The Resistance: Grift Edition

Scott Dworkin aggressively raised funds for his anti-Trump "resistance" group, the Democratic Coalition Against Trump, and then he kept most of the money for himself and his friends:

Omar Siddiqui couldn’t make it to an August fundraiser in Beverly Hills for the Democratic Coalition Against Trump. But he ponied up the $2,000 ticket price after the group’s senior adviser, Scott Dworkin, sent him a personal invitation.

Months later, Siddiqui, the Democratic challenger to Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), was surprised to discover his money—or three of every four dollars of it—had gone to the coffers of consultants and lawyers the group leaned on to fight a libel suit, rather than pushing back against the president.

When told by The Daily Beast how the group had spent his money, Siddiqui was, charitably speaking, not pleased.

“Being an attorney,” he said, “I intend to investigate this further and look forward to receiving a full explanation about the use of donations.”

The Democratic Coalition, one of the many new progressive-minded organizations to bloom in the age of anti-Trump fervor, brought in nearly half a million dollars last year. Its donors include Siddiqui, a pair of Hollywood television producers, a former Real Housewife of Miami, and a member of the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors. The vast majority of its funds, however, have come from people whose names don’t make it into Federal Election Commission disclosures: the small, “unitemized” donors who give $200 or less.

It’s what the group has done with its money—not how much it has brought in—that has raised eyebrows among other operatives.

The Democratic Coalition paid more than half of the money it raised last year to its employees or their consulting firms, according to Federal Election Commission records. Dworkin’s Bulldog Finance Group was the chief beneficiary, drawing more than $130,000 from The Democratic Coalition.

This is what is wrong with the Democratic Party establishment in a nutshell.

The DNC requires candidates that it supports to spend a large proportion of their money on a consultant from their list, and Scott Dworkin is most assuredly on their list, at least until this story came out.

First, we need to end the grifting.