COVER LETTER TO THE STATEMENT OF COMMISSIONER ELLEN L. WEINTRAUB IN MUR 6920 (AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE UNION)
DECEMBER 19, 2017
Due to pending litigation, I must take the unprecedented step of releasing the attached statement with the identities of certain persons and entities redacted. As can be seen from my statement and the third General Counsel’s Report, these were not incidental witnesses swept up in the agency’s probe, but rather key players in the scheme the Commission unanimously found to have violated the law against making contributions in the name of another.
After engineering an intricate plot to defeat the public’s interest in knowing who was actually behind a $1.7 million political contribution, the plaintiffs are now taking the extraordinary step of suing the Commission to force us to continue to hide their identities.1 I am looking forward to the expeditious resolution of this litigation with a ruling in the FEC’s favor that will allow me to reissue my statement unredacted.
The public has the right to know as much as this agency was able to determine about who was trying to influence the election with this huge contribution. Likely the beneficiaries of their largesse already do.