illegally coordinating with VoteVets.Org Action Fund, an outside organization that supports his candidacy. As the original complaint outlines, Cunningham uploaded campaign photos to a public Flickr account in December which were then utilized in a VoteVets.Org television advertisement, entitled “Stood Up,” just days later. The incredibly short time between Cunningham’s campaign providing the photographs and the production and dissemination of the television commercial is clear evidence of coordination. Moreover, VoteVets.Org Action Fund republished Cunningham’s campaign materials in the form of television advertisements, thus making an illegal contribution to the Cunningham campaign. As this second complaint sets forth, since the first filing VoteVets.Org Action Fund began running a second television commercial entitled “Answered the Call,” using photographs and b-roll video provided by Cunningham’s campaign. In this case, the campaign material makes up roughly 80 percent of VoteVets.Org Action Fund’s advertisement. “By the end of January, VoteVets.Org Action Fund was reportedly set to spend $3.3 million for the two Cunningham advertisements to run on television,” said Kendra Arnold, Executive Director of FACT. “The clear evidence of a tremendous sum of money illegally contributed to Cunningham’s election efforts are absolutely unjust and should be investigated accordingly,” added Arnold. A full copy of the complaint can be found here. FACT is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting accountability, ethics, and transparency in government and civic arenas. For more on FACT, visit: www.factdc.org
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