Cruz Is Lying - O'Rourke Accepts NO PAC MONEY!

Ted Cruz has been embarrassed in the fundraising race this year. He has not been able to raise anywhere near as much money as his opponent in the Texas Senate race (Beto O'Rourke -- and a good hunk of what he has raised has come from political PAC's, while O'Rourke spurns PAC money.

So, how does Cruz handle his embarrassment? He accuses O'Rourke of doing what he himself is guilty of -- accepting PAC money. Of course, Beto's supporters knew that was a lie, but the nonpartisan fact-checkers at Politifact decided to find out for themselves. Here's what they found:

So, has O’Rourke not taken PAC money?

Chris Evans of O’Rourke’s campaign replied to our inquiry about this claim by noting in an email that for the second quarter of 2018, O’Rourke reported raising more than $10.4 million from individuals and absent PAC donations. Evans said all of O’Rourke’s 2017-18 filings with the Federal Election Commission would show a similar pattern--all contributions from individuals, none from PACs.

On the FEC’s website, we checked O’Rourke’s seven campaign finance reportscovering 2017 through June 2018. In the period, the reports state, O’Rourke’s campaign reported raising more than $23.5 million entirely from individuals. Each report shows a zero for contributions from PACs.

Cruz’s Senate campaign reported raising more than $14 million in the same period--counting a little over $1 million from PACs, according to its finance report filed in July 2018.

Months after O’Rourke made his claim to Maher, Cruz’s campaign suggested that O’Rourke had benefited from a PAC’s--running afoul of his no-PACs self-description. In July 2018, as noted in a Dallas Morning News account, Cruz said O’Rourke had accepted $167,408 in contributions collected, or bundled, from individuals by the J Street PAC, which says it endorses candidates based on goals including a focus on American diplomacy "toward a two-state outcome between Israel and the Palestinians."

To our inquiry, Evans defended the PAC-bundled donations, saying by email: "Each contribution was made by an individual following individual contribution limits and the reporting requirements mandated for individuals such as name, address, employer."

We separately heard back from the Center for Responsive Politics, which has long tracked the influence of money in politics.

Andrew Mayersohn told us by email that the center doesn’t consider PAC earmarking/bundling of donations by individuals to be the same as a PAC contribution. Mayersohn also pointed us to an Aug. 6, 2018, Associated Press fact-check confirming that $170,000 in donations by individuals were routed to O’Rourke’s campaign through the J Street PAC, "which also hosted an event to collect individual donations to put directly toward his campaign."

That story quotes an unidentified FEC spokeswoman saying the commission doesn’t consider individuals’ donations delivered through "conduit" PACs to be PAC money. The AP story went on: "Neither do campaign finance experts, who say the donations are more transparent than PAC donations. ‘No, it's not a PAC donation,’ said Victoria Farrar-Myers, an expert on campaign finance at Southern Methodist University in Dallas." Noted too:  By law, individual donations are capped at $2,700 per election while PACs may donate up to $5,000.

Our ruling

O’Rourke’s campaign finance reports from the launch of his candidacy in 2017 through June 2018 show no PAC contributions. O’Rourke didn’t object to a PAC focused on Israel bundling donations for his campaign, but all of those were made by individuals.

We rate this claim True.