On June 1, Santa Fe County’s roughly 15,000 registered Republican voters can make their picks in the primary election for the 3rd Congressional District, in which Santa Fe anti-war veteran Adam Kokesh faces Farmington oilman Tom Mullins.
Whichever Republican wins the primary will take on first-term US Rep. Ben Ray Luján, a Democrat and the son of New Mexico House Speaker Ben Luján, in the November general election.
The race is interesting as a microcosm of the forces vying for control of the Republican Party
TOTAL FUNDS RAISED
With support from traditional Democratic donors such as labor unions and trial lawyers, plus large corporate donations from companies including PNM Resources, Raytheon and Ardent Health Services, Luján has a huge fundraising advantage over both of his prospective Republican opponents. Although Mullins has a lead on Kokesh in opinion polls, Kokesh has raised significantly more money than his Republican opponent, much of it from non-traditional, internet-era sources.
NOTABLE DONORS
SFR collected the following information from Federal Election Commission reports and
, which compiles and analyzes FEC data. To get a sense of which factions support each candidate, SFR pored over Kokesh and Mullins’ campaign finance reports. Here is what we learned.
KOKESH
George and Barbara Von Gehr, Pebble Beach, Calif.: $4,675
Liberty PAC: $3,000
Charles Kokesh, Santa Fe: $2,400
Equity Management Associates,
N. Falmouth, Mass.: $2,400
Euro Pacific, Darien, Conn.: $2,400
Joseph Archibald, HSBC manager, Darien, Conn.: $2,400
Wesley Ismay, professional gambler, Tempe, Ariz.: $2,400
Grant Winthrop, Beverly Hills, Calif.: $2,400
Stephen Thomas, ExxonMobil engineer, Beaverton, Ore.: $2,400
Ludwig Von Mises Institute, Auburn, Ala.: $2,000
Liberty PAC: Kokesh’s most important supporter may be US Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, the libertarian-minded former presidential candidate whose political action committee has blessed Kokesh with its backing.
Charles Kokesh: The candidate’s father, a Santa Fe venture capitalist recently embroiled in legal disputes with the City of Santa Fe and Los Alamos National Bank, gave his son the maximum allowable donation under existing federal campaign finance rules.
Euro Pacific: On the assumption that the US economy is bound for collapse, this Connecticut investment firm puts clients’ money into foreign equities that don’t depend on the US market. Its president, Peter Schiff, gave to the Kokesh campaign.
Ludwig Von Mises Institute: This Alabama think tank bills itself as “the world center of the Austrian School of economics,” of which Kokesh is a fan. Senior fellow Thomas Woods, a New York Times bestselling author, supports Kokesh financially. In a 2005 Weekly Standard review of The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, Max Boot calls Woods’ book an “absurd manifesto” that endorses secession and denies the role of slavery in “the War of Northern Aggression.”
MULLINS
Blue Jet: $4,600
Kevin and Elizabeth McCord, K&M Production: $4,600
Jason Sandel, Aztec Well Servicing: $2,400
Tom Dugan, Dugan Production: $2,400
Greg Merrion, Merrion Oil & Gas: $2,400
Price Bayless, Bayless Companies: $2,000
Sam Henry, Henry Production: $2,000
John Zent, ConocoPhillips project
manager: $1,500
William Sharer, CBF: $1,000
Voices for Family Values: $200
Blue Jet: This oil and gas company, owned by Danny and Margie Seip of Farmington, is the archetypal Mullins donor. Most of Mullins’ financial support comes from the local fossil fuels industry of which he himself is a part.
CBF: This Farmington “money management” company is registered to state Sen. William Sharer, R-San Juan. On his personal website, Sharer declares that the “liberal train is at full steam and we can expect every extreme social experiment and socialist plan to be used against the good citizens of New Mexico.”
Voices For Family Values: “Rich homosexual activists are playing a significant role in funding same-sex marriage initiatives,” the website of this Flora Vista, NM-based advocacy group warns followers.
