Daily Beast: How a Trumpy Billionaire Is Single-Handedly Reshaping Campaigns

When tech billionaire Peter Thiel pours his money into candidates, he isn’t just donating; he’s buying into a new strategy to reshape the way campaigns are run—a strategy that legal experts say is subverting traditional campaign laws.

Despite the way Thiel’s donations are often framed in headlines, he doesn’t give the bulk of his money to individual candidates. That’s largely because he can’t. Federal law caps individual campaign contributions at a comparatively low amount—$5,800 for a full election cycle.

Instead, the bulk of Thiel’s cash is going to outside groups called super PACs, which unlike campaigns can accept unlimited amounts of money, both from individuals and corporations.

But the super PACs Thiel bankrolls aren’t just any super PACs. They each focus on one candidate, and one candidate only. In Ohio, Thiel has J.D. Vance, and in Arizona, he has Blake Masters.

The singular focus is part of a trend in Republican politics. According to data from the Center for Responsive Politics, while there are currently about 100 fewer single-candidate super PACs than in the 2018 midterms, they’ve already raised and spent more than $30 million above the 2018 totals—with the home stretch still months away.

The GOP dominates this landscape. In 2018, one in three single-candidate super PACs (or “SCSPs”) were liberal. This year, the proportion is half that, according to CRP data. The GOP groups have also outspent their Democratic counterparts $144.1 million to $10.6 million. (Democrats tend to launch more “pop-up” PACs in the weeks just before an election.)

Watchdogs say these groups create unique concerns about corruption and fairness in elections. And in Thiel’s case, it’s part of a broader attempt to influence the shape of the political playing field itself. …

Aaron Scherb of government watchdog Common Cause observed that “sometimes people say the quiet part out loud.”

“Super PACs are often seen as proxies for campaigns, but they can’t work with the campaign,” Scherb said. …

“There’s definitely disproportionate involvement of single-candidate super PACs this cycle,” Scherb observed. “These groups tend to have a small number of donors, and they often silence and drown out the voices of small donors and everyday voters.” …

Scherb agreed. “Often these donors want something in return,” he said.  …

“There’s definitely more danger of a quid pro quo with these groups,” Scherb said. “At the very least it creates the perception of corruption, which in many ways can be just as damaging.”