BY THE NUMBERS: Campaign cash


Joan McGuire

The people spending the big bucks on the November elections. 

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With elections just under a month away, we held a microscope to contributions to the main candidates and controversial ballot measures. Timber companies and wealthy businessmen are writing big checks to Republican gubernatorial candidate Knute Buehler.

His opponent, governor Kate Brown, is scoring her cash from unions, teachers and senior-living facilities. A hate group wants Oregon’s sanctuary law off the books, and one wealth manager in the Dalles really doesn’t think the government should help fund abortions.

Here are a few of the more interesting contributions recorded this fall.

Buehler

$250,000
from Henry Swigart,
the retired 87-year-old executive of steel foundry ESCO Corporation.
Buehler received another $100,000 from ActionPAC, a Republican political action committee formed this year with a quarter of a million in funding from Swigart.

$100,000
from Seneca Jones Timber Company in Eugene.

$100,000
from George Austin,
86-year-old founder of A-Dec, a multimillion dollar dental equipment manufacturer.

$50,000
from Freres Timber,
a plywood manufacturer in Lyons.

$50,000
from Greenbrier Companies,
a rail manufacturer and one of the largest publicly-traded companies in the state.

$50,000
from Thomas Cook,
the manager of a Taco Bell franchise in Vancouver, Washington.

Brown

$500,000
from EMILY’s list,
a D.C.-based political action committee that aims to elect pro-choice Democratic women to office.

$250,000
from Everytown for Gun Safety,
a New York nonprofit that seeks to end gun violence.

$100,000
from Working for Working America,
the Washington D.C.-based political action arm of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), the nation’s largest union.

$100,000
from United Food and Commercial Workers Union,
another AFL-CIO group.

$50,000
from American Federation of Teachers,
the second largest teachers’ union in the nation.

$50,000
from the American Federation of State County and Federal Employees (AFSCME),
the nation’s largest union for public employees.

$25,000
each from Avamere Health services,
an assisted-living facility, and Prestige Senior Living.

 


Measure 105: repeals Oregon’s sanctuary law

Oregonians for Immigration Reform donated $7,000 to the committee seeking to pass the measure. Although it sounds like a collection of concerned Oregonians, this McMinnville-based group traces its roots to white nationalist John Tanton, who founded a number of local groups to oppose immigration. The Southern Poverty Law Center labeled the organization a hate group.

Louis McAlpin, a freelance writer in Michigan, also contributed $5,000 to the committee supporting the measure.


Measure 106: bans public funding for abortions

Marta von Borstel, operations manager at wealth management firm Von Borstel & Associates, gave $100,000 to Oregon Life United, the political action committee advancing the measure. It’s the only individual contribution over $10,000.

Source: Oregon Secretary of State campaign finance database


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