Texas oilman Kenneth W. Davis Jr. formed his own super PAC last year, Vote2ReduceDebt, and spent nearly three million dollars to back conservative Senate candidates in eight states in 2014. He didn’t spend money on our Annette Bosworth or GOP nominee Mike Rounds, but he did spend $274K in Iowa to help Joni Ernst go to Washington.
However, the Texas oilman did hire Annette Bosworth’s campaign manager, Patrick Davis of Colorado Springs, as senior consultant right around the time the fake Bosworth campaign was imploding into futile vulgarity and indictment for perjury.
But now Patrick Davis is embroiled in accusations that he imported some of Bosworth’s financial mismanagement to Kenneth Davis’s super PAC:
In his July memo to the board, [V2RD exec] Randy Hill alleged irregularities in Patrick Davis’ reimbursement requests. He wasn’t turning in receipts, Hill wrote, and some expenses didn’t track, such as a bill for an Iowa hotel stay that had been prepaid and a bill for a plane ticket even though Davis had driven to his destination.
Hill also questioned whether events organized by Davis were all they claimed to be. At an Iowa phone bank, Hill said, a caller admitted they were just “pretending to make phone calls” for the benefit of the campaign’s video cameras [Robert Faturechi, “Super PAC Men: How Political Consultants Took a Texas Oilman on a Wild Ride,” ProPublica, 2015.03.19].
Hogwash, says Patrick Davis: Hill is the real trickster, scamming the super PAC for cash to start his own NASCAR team and reality TV show:
By Davis’ account, Hill offered him a trade of sorts. He would make Patrick Davis “a character in his reality TV show.” And Patrick Davis would help Hill get $4 million out of the PAC: half a million for PAC promotions, and the rest going toward racing expenses including drivers and pit crews. Ken Davis, recently hospitalized, would be told the money was going towards legitimate get-out-the-vote operations.
In his memo, Patrick Davis wrote that he would never go along with such a scheme because it would have “required lying to Mr. Ken Davis which was something I was not going to do” [Faturechi, 2015.03.19].
Patrick Davis won. Kenneth Davis canned Hill, and Patrick Davis got Vote2ReduceDebt to hire three South Dakota companies run by Patrick’s pal and Annette Bosworth’s former attorney Joel Arends. Patrick Davis managed to funnel $875,000 from the super PAC to organizations connected with himself and associates, including a $200,000 deal with Red State Productions, incorporated by Arends on August 11, 2014, to stage voter rallies. That deal sparked a lawsuit:
…Davis’s lawyer said in a statement that Red State “is a skilled political campaign services provider with years of experience and excellent results over many campaigns.”
While Arends had worked with campaigns in the past, Red State’s website, which displays photos of big political rallies featuring Republican stars such as Rep. Michelle Bachmann and Newt Gingrich, was created a couple of days before Red State pitched the $200,000 deal to Vote2ReduceDebt, domain registration records show. The company was incorporated in South Dakota a few days after the pitch.
Red State’s events, according to the website, “are widely attended, photographed and reported.” A search of online databases turned up no previous record of payments to Red State Productions by a candidate or political committee. The D.C. number for the company has since been disconnected. The address listed on its website is for a service on Washington’s K Street lobbying corridor that provides mail drops and temporary office space.
Vote2ReduceDebt staffers were not pleased with Red State’s work, according to a lawsuit the super PAC filed in December to get the money back. One of the firm’s main responsibilities was promoting rallies and getting people there. But most of the people who attended their rallies, the PAC alleged, were paid Vote2ReduceDebt staffers, with one rally only drawing seven outsiders [Faturechi, 2015.03.19].
Arends is countersuing Vote to Reduce Debt for breach of contract. Vote to Reduce Debt ended its contract with Patrick Davis in October.
Thanks for reporting this Cory.
I am very curious as to what happened to the 2 million dollars that Annette Bosworth raised????? Who ended up with the money after a percentage was paid to the company that helped raise the money.
2014 was such a bizarre election cycle here in SD. Will we see future elections in SD for national office flooded by fake candidates influenced by the SDGOP to run in an effort to distract from a their main candidate who is politically vulnerable? Will it become the new standard operating procedure?
What did those graffiti artists get paid to spray paint that wall in preparation for the staged mental breakdown press conference? Ryan do you remember?
Sadly the citizens South Dakota suffered the biggest loss from the November 2014 election.
Has our political process become a freak show? Or has it always been a freak show, but it’s just getting ‘bigger and better’ because the promoters now have unlimited production and marketing budgets, and nobody has to put their name on it?
Sidenote: Hey Cory, do you have Meerkat yet? Could be a whole new ballgame, I’m thinkin’.
Bill,
Do you mean that it’s hard to know who is behind all these PACS?
Meerkats? like the program that was on Animal Planet and the cunning politics involved?
Yes, Lynn, especially the SuperPacs. Impossible to know who’s doing what to whom.
Regarding Meerkats, they’ve been one of my favorite animals ever since I first learned about them. But there is a new app called Meerkat that lets people ‘tweet’ live video. Seems like it could be a game changer.
Bill,
I discovered old reruns of Meerkat Manor for the 1st time last year and love that show. Talk about complicated political games and power plays in the Meerkat world besides being such cute critters.
Jindal in La. moved the presidential primaries up two weeks in 2016 and then forgot to budget any money to pay for them. The side-show in wingnut land continues.
https://www.google.com/search?q=the+show+must+go+on&oq=the+show+must+go+on&aqs=chrome..69i57.8082j0j4&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8#q=the+show+must+go+on+three+dog+night&revid=1916417799
What they were,you are. What they are,you will become-if you don’t get Libs and independents to vote for sanity.
http://www.animalplanet.com/tv-shows/meerkat-manor/ Have at it,folks.
Davis jr Granddad, Cullen “Stinky” Davis was tried for murder and acquitted of killing his wife or ex-wife. One of the strangest trials in Texas. Afterwords,he found the lord with the help of James Robison,who talked Davis out of his extensive art collection and later they smashed them instead of selling them and letting Robison pocket the money.
i tweet videos now w/o no stinkin’ meerkat. gulp. richard parker
I would suggest, Bosworth should get her money back. Where did that 2 million go? I checked the Red State website. Very generic with just a lot of pictures, but no testimonies or information who their clients are.
Wrong train, Tara. Bosworth already settled the lawsuit Patrick Davis had to file to get her to pay him part of what she owed him. Red State Productions didn’t exist when Davis rendered services to Bosworth.
Come on Cory, get on the Follow the Money Train! What has Red State Productions done so far other then pay themselves a hefty salary. I still would like to know if the newbie got frauded.
I’m more interested in the fraud Bosworth perpetuated on South Dakota voters with here fake candidacy.
And the fraudulent fund raising she did on Facebook, bilking millions of dollars from grandmas and grandpas around the country with that same fake candidacy.
And Roger, aren’t you interested as to where the millions of dollars went?
I am fairly certain roger would agree we’d like to know how many and where did millions or hundreds of millions go in rounds/daugaard’s EB5
Leslie, I think it is just as important to have an outside prosecutor investigate the millions of dollars that has disappeared from Annette Bosworth’s campaign war chest. Randy Seiler, where are you. I think a phone call is in order to the new US Attorney.
Where’s the SD press on this one. I think this guy is from the LA Times. We have 2 out of state investigative reporters that think there is something more to the Bosworth campaign than signing some petitions. Being a woman doesn’t help the case either. Bosworth needs to be put in her place, right. Shut that B—- up. She is raising havoc with the political establishments, especially the Republican party.
Where’s all the missing millions from the Bosworth campaign? Ask Chad.
or Joel or Patrick. Roger you just can’t admit that maybe some people from the Republican establishment might just be involved. Time for an investigation from an Independent prosecutor.
Young Dr. Bos used her attractiveness to fraud on South Dakota. She is a thief in my eyes and probably insaner than most.
How about her campaign manager? Oh I guess if SDWC says these guys are innocent, then maybe they are.