In a bid to stay relevant in the political world, Sarah Palin has formed her own political action committee(PAC). The trouble is, while the goal of a PAC is to donate money to like-minded candidates to help get them elected or get the opposition defeated, Sarah’s PAC seems to have a different mission entirely – to fund Sarah Palin.
In a review of Palin’s PAC finances, SarahPAC donated just $45,000 to nine candidates, or less than 3 percent of the revenue earned by the PAC.
The vast majority of the money went to fund Palin’s travel, books, and other needs.
According to Open Secrets, despite having nearly a million dollars in the bank for the third quarter and getting donations of nearly a half of a million dollars, instead of distributing the money donated by voters to help sway the mid-term elections, SarahPAC was spending it on other things including, “many of the same consultants she has used all along — for speechwriting, fundraising, logistics and research.”
Open Secrets also noted that SarahPAC did pay one consultant to discuss ‘coalitions.’
Most of the rest was spent by Sarah on appearances and donor gifts.
“Travel, presumably for Palin, is part of the equation; a PAC like this is useful for keeping a high profile nationally without having to pay those pesky airline and hotel tabs out of personal funds,” Open Secret pointed out. “And the PAC sent $10,885 to HarperCollins — publisher of all three of Palin’s books — for ‘books for donor fulfillment.’ That wasn’t the only book purchase by the committee: A lump sum of $13,000 was listed as being spent for “lodging, SUV rental, books for donors.”
In addition, SarahPAC’s stinginess was mirrored by Palin’s own. While she seemed to score big by dipping into the PAC’s funds to make sure she could be seen and heard, Palin donated only $628 of her personal funds to candidates vying in the upcoming November race.
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