Alaska campaign finance regulators on Thursday ordered an investigation into the GOP-backed Families of the Last Frontier, an independent expenditure group primarily funded by Outside groups that’s boosting right-wing Republicans in state legislative races.
The decision comes after a daylong meeting on Wednesday, where an attorney for the group argued that it did nothing wrong beyond failing to disclose in its advertising that it was an Outside-funded group, an issue they say they disclosed before the complaint was filed.
“Families of the Last Frontier has no burden to prove anything or disprove anything,” said Richard Moses, the attorney for Families of the Last Frontier.
Moses argued that everything beyond the failure to disclose that it was not funded primarily by Alaskans should be dismissed altogether.
Alaska Public Offices Commission members disagreed in a decision issued late Thursday. While they stopped short of ordering immediate penalties against the group, they saw enough to warrant having staff investigate every complaint brought against the group by the 907 Initiative.
Families of the Last Frontier is accused of filing misleading and inaccurate disclosure reports to dodge Alaska’s dark money laws and hide the true source of its funding from the public. In this case, Families of the Last Frontier is primarily funded by the Republican State Leadership Committee and GOPAC, both Outside political action committees.
Families of the Last Frontier has spent nearly $400,000 boosting conservative Republican candidates who are crucial to maintaining GOP control of the House. Those candidates include Anchorage Republicans Craig Johnson, Stanley Wright, David Nelson and Mia Costello, Fairbanks Republican Bart LeBon and Interior Republican Rebecca Schwanke.
In Alaska, any money spent to sway candidate races must be reported to its “true source,” even if it flowed through a national political action committee.
In the case of the RSLC, the group filed a “true source” report that showed more than 130,000 donors — likely capturing a much broader swath of donors than just the money that flowed into Alaska — but the document had asterisks in the column that were supposed to show how much money they had given. The group argues this was merely a technical error.
In the case of GOPAC, the national group simply claimed that it was the “true source” of the money. Attorneys for 907 Initiative argued the state shouldn’t take their word for it because political action committees are, under federal law, essentially pass through entities that collect and spend political contributions. They don’t typically make their own money. Moses, the Families of the Last Frontier attorney, said they must take their word they did.
“One cannot hide behind the certification to deprive voters of the information that (the dark measure laws require),” said attorney Noah Star, who said if it’s allowed to stand, it would create a loophole that would render the dark money laws meaningless.
APOC commissioners ordered staff to get to the bottom of both issues to determine whether penalties are warranted. They also noted that explaining how the group made money, if that really was the case, would make the group’s claims easier to trust.
The investigation won’t stop there.
In addition to failing to disclose that it was primarily funded by Outside groups — a requirement when a majority of funding doesn’t come from Alaska — the group is accused of failing to include GOPAC as one of the top three contributors in mailers that went out in September. Moses argued that the contribution came in after the mailers were sent to the distributors.
Finally, the commissioners also ordered an investigation into the group’s third largest contribution, which is listed as coming from a business owned by longtime Republican activist Randy Ruedrich. While companies can contribute to political activities, contributions from sole proprietorships such as Ruedrich’s must be reported under the donor’s name, not the business. In addition to the investigation, the commissioners suggest it “should probably list Randy Ruedrich instead” on any additional election communications.
What’s next
Staff reports take time, so they will not be complete before the election next week on Nov. 5, and regulators will discuss them at a later meeting. Still, campaign regulators have been persistent in enforcing the state’s campaign finance laws — they are still litigating penalties tied to the 2022 election when another Republican-backed group also appeared to try to skirt the state’s dark money laws.
This week, it also issued five-figure penalties to two East Anchorage Republican candidates — Stanley Wright and David Nelson — over violations from the 2022 election.
Still, campaign finance penalties have seemed to become a part of doing business for Republican campaigns in Alaska. Some of the largest fines in recent years have been over conservative campaigns, such as the nearly $200,000 in fines levied against the groups pushing to repeal open primaries and ranked-choice voting.
Matt Acuña Buxton is a long-time political reporter who has written for the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and The Midnight Sun political blog. He also authors the daily politics newsletter, The Alaska Memo, and can frequently be found live-tweeting public meetings on Twitter.
