Real Koch Facts

The Kochs diversify their GOP investment by backing multiple candidates

This weekend, David Koch confirmed that the billionaire brothers will use the roughly $900 million they are doling out for the 2016 presidential race to bankroll multiple GOP contestants. The Kochs have already revealed their top draft picks this cycle are Scott Walker, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Marco Rubio. They’re going to do the same with the Republican presidential field as they are with their business portfolio: diversify their investments. They want to make sure they own whichever GOP nominee is competing for the White House.

The Republican wannabees are already running to the right to cater to Koch priorities on the flat tax, the Export-Import Bank, and the minimum wage. How far will the GOP presidential field go for a chunk of Koch cash?

Check out Bridge Project’s web ad, “Koch Tank” that gives a sneak peak of the Kochs’ auditions to pick their GOP presidential candidates.

GOPers Cave to Koch Stance on Export-Import Bank

May 22, 2015

In the Kochs’ invisible primary, the crop of GOP presidential wannabees are bending over backwards to win the financial backing of the electorate of two. An aide to the Kochs told the Daily Signal that opposition to the Export-Import Bank would be a key factor in determining whether a candidate would garner the billionaire brothers’ support.

Of course, the Kochs are opposed to the program because it gives small businesses an edge over their multi-national corporation, Koch Industries. Now the Kochs have set their sights on killing the bank through several of their organizations, including Americans for Prosperity, Freedom Partners, and the LIBRE Initiative.

The truth is the Ex-Im Bank’s mission is to protect American companies and give them a competitive edge abroad. For more than 80 years, it’s been a bipartisan program because it promotes American exports. Last year alone it supported 164,000 jobs here at home with no cost to […]

Koch brothers welcome flat tax acolytes Cruz and Paul with open arms

May 15, 2015

It’s hard to understate just how important tax reform is to the Koch brothers, but if you asked them to finally admit that climate change is caused by humans to enact a flat tax, they wouldn’t think twice. The New York Times confirmed todaythat their preferred method of tilting the scales in their favor – the flat tax – is sure to be a major debate in the GOP primary. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Ben Carson, and Rick Perry all strongly support the flat tax, which the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities describes as:

“injurious to working and middle-class Americans, who would have to pay higher taxes to help make up for the massive revenue losses, face deep cuts in key programs — likely including programs such as Medicare — to accommodate the large revenue losses, or both.”

In other words, the flat tax will force low […]

Koch Industries’ Plant Closure Will Leave Most Workers Unemployed

May 11, 2015

Most of the workers at a shuttering Georgia-Pacific plant are facing unemployment at the end of the year due to Koch Industries most recent cuts. Koch subsidiary, Georgia-Pacific, announced the closure of its Dixie Plant in Parchment, Michigan on Friday. The Kochs’ move is a devastating loss to the city as it was the last remaining paper producer in the town nick-named “Paper City” for the many paper companies it once was home to. Parchment Mayor Rob Heasley said he was shocked by the move since he believed the plant was doing well.

The impending closure is a stark reminder — while the Koch brothers gear up to spend nearly $900 million picking a conservative Republican and try to buy the White House, they have a long history of destroying livelihoods and families. The historic closing is just the Kochs’ latest maneuver to increase Georgia-Pacific’s profits. In Michigan, the Kochs’ Americans for Prosperity is

Florida Man Buys State: Koch Impacts in the Sunshine State

Through their decades in business and politics, Charles and David Koch have honed their methods for rigging the system in their favor, both through their national operations and activities. Their history in Florida is indicative of this overall multifaceted strategy, which includes lobbying and raising funds for politicians, using their advocacy network to sway public policy, and leveraging financial donations to universities to buy professors that promote their worldview. Time and time again, the Koch brothers’ self-interested actions proved to be beneficial to their bottom line at the expense of hardworking Floridians.

One key aspect of the Kochs’ strategy was cultivating relationships with high-profile Florida politicians who were sympathetic to their message. Senator and likely GOP presidential candidate Marco Rubio was the only U.S. Senator to receive a 100 percent score from Koch-group Americans for Prosperity in 2013. In that same year, Sen. Rubio was the keynote speaker at […]

Bush Hires Staff with Deep Koch Ties

May 4, 2015

Jeb Bush figured out yet another way to suck up to the Koch brothers: Hire their former staff for his campaign. Conveniently, as the Kochs hold open auditions to find their preferred presidential candidate, Bush is adding Jose Mallea, the former national strategic director for the LIBRE Initiative. LIBRE is the Kochs’ front group for Latino outreach.

The LIBRE Initiative has received at least $10 million from the Koch money machine, Freedom Partners, to push the Koch agenda under the facade of Hispanic outreach. While the LIBRE Initiative claims that they are working to empower the Hispanic community, the reality is that they are promoting Koch policies at the expense of Hispanics. LIBRE opposes policies that disproportionately help Hispanics including the Affordable Care Act, minimum wage increases, and immigration reform. Mallea led LIBRE through the 2014 elections when the group challenged Latino candidates in favor […]

Cutting Seniors’ Benefits to Win the Blessing of the Kochs

April 30, 2015

Last week, Politico got its hands on a secret Koch brothers memo to their donors about their plot to expand into new states, recruit new donors, and continue to co-opt the Republican Party — and its presidential field — as the 2016 cycle gets underway.The secret memo the Kochs never wanted us to see gives the 2016 GOP wannabes a roadmap of Koch priorities that will help in their audition for Koch cash: repealing federal support for wind energy, eliminating estate taxes that largely benefit the very wealthy, defunding the EPA, all in service of their bottom line. The Kochs’ priorities, however, would be disastrous for the American people.

In the memo, the Kochs go even farther, taking a page from Mitt Romney’s “47 percent” playbook and appallingly putting blame on social welfare programs for sustained poverty. “The irony is maddening. America’s poor have been shackled by […]

The Kochs vs. the Pope: Equal Pay Edition

April 30, 2015

The Kochs won’t be too excited about Pope Francis’ latest advocacy issue. The pope is now unequivocally supporting equal pay — one of the brothers’ most loathed ideals. The religious leader called the wage gap between men and women “pure scandal” in a speech Wednesday.

“Why is it taken for granted that women must earn less than men? No! They have the same rights. The discrepancy is a pure scandal,” said Francis.

This is more than likely to set off the brothers against the pope once again. Koch Industries spent almost a million dollars lobbying against issues like the paycheck fairness in 2010, which would have brought the country closer to equal pay.

In their audition for the Kochs’ invisible primary, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Jeb Bush all fall in line on equal pay. Scott Walker repealed the Wisconsin equal pay law and Rand Paul once […]

Koch Brother$ Force GOP Pick$ to Focu$ on Their I$$ue$

April 22, 2015

Ryan Lizza pointed out that the Koch brothers’ invisible primary between Scott Walker, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio will have horrible consequences. The billionaires only care about a narrow set of issues that aren’t on the voter’s radar:

“That changes your sense of what issues are really important. When these guys go to, say the Koch brothers conference to try to win their support, the Koch brothers have issues like anyone else but they are not necessarily the top issues on the minds of the American people. When you go to Sheldon Adelson, one of the billionaires in Las Vegas, who is very influential in Republican politics, he has a set of narrow issues that are not the ones the American people are talking about. And I think that’s – as much as the money – that is what is corrupting.”

While the Koch brothers are […]

Speaking fluent Koch, Jeb Bush Backs Moving VA to Voucher System

April 9, 2015

While speaking at a Colorado Springs IHOP, Jeb Bush called for privatizing elements of the Department of Veterans Affairs.

“This is where I think empowering people with the equivalent of a voucher that gives you the same economic benefit of receiving care inside of a clinic or a hospital,” he said. The likely presidential candidate has previously called for a system change saying he was “all in on the voucher thing.”

What a coincidence — the Kochs are all in on the voucher thing, too.

In February, Koch-funded organization Concerned Veterans for America (CVA) released a report calling for extreme policy changes including privatization and tougher enrollment standards. Under the CVA’s plan, one-fifth of future veterans would be ineligible for care.

These radical policies are widely unpopular with veterans groups like the American Legion and Paralyzed Veterans of America. That’s because they know what Jeb doesn’t: privatizing their care does […]

Koch-backed veterans group advocates for VA privatization

March 13, 2015

During the 2014 midterm election cycle, the Koch-funded group Concerned Veterans for America (CVA) backed a bevy of extreme conservative candidates and helped send top Koch cronies (and veterans) Joni Ernst and Tom Cotton to the U.S. Senate. Scarcely a couple months into the 2016 cycle, CVA has released a report recommending that much of the U.S. Veterans Administration be privatized, an extreme policy position that would jeopardize the care received by millions of our nation’s veterans.

Last month, CVA’s Fixing Veterans Health Care Taskforce released its final report suggesting “policy reforms” for the VA, namely that the VA’s health care system be converted into an independent, nonprofit corporation and advocating for the creation of a private insurance option for veterans. Additionally, new enrollees into the proposed system would face tougher enrollment standards. According to USA Today, a whopping one-fifth of future veterans would not be […]

For GOP Presidential Hopefuls, The Koch Primary Looms Larger Than IA or NH

Yeah, but how will that play in Iowa and New Hampshire?

That’s a question that used to be asked about presidential candidates as they geared up to court base voters in the nation’s crucial first caucus and primary. But for today’s GOP hopefuls, the game has changed, and the most important primary is already underway: The Koch primary.

If you want to understand who makes up the core constituency that Republicans are hoping to impress ahead of 2016, look no further than this morning’s lede from POLITICO — a revealing commentary on the current state of the GOP:

Four leading Republican presidential prospects are expected to appear this weekend in the California desert before an exclusive gathering of rich conservatives convened by the Koch brothers’ political operation, several sources tell POLITICO.

And the New York Times coverage of the upcoming Koch gathering recounted GOP presidential hopefuls’ varying attempts to cozy up to the billionaire […]

Closing Argument: Kochs Fight To Save Candidate Cronies In Critical Election

October 30, 2014

The midterms are around the corner and the Koch brothers and their vast political network have gone to unprecedented lengths to elect extreme Tea Party candidates who support their self-serving agenda. The Kochs have bought and paid for these candidates (both senate and gubernatorial), and are clearly hoping for an Election night wave to secure support for their anti-working families agenda.

Unparalleled Spending

The billionaire brothers began their dirty campaign early this cycle. By January of 2014, the Kochs’ chief political arm, Americans For Prosperity (AFP), had already poured $22 million in dark money into TV ads smearing Democratic senators up for reelection. AFP did not stop there. They have continued to spend so heavily on television ads, which range from misleading to patently false, that AFP has accounted for one out of every sixteen Senate ads this cycle as of August 2014.

But Americans For Prosperity’s spending is just one cog […]

The Republican Agenda, As Dictated By The Koch Brothers

June 20, 2014

Super-secretive, well-guarded rooms at a Koch brothers’ billionaires retreat–this is where the Republican agenda is being hatched these days.

Last weekend, the Kochs and their wealthiest friends rented out an entire luxury resort complex in Laguna Beach. Because where else are you supposed to hold your brainstorming session on how to best spend hundreds of millions of dollars to buy elections?

But as detailed by The Nation, it wasn’t just dark money donors palling around at the conference. Guess who else made an appearance? Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, presidential hopeful Marco Rubio, key Senate candidates, Cory Gardner and Tom Cotton, and influential conservative congressman, Jim Jordan.

There is much ado these days about the jockeying for power between the Tea Party and the Republican establishment. But the reality is, in today’s GOP, the Koch brothers are the ones calling the shots.

The Kochs and the GOP Science of Denying Climate Change

Photo Credit: Thomas Quine

Marco Rubio, Rick Scott, John Boehner, the list of extreme Republicans denying basic science showing humans impact climate change seems to grow by the day. Who else can be added to this list? Why David Koch, of course. Not only has Koch denied human caused climate change, he’s gone so far as to speculate that warming of the planet is a GOOD THING. According to New York Magazine, Koch rationalized that any trauma caused by migration of people from disappearing coastlines would be made up for by lengthened growing seasons.

As is typical of their self-serving agenda, the Kochs recognize that addressing climate change could threaten the massive profits of their piggybank – Koch Industries. So they have spent $50 million funding groups that deny climate science, fighting tooth and nail to protect their oil fortune at the expense of our air and treating this misinformation campaign as just another investment in their bottom line.

The sad part? It’s working. PolitiFact recently rated it “mostly true” that “virtually no Republican” in Washington accepts climate change science.

Check out the research after the jump.