Mega-donor George Soros is contributing $125 million to his go-to Super PAC to aid Democrat-aligned groups and candidates in the 2022 election cycle.
The group receiving the enormous investment, Democracy PAC, has been Soros’ main instrument for campaign funding since 2019. He used it to channel over $80 million to candidates and organizations through the 2020 election.
The new nine-figure sum is intended to support “causes and candidates, regardless of political party,” who are dedicated to “strengthening the infrastructure of American democracy: voting rights and civic participation, civil rights and liberties, and the rule of law,” per a statement first shared with Politico.
Soros called the donation a “long-term investment” meant to finance political work beyond only this year.
Alexander Soros, George Soros’ son, will serve as president of Democracy PAC.
In a statement of his own, Alexander Soros, who is also deputy chair of the Open Society Foundations, cited as motivators the events of January 6, 2021 and “ongoing efforts to discredit and undermine our electoral process, reveal the magnitude of the threat to our democracy.”
The younger Soros added that this “is a generational threat that cannot be addressed in just one or two election cycles.”
Only a handful of individuals in recent years have given nine figures to federal groups and candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks political giving. This is likely to make Soros among the highest political donors of the 2022 midterms.
Democracy PAC may claim to donate “regardless of party,” but it has already made out large checks to two of the Democrat Party’s largest vehicles: $2.5 million to Senate Majority PAC and $1 million to House Majority PAC.
The donations didn’t end there. A $1 million sum went to the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State (DASS), which helps elect Democrats to the secretary of state position throughout the nation. This is notable given that secretaries of state play a major role in administering elections.
As Politico notes:
Trump has since endorsed candidates for secretary of state in several battleground states he lost in 2020, and DASS has stepped up its fundraising in response. Soros’ contribution helped fuel a record year for the Democratic group, which raised $4.5 million in 2021 to prepare for this year’s elections.
Several groups focused on field operations also got six- and seven-figure donations. BlackPAC, a group focused on turning out Black voters, received $250,000 to support its efforts during the Virginia gubernatorial and legislative races in 2021, while Vote Rev (formerly called VoteTripling.org) received $1 million. That group is focused on training campaigns to canvass voters at polling places to then reach out to their family and friends, urging them to vote.
Soros’ Open Society Foundations pushed back last week at a recent documentary by Fox News personality Tucker Carlson. The documentary examines Soros’ relationship with his homeland of Hungary.
In Hungary vs. Soros: The Fight for Civilization, which was created for the Fox Nation streaming service, Soros is pitted against Hungary’s right-wing prime minister, Viktor Orbán.
In the documentary, Carlson accuses Soros of “waging a kind of war — political, social and demographic war — on the West.”
The Fox News host also asserted that Open Society Foundations is “trying to eliminate national borders, to oust democratically elected leaders, and install ideologically aligned puppets into positions of power.”
Laura Silber, Open Society’s vice president, told the Washington Post that Soros and his group “have worked for more than 30 years to support vibrant and inclusive democracies whose governments are accountable to the people they serve.”
“Mr. Carlson appears to prefer authoritarian rule, state capture of media and the courts, crony corruption and rigged elections.”
Carlson defended his documentary during his Fox News show on Thursday night, saying Soros and Orban have been at “loggerheads for years.”
“And so we thought that was interesting enough, enough of a metaphor for the struggle that is going on globally between nationalists and people who oppose them. We thought it was worthy of our season finale documentary for our series Tucker Carlson Originals.”
In response to the criticism, Carlson said, “You have a right to know exactly what George Soros is doing to this country and to other countries around the world and we think we have an obligation to tell you, so we are going to continue to.”
