Sen. Obama and early campaign funding

Taken from the list at Rezko Watch blog of 30 MAR 2008, looking at the Rezko backers and who they are from the DoJ Rezko Donation List, along with the known Obama backers of today, and then crossing that with the Illinois State Board of Elections Campaign Disclosures, some of the earliest donors to Barack Obama starting in 1995 have been doing so way before he got into State politics. Doing some cross referencing here are some of the names that show up early in Barack Obama's political career, non-Rezko list in purple (please excuse table formatting as Blogger is table hostile):

Blackwell	Jr, Robert	12/16/95	150
Mckissack	Eric T	12/16/95	150
Pfleger	Michael	10/01/95	500
Pfleger	Michael	12/21/95	500
Rogers	Jr, John W	12/12/95	1000
Rezko Foods		07/31/95	1000

And from the article there is this description of Robert Blackwell:

Robert Blackwell, Jr., Electronic Knowledge Interchange: Rezko list: 07/15/04 - $5,000.00. Obama: 2000 cycle: 07/01/99 - $3,000.00; 07/25/99 - $2,000.00; 2004 cycle: 03/12/03 - $2,000.00; 06/23/03 - $8,000.00 and $2,000.00. Blackwell was a member of Obama's 2004 Senate Finance Committee. In response to pressure from the Chicago Sun-Times's Lynn Sweet, on January 8, 2008, Obamareleased the name of hosts for a "secret" fundraiser in Chicago. Blackwell's name was on the list. Blackwell is also a bundler for Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, raising over $100,000.00.

At Ariel Capital Management, also on the Rezko list:

Eric T. McKissack: Obama: Obama 2010: 04/19/06 - $2,100.00.

John W. Rogers is co-chair of Obama's fundraising efforts and an Obama bundler; CEO and founder of mutual fund company Ariel Capital Management; and a director of Exelon: Obama: 2002 cycle: 12/13/02 - $1,000.00 and $1,000.00; 2004 cycle: 03/25/03 - $4,000.00; 03/31/03 - $1,000.00; 09/23/03 - $500.00 and $500.00; 11/11/03 - $1,000; 10/27/04 - $2,000.00.

For such a 'new style' politician, Sen. Obama's roots go pretty far back into the Rezko based coterie. Mind you these are only out of 139 contributors, and not even much in the way of contributions, but one must start somewhere.

Now, in case you want to do a bit of network searching, Muckety has a nice little application that does that, just type in new names as you go.

Moving on to the 1996 list, the following name comes up from the Rezko Watch cross-check:

Davis	Allison	10/02/96	200
Narefsky	David	10/17/96	300

For those who have forgotten this is the boss of Sen. Obama at the Woods Fund and I looked at that in a previous article of mine and found this on Allison S. Davis (Source:Chicago Sun-Times report by Tim Novak on 20 NOV 2007):

Seven years ago, Sen. Barack Obama was on the board of a Chicago charity when his former boss, Allison S. Davis, came looking for money.

At the time, Davis was a developer represented by the law firm where Obama worked, as well as a small contributor to Obama's political campaign funds. He wanted the charity to help fund his plans to build housing for low-income Chicagoans.

Obama agreed. He voted with other directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago to invest $1 million with Neighborhood Rejuvenation Partners L.P., a $17 million partnership that Davis still operates.

It's not clear whether Obama told other board members of his ties to Davis, whose family would go on to donate more than $25,000 to Obama's political campaigns, including his bid to be president of the United States.

"Let me get back to you on that," Obama presidential campaign spokesman Bill Burton said when asked about that two weeks ago. He never did.

[..]

As a developer, Davis' partners have included Tony Rezko, the now-indicted political fund-raiser who has been among Obama's biggest political supporters.

A few months after Davis left the law firm, Obama won his first political office -- a seat in the Illinois Senate. His campaign contributors included Rezko and Davis.

Two years later, Obama wrote to city and state officials, urging them to give money to New Kenwood LLC, a company that Davis and Rezko formed to build an apartment building for low-income seniors at 48th and Cottage Grove.

Davis and Rezko were building that project in 2000 when Davis approached the Woods Fund, seeking its investment in future projects. Besides Obama, Davis also had ties to another of the not-for-profit organization's seven board members -- Howard Stanback, a former city aviation commissioner who worked for Davis at New Kenwood.

Mr. Davis' donation, then, ties in with the time that Obama would start to work at the Woods Fund. At a later Rezko Watch article of 04 MAR 2008, the other individual is also backgrounded while looking at a later fundraiser, the one in JUN 2003 by Tony Rezko:

David Narefsky, and attorney with Mayer Brown & Platt, contributed $1,000.

Getting just ahead of things a little that would be the same fundraiser that showed up at Counter Currents on 16 MAY 2008 by Evelyn Pringle, where a man now suing Rezko was an attendee:

However, Joe Cacciatore told the Associated Press that he was a partner with Rezko in Riverside Park before Auchi showed up, and has not seen any money as a result of the sale. Cacciatore has filed a lawsuit against his
former partners, according to the article.

Carriatore says he met Auchi at an "Obama fundraising party" Rezko gave at his home several years ago. "He was well dressed," he told the Press. "He seemed distinguished."

According to Obama, Rezko only hosted one fundraising party at his home in July 2003. So exactly how many times did Obama party with Auchi?

Which is a question that Sen. Obama has yet to answer.

Back to cross-references, and now moving onto 1997 and crossing the State Election numbers with the Rezko list:

Il State Medical Society		05/12/97	250
Il State Medical Society		11/05/97	500
Katten Muchin & Zavis		09/26/97	200
Rezko Concessions Inc		01/13/97	1000
Rezmar Corp		01/14/97	1000
Rezmar Corp		07/29/97	1500
St & Muni Teamsters Chauffeurs Local U 726		04/24/97	250
State & Municipal Teamsters		10/08/97	200
Teamster Local 710		04/24/97	500
Teamsters Local 705		05/02/97	500
Teamsters Local 710		10/08/97	1000

Although SEIU, AFSCME, UAW and other union organizations have shown up, this is the first time the Teamsters started to contribute to Obama's campaign funds. The reason I consider this important is that Sen. Obama has proposed 'loosening oversight' on the Teamsters which have had long-term historic ties to organized crime. Katten Muchin shows up due to a later appearance on the Rezko list:

Illinois State Medical Society PAC: Rezko list: 07/25/03 - $25,000.00. Obama: 10/4/01 - $1,000.00; 07/31/02 - $1,000.00.

Terry Newman, Katten Muchin Rosenman: Rezko list: 07/25/03 - $25,000.00. Obama: 2008 cycle: 04/23/2007 - $1,000.00.

That catches us up to 1997. The list was 149 names long, but repeats are in there, too. So onwards to 1998 and cross-referencing I come up with:

Hobson	Mellody	09/10/98	300
Il Amoco Pac		07/30/98	500
Il State Medical Society		05/15/98	250
Kiley	Roger J, Jr	10/01/98	750
Newman	Terry E	10/08/98	200
Pfleger	Michael	10/12/98	300
Rezko	Tony	01/22/98	457.7
Teamsters Local 710		04/22/98	1000
Teamsters Local 710		09/24/98	1000

Hey! An oil company PAC - Amoco, now BP. Good going on that, getting local outlets of oil companies to donate to you... hope he sent it back to keep up with the 'new politician' credentials. Can't have simple oil companies showing up when you got folks with mobster ties contributing to you.

From the two Rezko articles listing the names of those involved with Rezko:

Ariel Capital Management - Hobson, Mellody, Vice President: Obama: 04/08/01 - $1,000.00; 07/24/02 - $2,500.00.

Roger Kiley, an attorney with Mayer Brown & Platt and former chief of staff to Mayor Daley, whose firm Mayer Brown & Platt lobbied City Hall on Rezko's behalf, contributed $1,000.

Still, not much for 1998, only 133 donors listed, although there are repeats as seen above.

And the first glance at the 1999 list looks like a PAC man game, more of them than one can easily shake a stick at really. LAWPAC, Nurses PAC, Medical Society PAC, IMPACT, American SIPS PAC, Fire Fighters PAC, Road Builders PAC, MPAC, M Power PAC. Peoples Energy PAC, UPSPAC... and then there is big business showing up in Coca Cola, CSX Transportation, Automobile Dealers
Association, MCI World Com, Novartis, Sears Roebuck, United Airlines. Some of these had shown up before, but in 1999 they outnumber individual contributors of which there are 6 out of 71 listings.

Illinois State Medical Society PAC		05/17/99	500
Mayer Brown and Platt		07/25/99	750

Remember, this is from the same guy that now looks askance at PACs of various sorts.

In Sen. Obama's run for the 2000 seat held by Black Panther Bobby L. Rush does explain that as his 2000 income report is full of corporate, labor union, and big business supporters but he is down to just three people who would contribute to his campaign in any serious manner, and a NYT article by Janny Scott would look at that on 09 SEP 2007:

The rise of Barack Obama includes one glaring episode of political miscalculation. Even friends told Mr. Obama it was a bad idea when he decided in 1999 to challenge an incumbent congressman and former Black Panther, Bobby L. Rush, whose stronghold on the South Side of Chicago was overwhelmingly black, Democratic and working class.

Mr. Obama was a 38-year-old state senator and University of Chicago lecturer, unknown in much of Mr. Rush’s Congressional district. He lived in its most rarefied neighborhood, Hyde Park. He was taking on a local legend, a former alderman and four-term incumbent who had given voters no obvious reason to displace him.

Mr. Rush’s name recognition started off at 90 percent, Mr. Obama’s at 11. Then Mr. Rush’s son was murdered, leading Mr. Obama to put his campaign on hold. Later, while vacationing in Hawaii with his family, he missed a high-profile vote in the Legislature and was pilloried. (One Chicago Tribune editorial began, “What a bunch of gutless sheep.”) Then President Clinton endorsed Mr. Rush.

“Campaigns are always, ‘What’s the narrative of the race?’ ” said Eric Adelstein, a media consultant in Chicago who worked on the Rush campaign. “In a sense, it was ‘the Black Panther against the professor.’ That’s not a knock on Obama; but to run from Hyde Park, this little bastion of academia, this white community in the black South Side — it just seemed odd that he would make that choice as a kind of stepping out.”

[..]

Mr. Obama’s Ivy League education and his white liberal-establishment connections also became an issue. Mr. Rush told The Chicago Reader, “He went to Harvard and became an educated fool. We’re not impressed with these folks with these Eastern elite degrees.”

Mr. Rush and his supporters faulted him for having missed experiences that more directly defined the previous generation of black people. “Barack is a person who read about the civil-rights protests and thinks he knows all about it,” Mr. Rush told The Reader.

Mr. Obama was seen as an intellectual, “not from us, not from the ’hood,” said Jerry Morrison, a consultant on the Rush campaign. Asked recently about that line of attack, Mr. Rush minimized it as “chest beating, signifying.”

The implication was not exactly that Mr. Obama was “not black enough,” as some blacks have suggested more recently; his credentials were suspect. “It was much more a function of class, not race,” Mr. Adelstein said. “Nobody said he’s ‘not black enough.’ They said he’s a professor, a Harvard elite who lives in Hyde Park.”

Not everything went badly. Mr. Obama proved unusually good at raising money. He raised more than $500,000 — less than Mr. Rush but impressive for a newcomer — tapping connections at the University of Chicago, Harvard Law School, law firms where he had worked, and a network of successful, black, Chicago-based entrepreneurs who have played an important role in subsequent campaigns.

He was also catching on among whites in the district thanks to Thomas J. Dart, then a popular state representative who is now Cook County sheriff.

Considering he only got three people to contribute to his campaign, one can say that the rest of the support from unions, PACs and business constituted a 'machine politics' campaign. Of course the Chicago Machine couldn't overcome a well known individual like Bobby Rush, so Barack Obama would get his only defeat in campaigning.

Illinois State Medical Society PAC		02/16/00	250
Illinois State Medical Society PAC		08/21/00	1000

After that solid, Chicago machine cash flow, his 2001 money reflects the support of those that follow that pattern when the lower-level supporters get tapped for help. So now the 2001 cross-reference with Rezko Watch highlights:

Ayers	William	04/02/01	200
Bynoe	Peter	04/10/01	6768.73
Bynoe	Peter	10/15/01	1500
Exelon PAC		10/30/01	500
Hobson	Mellody	04/09/01	1000
Illinois State Medical Society PAC		04/12/01
Illinois State Medical Society PAC		10/04/01
Katen Muchin Zavis		04/06/01	250
Katten Muchin Zavis		10/30/01	250
Mayer Brown & Platt		04/20/01	1000
Mayer Brown & Platt		10/03/01	500
Melton	David	11/08/01	1500
Pfleger	Michael	04/10/01	200
Rogers	John	04/09/01	1000
The Northern Trust Co.		10/15/01	1000

From the Rezko Watch look at contributors:

Peter Bynoe, an attorney, lobbyist and partner in Piper Rudnick LLP: Rezko list: 07/25/03 - $25,000.00. Obama: Bynoe is a bundler for Obama, reportedly raising more than $100,000.00 for his presidential campaign. Bynoe has also made numerous individual contributions to Obama since 1999: 09/24/99 - $1,000.00; 2002, 2004 (and here: 12/10/02 - $1,000.00 and $1,000.00; 03/31/03 - $1,000.00; 01/26/04 - $1,000.00; 06/30/04 - $2,000.00; 01/26/04 - $1,000.00; 02/14/07 - $2,100.00 and 02/23/07 - $200.00. See Laura MacCleery, They talk big, but will candidates deliver the fundraising transparency we need?, MyDD, August 8, 2007, on Obama's lobbyist contributors. Also see Lynn Sweet, Obama, at Sun-Times request, releases names of finance committee members, Senate interns, Chicago Sun-Times, March 24, 2008.

John W. Rogers is co-chair of Obama's fundraising efforts and an Obama bundler; CEO and founder of mutual fund company Ariel Capital Management; and a director of Exelon: Obama: 2002 cycle: 12/13/02 - $1,000.00 and $1,000.00; 2004 cycle: 03/25/03 - $4,000.00; 03/31/03 - $1,000.00; 09/23/03 - $500.00 and $500.00; 11/11/03 - $1,000; 10/27/04 - $2,000.00.

Kelly Dibble, formerly Illinois Housing Development Authority, a state agency that loaned Rezko money, and now an attorney with The Northern Trust Company which in June 2005 financed Obama's Hyde Park mansion, contributed $250.

David Melton worked at Mayer, Brown & Platt according to a Chicago Sun Times article 17 DEC 2007.

Plus the assortment of PACs from various groups.

Moving on to 2002 the cross-referencing from the Illinois State Board and those two Rezko Watch articles looks like this:

Ariel Capital Management		07/24/02	2500
Exelon PAC		08/12/02	500
Hobson	Mellody	07/24/02
Illinois State Medical Society PAC		07/31/02	1000
Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw		07/31/02	1000

Then 2003:

Illinois State Medical Society PAC

05/16/03

1000

And that gets us up to the US Senate run by Sen. Obama! Remember that these are the State of Illinois numbers captured for local races only, not for federal races.

What can one take away from these earlier, pre-federal and near federal campaigns?

First - Barack Obama is a machine politician. His support that he garners is from, as one article pointed out, a network of small businesses and law firms. Beyond that the big business, major in-State PACs and other political organizations fielded by Unions and special interest groups gave Barack Obama the ability to garner nearly as much support as the old Black Panther Bobby L. Rush.

Second - Barack Obama has strong ties to the Chicago machine, meaning mob ties. Those ties show up in the very first year of donations to Barack Obama way back in 1995. Those ties to well known 'bundlers' and connected criminal figure Tony Rezko allowed Barack Obama to build the network of the first point. That group of John W. Rogers, Robert Blackwell, Tony Rezko and Fr. Pfleger have remained with him up to today but its basis started in 1995, and was dirty, then, with Chicago machine backing.

Third - Barack Obama was seen as too cerebral to win in middle and lower income neighborhoods. That was not about 'race' but about 'class', and by demonstrating his Ivy League education at every turn, Barack Obama came off as too distant to take those neighborhoods against established politicians from those areas. That said the 'grooming' process to higher office, by Rezko, Rogers, Blackwell, and Pfleger allowed Barack Obama to think of actually challenging Bobby Rush and being competitive on a fund-raising venue.

Fourth - The idea of Barack Obama not taking PAC money from across the board, be it big business, big labor or special interests is laughable. His money raising efforts demonstrate just the opposite: he raises money well from such organizations. He could no more disdain the influence of PACs and multiple 'political wings' of large organizations than he could his 'associates'. As we have seen he is far more ready to toss his pastor, grand-mother and, indeed, anyone who detracts from him in a personal way, to the wayside. It is, apparently, a lot easier to give up on these sorts of individuals than the ones gaining money input for campaigning.

Fifth - For a reformer, Barack Obama has not taken on the Chicago machine and its mob ties. In fact he has cultivated that machine and its donor base to his benefit as the top local donor base of PACs, Unions, and political interest groups outweighs the donor base at the minimum level of reporting for Illinois, which looks to be at the $150 range. When a politician, even at a local level, cannot stimulate interest amongst the citizenry, even in poor neighborhoods (and Hyde Park is far from poor) and yet can still be competitive on a funding basis with established 'grass roots' politicians, you have an indication of a politician with big donor backing. As Chicago has been the center of 'politics for cash' since the turn of the 20th century, actually going against it as a 'reformer' with 'hope & change' for a clean political venue would have been a major point in favor of Barack Obama if he had done so. Taking on the mob and a huge political machine is a noble endeavor and points to a politician who is serious about changing politics. At even the local level, Barack Obama does not evidence that.