Exclusive: RNC document mocks donors, plays on ‘fear’
The Republican National Committee plans to raise money this election cycle through an aggressive campaign capitalizing on “fear” of President Barack Obama and a promise to “save the country from trending toward socialism.”
The strategy was detailed in a confidential party fundraising presentation, obtained by POLITICO, which also outlines how “ego-driven” wealthy donors can be tapped with offers of access and “tchochkes.”
The presentation was delivered by RNC Finance Director Rob Bickhart to top donors and fundraisers at a party retreat in Boca Grande, Florida on February 18, a source at the gathering said.
In neat PowerPoint pages, it lifts the curtain on the often-cynical terms of political marketing, displaying an air of disdain for the party’s donors that is usually confined to the barroom conversations of political operatives.
The presentation explains the Republican fundraising in simple terms.
“What can you sell when you do not have the White House, the House, or the Senate…?” it asks.
The answer: “Save the country from trending toward Socialism!”
Manipulating donors with crude caricatures and playing on their fears is hardly unique to Republicans or to the RNC – Democrats raised millions off George W. Bush in similar terms – but rarely is it practiced in such cartoonish terms.
One page, headed “The Evil Empire,” pictures Obama as the Joker from Batman, while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leaders Harry Reid are depicted as Cruella DeVille and Scooby Doo, respectively.
The document, which two Republican sources said was prepared by the party’s finance staff, comes as Chairman Michael Steele struggles to retain the trust and allegiance of major donors, who can give as much as $30,400 a year to the party.
Under Steele, the RNC has shifted toward a reliance on small donors, but the document reveals extensive, confidential details of the strategy for luring wealthy checkwriters, which range from luxury retreats in California wine country to tickets to a professional fight in Las Vegas.
The 72-page document was provided to POLITICO by a Democrat, who said a hard copy had been left in the hotel hosting the $2,500-a-head retreat, the Gasparilla Inn & Club. Sources at the event said the presentation was delivered by Bickhart and by the RNC Finance Chairman, Peter Terpeluk, a former ambassador to Luxembourg under President George W. Bush.
The RNC reacted with alarm to a question about it Wednesday, emailing major donors to warn them of a reporter’s question, and distancing Steele from its contents.
“The document was used for a fundraising presentation Chairman Steele did not attend, nor had he seen the document,” RNC Communications Director Doug Heye said in an email. “Fundraising documents are often controversial.
“Obviously, the Chairman disagrees with the language and finds the use of such imagery to be unacceptable. It will not be used by the Republican National Committee – in any capacity – in the future,” Heye said.
The most unusual section of the presentation is a set of six slides headed “RNC Marketing 101.” The presentation divides fundraising into two traditional categories, direct marketing and major donors, and lays out the details of how to approach each group.
The small donors who are the targets of direct marketing are described under the heading “Visceral Giving.” Their motivations are listed as “fear;” “Extreme negative feelings toward existing Administration;” and “Reactionary.”
Major donors, by contrast, are treated in a column headed “Calculated Giving.”
Their motivations include: “Peer to Peer Pressure”; “access”; and “Ego-Driven.”
The slide also allows that donors may have more honorable motives, including “Patriotic Duty.”
A major Republican donor described the state of the RNC’s relationship with major donors as “disastrous,” with veteran givers beginning to abandon the committee, which is becoming increasingly reliant on small donors.
The party’s average contribution in 2009, according to the document, was just $40, and the shift toward a financial reliance on the grassroots may help explain Steele’s increasingly strident tone toward the Obama Administration.
While the crude portrayal of Obama may be – as Steele ‘s spokesman put it – “unacceptable,” other elements of the presentation may be of equal interest to close political observers.
The RNC plans to raise $8.6 million from major donors alone in 2010, less than 10% of its total 2009 fundraising take, which was primarily from small donors.”
The center of that plan is an extensive, and colorful, schedule of events. Along with traditional fundraisers with conservative luminaries including Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol and former presidential candidate Steve Forbes, the party plans to raise $80,000 for a trip to London to meet David Cameron, the British Conservative Party leader, on September 17.
The RNC’s “Young Eagles” – younger major donors and the only group, according to a major donor, continuing to pull its weight financially – are invited to a “professional bull riding event” in October, expected to raise $50,000, and to a no-holds-barred Ultimate Fighting Championship fight in Las Vegas the same month, expected to raise $60,000.
The RNC’s aim, according to one section of the document: “Putting the Fun Back in FUNdraising.”
well far left vern your boy nobama is heading us down to b/k and has to be stopped . so anything the reps do is fine by me because of what we face if we keep this clown in office with stretch face and smelly reid . he has 8 mnoths left and then his power at least will be stopped when he loses both the house and the senate .
You da man, Grate One! Give till it hurts!
I click on OC Juice and the first article is Terry Crowley scaring me about healthcare. No links, no back up support. Just a bunch of grotesque questionable images of ….well who knows what.
Scare em! Scare em all! Keep em scared! It just cracks me up how cowardly and easily manipulated these people are.
“how cowardly and easily manipulated these people are.”
and Rush Limbaugh is counting on it. That’s how he became a millionaire and soon to be billionaire.
I’m surprise “great one” isn’t disgusted by it.
o k the dems do this too dont think its just one party here . renember the naacp add about that bryd guy how they came on there and said if bush is elected its like my father begging dragged all over again . byrd was dragged on the ground by a couple of kkk goons . so both parties do this .
No Grate One, I don’t remember that. See, you have to drag out some very obscure instance (that may or may not even have happened as far as I know.) Me, I’ve got an official party memo here, not to mention the general GOP behavior since at least the Cold War.
of course you dont renember vern . the naacp that great orginaztion who is honnoring rev wright and farahkook and the other bozo flagger they put that add on on a comercial i renember it im not pulling your leg on this one . when the dems do it its obscure of course they would never stoop that low.
*Aren’t Republicans the Ethical Top of the Mountain? Aren’t the Republicans all just here to serve their constituents with honor and truth? Aren’t the Republicans here just to stand in the way of the Libertarians, the Greens and the Larouchee’s? Aren’t they all just fiscal conservatives that never want to raise taxes or give cash away to pull out greedy banking interests?
We thought Republicans were not against Abortion…just against the Government Paying for it? We thought the Republicans weren’t against illegal immigrants, just ones that were felons, socially abusive takers of our healthcare and those that were in drug cartels and gangs?
Hmmm…times change!