Billionaire Republican megadonor Harlan R. Crow contributed the maximum allowable amount to the campaign of Democratic Senator John Fetterman (D-PA). According to the Intercept, not only did Crow — who notoriously has a garden filled with statues of authoritarian leaders — donate to Fetterman, but it appears he took some steps to conceal the transaction.
“Crow contributed the FEC’s maximum of $7,000 to Fetterman’s campaign on June 30,” writes the Intercept. “Crow is currently listed as the chair of the board of Crow Holdings. In the contribution to Fetterman’s campaign, Crow listed his employer as the Trammell Crow Company and his occupation as real estate developer, rather than head of Crow Holdings, as he’d listed in other FEC filings earlier this year. (Trammell Crow was Harlan Crow’s father.)”
As the Intercept notes, Crow “has come under increased scrutiny in recent years after ProPublica reported that he financed luxury travel for and bought property from conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who did not disclose the dealings. Crow also reportedly paid tuition for Thomas’s grandnephew at a private boarding school in Georgia.” He has drawn further criticism for purchasing citizenship in St. Kitts and Nevis, an island nation notorious for functioning as a tax shelter for the super-rich.
For his part, writes the Intercept, “Fetterman has drawn ire from his previous supporters and Democratic colleagues for what they’ve characterized as a stark shift in his ideological and policy stances since he was first elected to the Senate. That shift has attracted Republican donors who said they appreciated Fetterman’s vocal embrace of pro-Israel policies since entering office. A recent poll found that a majority of Democrats in Pennsylvania want Fetterman to leave the party, and that his approval rating is higher among Republicans than Democrats. Last week, Fetterman launched a bipartisan joint fundraising committee with Sen. Dave McCormick, R-Pa.”
Fetterman had campaigned for the Senate as a progressive, but “has faced criticism for breaking with his party and voting with Republicans on key issues from immigration to U.S. attacks on boats in international waters to the war with Iran, as well as also voting for nominees of President Donald Trump. Over the last two years, he’s seen an exodus of staffers, some of whom complained that they were ‘working on Israel all the time,’ had donors request refunds, and brought registered Republicans into his fold.”
While Crow has donated ”sparingly” to a number of Democratic candidates in the past, he is firmly associated with conservative politics. Crow’s Dallas home is infamously packed with Nazi memorabilia, including two paintings by Adolph Hitler and a signed copy of Mein Kampf. His backyard is also full of statues of authoritarian leaders, which he calls his “Garden of Evil.”