Campaign finance

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his allies spent nearly $170 million for him to get utterly humiliated in his bid for the 2024 Republican nomination.  According to newly released Federal Election Commission filings, Never Back Down, the primary super PAC backing DeSantis, had spent $131 million backing his campaign by the end of 2023. His campaign had spent $28 million by that time.    DeSantis withdrew from the race earlier this month following a campaign-ending second-place finish in the Iowa caucuses,…

The former president’s PAC are operating as slush funds to help him fight off a mountain of civil and criminal cases   Donald Trump’s PACs spent a staggering $50 million on the former president’s legal defense in 2023, according to a report from The New York Times.  According to two sources who spoke to the Times, the former president’s massive legal bills were paid out through funds from the Save America PAC and the Make America Great Again PAC, his two primary political action committees. The…

Republican presidential candidate businessman Vivek Ramaswamy speaks to guests at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition Spring Kick-Off on April 22, 2023 in Clive, Iowa.Scott Olson | Getty ImagesRepublican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy built his White House bid around urging companies to stay out of politics.What he doesn't tell voters is the asset management firm he co-founded has engaged more with Republican Party officials behind the scenes than was previously known, according to private email correspondence…

Former FTX chief executive Sam Bankman-Fried (C) arrives to enter a plea before US District Judge Lewis Kaplan in the Manhattan federal court, New York, January 3, 2023. Ed Jones | AFP | Getty ImagesThe Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office said Tuesday it had created an FTX Task Force to trace and recover assets of victims of the cryptocurrency exchange firm's collapse and to handle investigations and prosecutions related to the company and other entities.The announcement came as FTX founder and former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried…

Samuel Bankman-Fried, founder and CEO of FTX, testifies during a Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry hearing about "Examining Digital Assets: Risks, Regulation, and Innovation," on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on February 9, 2022.Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty ImagesA network of political action committees supported by cryptocurrency industry leaders are planning a last-minute ad campaign in support of congressional candidates, according to one of the groups' chief strategists.Web3 Forward and Crypto…