Oregon Freedomworks part ii – Turning the Double Play

This is part ii. Here is part i. Part iii is here.

Already hard to keep track of … Oregon Freedomworks began life as Oregon Citizens for Responsible Government, but Richard Russell Walker is literally a living bridge between them. In the last installment, we met Walker and Mannix and Day.

Let’s take a look at the tax return for FreedomWorks’ national Issues PAC. All three contributions are from Oregonians. From the 2008 “Richard R. Walker, Treasurer” (page 7)  FreedomWorks Issues PAC’s tax return, page 13 here is a $10,000 contribution from Oregonians in Action:

Ross Day’s employer at the time was Oregonians in Action, as had it been his employer since 2003. But it’s the other two — Parks Medical Electronics, INC and Hire Calling Public Affairs — that are of particular interest here. PME is owned by Loren Parks, a notorious right-wing money man who has funded endless Oregon ballot initiative campaigns. And Hire Calling?

i. Tinker to Evers to Chance

Tinker to Evers to Chance was a famous double-play combination in old-time baseball. The ball that was hit to the shortstop goes to second base and then, in time to get the runner who hit it, to first for the double out.

You see, Oregon has, for many years, led the nation in ballot measures, if only in sheer volume. Even more than it’s equally cranky neighbor to the south, California. And a whole industry sprung up over the years. People sitting at card tables at Supermarkets, being paid per signature to get people to sign. Increasingly, the financing of those ballot campaigns has come under greater scrutiny, with the funders adopting ever more extreme methods of hiding FROM any scrutiny.

Here, two famous “sugar daddies” of the Right Wing Ballot Factory seem deeply entrenched in that FreedomWorks machine that I described in Part i. A brief detour and then we’ll come back to Mannix, Walker and Day, VOTE OREGON LLC and VOTE LLC.

One of the financiers of these has been Loren Parks, who for years has funded Kevin Mannix’s various ballot and elective campaigns.

Earlier this year (if this is to be believed and isn’t just political disinformation) Parks announced that he wasn’t going to fund any more of Mannix’s campaigns, having spent several million dollars and ending up with only a big fat goose egg to show for it. Zero.  Zip. Zilch. Nada. Even the most ideological of wealthy businessmen are, finally, businessmen after all, and if it isn’t there on the bottom line, it’s got to go, however filled with wistful regret for what might have been.

Loren Parks puts $375,000 into Senate Republican races
Published: Thursday, September 30, 2010, 10:46 AM
Updated: Thursday, September 30, 2010, 11:07 AM
Jeff Mapes, The Oregonian

… [Loren] Parks is Oregon’s most prolific individual political contributor, having given about $13 million since he first appeared on the political scene in 1994. For many years, he was a big contributor to Kevin Mannix, the former legislator and gubernatorial candidate. Parks helped bankroll Mannix’s 1994 initiative, Measure 11, which boosted violent crime sentences.

However, Parks reportedly had a falling out with Mannix and has yanked funding from him, according to a story by The Oregonian’s Les Zaitz last month…

In Oregon, the fact that Loren Parks donated $100,000 to that FreedomWorks Action PAC wouldn’t be particularly newsworthy, except when you start to consider that that “FreedomWorks Issues PAC” $120,000 all CAME from Oregon, and, presumably was SPENT in Oregon. Which is fine, because their treasurer is an Oregonian, Richard Russell Walker.

Walker is now NW Regional Director for FreedomWorks as of 2009

After awhile, it’s like having watched a long retro game of PONG.  It goes back and forth and back and forth and back and forth again. Tinker to Evers to Chance.

pong.png

Why on Earth would Loren Parks have any need to donate to FreedomWorks PAC, while its treasurer, Richard Russell Walker, is partially paid from the charity and partially from the FreedomWorks, Inc. ‘civic league’ all of whom are headquartered in Washington D.C.? YOu know, the “charity” that ponied up $216, 775 for Glenn Beck’s 9/12 rally on the Washington Mall in 2009?

bottom of page 8 FOUNDATION’s 2009 return

He’s a State Director. He’s a paid charitable worker. He’s a political “mover” and shaker.

Actually, all we know is that he’s the paid employee of whoever finally funds FreedomWorks and before that, the Koch founded-and-funded ‘Citizens for Responsible Government’ going back to 2000.

And the great thing about financial disclosure is that Loren Parks’ $100,000 wouldn’t register until FreedomWorks Action PAC filed its 2008 tax return, long after the 2008 election. Convenient that, of course, and perhaps a REASON that Parks would feel the only way his hundred thousand dollars could be delivered across the state line (Parks now lives in Nevada, where financial transparency is prohibited by a compliant legislature) is via a long detour through Washington, D.C.

Richard Russell “Russ” Walker at the 2009 Salem Tea Party

Loren Parks just being himself.

Loren Parks

But at least we know who Parks Medical Supplies of Aloha, Oregon is. Still …

Who is “Hire Calling Public Affairs” of Klamath, Oregon?

Tinker to Evers to Chance.

We turn to the glowing obituary of Richard Wendt, Klamath Falls “philanthropist” and international businessman from the Oregonian [emphasis added]:

Richard Wendt

Richard Wendt, Jeld-Wen cofounder and philanthropist, dies in Portland
Published: Monday, August 16, 2010, 8:38 PM
Updated: Tuesday, August 17, 2010, 6:16 AM
[by] Richard Read, The Oregonian

… In 1990, Jeld-Wen gave $150,000 toward a ballot measure Wendt favored to place welfare and unemployment recipients in subsidized private-sector jobs. The initiative passed, leading to a program known as Jobs Plus that placed thousands in subsidized positions.

“One of his biggest passions has been full employment across America,” said John Courtney, president of NextJob, a Klamath Falls outplacement company.

NextJob is one of a group of companies including Hire Calling Co., SOS Staffing and Employment Trends that Wendt founded or bought, putting to work more than 70,000 people a year. He was also involved in Trendwest Resorts and JWTR, a large Northwest timber company…..

Ah. THAT “Hire Calling.”

The Oregonian continues:

Wendt founded the American Institute for Full Employment in 1994. He and his wife made large contributions to Republican political campaigns, including $100,000 for gubernatorial candidate Kevin Mannix in 2002.

“Knowing I wasn’t going to win, he still gave me $50,000,” said Bill Sizemore, a 1998 Republican candidate for governor who authored ballot measures backed by Wendt.

For the benefit of non-Oregonians, I won’t go into the Bill Sizemore “initiative factory” and Governor’s run, nor, after his racketeering connection, when his personal assets were attached, Wendt and Parks seemingly financed a 2006 scheme wherein Sizemore bought a McMansion in Klamath Falls, Oregon. Here’s just some of the fun:

top of page 30 of Bill Sizemore’s contempt citation by an Oregon court

For the benefit of Oregonians, I won’t go into the Bill Sizemore mess, because they’re probably sick and tired of it. [h/t Carla]

But there are a LOT of eerie parallels in that contempt case. And this ought to be mentioned in passing:

Sizemore Found in Contempt, Spends the Night in Jail
December 1, 2008
Read the ruling: (PDF, 3.9MB)

… The contempt claim stems from evidence gathered during court proceedings in which Mr. Sizemore admitted that the Nevada-based American Tax Research Foundation (ATRF) has been supporting the Sizemore household. This allows Mr. Sizemore to continue his work on ballot initiatives. ATRF is registered as a 501(c)(3) organization with the Internal Revenue Service and is primarily funded with contributions from Loren Parks and Richard Wendt. ATRF is also registered as a charitable organization with the Attorney General in Nevada, a state which has some of the most lax laws and reporting requirements for non-profits. [...]

But Wendt’s connection to FreedomWorks is almost as surreptitious as his earlier Sizemore funding, as his contribution via Hire Calling to the FreedomWorks Issues PAC (a 527).

Here’s the three contributions to the Oregon FreedomWorks PAC in 2009 (from the IRS):

Oregon FreedomWorks PAC 2009 tax return

Gee. There’s Loren Parks. And there’s “Hire Calling” again. This isn’t a short-term arrangement, evidently. Money goes in, more or less untraceably. Then it goes back out to Kevin Mannix, Richard Russell Walker, and various other “projects.” Neat. Oh, here’s the “treasurer” of that PAC, and his compensation for 2009, in case you were wondering:

Oregon FreedomWorks PAC 2009 tax return

Walker received $131,032 from the several other organizations occupying the FreedomWorks Washington, D.C. address.

And various Oregon sugar daddies sent $230,000 BACK to Oregon through the Oregon FreedomWorks PAC. Convenient.

After awhile, it’s like having watched a long retro game of PONG.  It goes back and forth and back and forth and back and forth again.

Tinker to Evers to Chance.

Why on Earth would Loren Parks and Richard Wendt have any need to donate to FreedomWorks PAC, while its treasurer, Richard Russell Walker, is partially paid from the charity and partially from the FreedomWorks, Inc. ‘civic league’ all of whom are headquartered in Washington D.C.?

And, when they each had in-and-out-of-state Foundations of their own, already? (See the Sizemore money-shuffle above.)

Bill Sizemore in handcuffs, 2008
(Photo: Matt Davis, Portland Mercury)

Let’s look at Richard Wendt’s American Institute for Full Employment.

Wendt pretty much finances it with stock, as Foster Friess financed his “family foundation.”

2006 AIFE tax return total contributions

Wendt clearly controlled the Board of Directors in 2006:

2006 AIFE Board of Directors (from tax return)

And, look at the Board of Directors in 2007:

2007 AIFE Board of Directors (from tax return)

And here’s the 2008 version (the latest year available):

Wait a minute. Isn’t that the SAME Ted Abram who’s on the board of directors for FreedomWorks Foundation?

Yes. (And see HERE.) See above. And here’s from FreedomWorks, Foundation’s 2008 tax return. Significantly, Ted Abrams — Richard Wendt’s personal agent, apparently — does NOT appear on any of the FreedomWorks Inc.’s tax returns during the same period.

2008 FreedomWorks Foundation tax return
with Dick Armey and Steve Forbes

If nothing else, the reader can probably concur that the almost undoubted intention in our example cases was to disguise the movement of political money as much as possible. And that’s BEFORE the Citizens United case changed the rules.

Tinker to Evers to Chance.

The money from Oregon goes INTO FreedomWorks in Washington, D.C. And the money comes back into Oregon from FreedomWorks in Washington, D.C. (as we learned in part one).

Now, we look at the confluence of those two money streams.

ii. In a slightly shabby neighborhood of Salem, Oregon

That’s enough for today. The circle remains unbroken. On the same 2008 tax return, we see this line:

FreedomWorks Foundation’s only independent contractor who
received more than $100,000 in 2008

He’s moved his office slightly. 2003 State Street is next door to 2005 State Street, in Salem, Oregon, next to Bruce Wood Insurance Agent for State Farm Insurance, at 2005 State Street. Now, Kevin Mannix’s law offices are listed at 2007 State Street. Here’s 2005 State Street:

2005 State Street, Salem, Oregon: State Farm Insurance

And here is 2007 State Street, the address that money comes into and out of, the Law offices of Kevin Mannix, among other pursuits.

Above: Kevin Mannix’s office at 2007 State Street in Salem, Oregon
Below: street view with homeless person

The physical building where FreedomWorks’ money goes in and
mystery money comes out of in Salem (and homeless person)

This is the current office of Kevin Mannix, though which at least about a million dollars of FreedomWorks’ money has passed through since 2004.

Tomorrow: Other pursuits.

Courage.