Some of us have been guessing that the reason Sheldon Adelson is giving so much money (around $100 million) to Romney’s campaign is to buy his way out of criminal charges that he might face under an Obama administration.
Well, we don’t have to guess any more. In a new interview with Politico, Adelson candidly verifies that his money is meant to prevent further investigations into his shady casino dealings in Macau, including money laundering and bribery. Or as the Huffington Post put it:
Adelson is spending millions of dollars to curry political favor in the United States, hoping to fend off charges that he spent millions of dollars to curry political favor in Asia.
That makes the estimated $100 million he is giving to the Romney campaign look like a pretty good bet. Adelson by himself has given around one-third of what John McCain’s entire presidential campaign spent in 2008. But to someone worth tens of billions, it isn’t that much for a get out of jail free card. Not to mention the $2 billion tax cut he would probably get under a Romney presidency.
And it is working. At the Republican convention, Adelson got plenty of quality time with people like Karl Rove, Rudy Giuliani, George Pataki, John Boehner, and Eric Cantor. Four days after being named the VP candidate, Paul Ryan made a pilgrimage to Vegas for a private meeting with Adelson. Not to mention all the attention he has received from Romney himself.
And as Adelson puts it, he’ll do “whatever it takes” to defeat Obama.
One Comment
The fact that wealthy individuals can use their wealth to flout the law is an unfortunate side effect of human nature, but the American system was intentionally designed to minimize the damage. Thanks to Citizen’s United the brakes are off.
HOWEVER – the Supreme Court has made it CLEAR in multiple statements including the original decision that if there is proof of, “corruption, or the APPEARANCE of corruption” then their ruling would be overturned.
The ACLU or whoever is legally challenging Citizen’s United should use Adelson’s comments and the results as a clear “appearance of corruption” to get the decision overturned.