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Wednesday, October 28, 2020

Inside the political donation history of wealthy sports owners

American professional sports owners have contributed nearly $47 million in federal elections since 2015, according to research by ESPN in partnership with FiveThirtyEight, including $10 million to Republican causes and $1.9 million to Democratic causes so far in the 2020 election cycle.

That strong Republican lean is consistent with owners’ spending in the 2018 and 2016 federal elections as well. A deep search in the Federal Election Commission database of campaign finances for principal owners, controlling owners, co-owners and commissioners from the NBA, NFL, NHL, WNBA, MLB and NASCAR reveals that this deep-pocketed group has sent $34.2 million (72.9%) to Republican campaigns or super PACs purely supporting Republican causes, compared to $10.1 million (21.5%) to Democrats over the past three elections. Less than 6% of contributions went to bipartisan or unaffiliated recipients.

RoyalsRetro (AG#1F) Posted: October 28, 2020 at 01:14 PM | 11 comment(s) Login to Bookmark
  Tags: politics

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   1. Jeff Francoeur's OPS Posted: October 28, 2020 at 02:41 PM (#5986190)
Republicans, bad! Democrats, good!
   2. filihok Posted: October 28, 2020 at 02:51 PM (#5986196)
Republicans horrible! Democrats very bad!
   3. Karl from NY Posted: October 28, 2020 at 03:14 PM (#5986208)
Republicans love baseball! Democrats hate baseball!
   4. John Northey Posted: October 28, 2020 at 04:04 PM (#5986222)
Shocking - billionaire white guys donating to help get another billionaire white guy elected? I'm shocked, shocked I tell you. Well, maybe not so much.
   5. The Honorable Ardo Posted: October 28, 2020 at 06:39 PM (#5986301)
What about MLS owners? You'd think owners in a socialist namby-pamby sport like soccer would buck the trend.
   6. Ken Griffey Junior Bacon Cheeseburger Posted: October 28, 2020 at 06:47 PM (#5986305)
This isn't surprising, is it? Sports owners trend toward the "rich old white guy" demographic, and it's a good bet that those guys are Republicans unless they say otherwise.
   7. ramifications of an exciting 57i66135 Posted: October 28, 2020 at 06:55 PM (#5986307)
Shocking - billionaire white guys donating to help get another billionaire white guy elected? I'm shocked, shocked I tell you. Well, maybe not so much.
i know he charges the american government hundreds of millions of dollars to use his properties (not to mention all of the foreign governments who wanted to curry favors with him), but i'm still pretty sure trump is not actually a billionaire.
   8. JJ1986 Posted: October 28, 2020 at 07:57 PM (#5986315)
I don't think I could have named the SF Giants owner given 100 guesses. Johnson is super anonymous in that role.
   9. Bhaakon Posted: October 28, 2020 at 08:13 PM (#5986320)
i know he charges the american government hundreds of millions of dollars to use his properties (not to mention all of the foreign governments who wanted to curry favors with him), but i'm still pretty sure trump is not actually a billionaire.


Maybe not, but it does make him a role model for sports team owners. Imagine if they could combine their powers: Get the government to pay for the property on your behalf and then get the government to rent the property from you.
   10. winnipegwhip Posted: October 29, 2020 at 09:18 AM (#5986394)
The one team that may be important to analyze and possibly correlate to next weeks result is the donation patterns of the Green Bay Packers owners.
   11. Starring Bradley Scotchman as RMc Posted: November 01, 2020 at 03:43 PM (#5986950)
I wished I lived in a universe in which Trump takes the NJ Generals to several Super Bowls, and never becomes president.

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