Republican Party of the Virgin Islands
Box 24261
Christiansted, St. Croix
US Virgin Islands 00820-4485
US Virgin Islands 00820-4485
Saturday, August 29, 2015
TO: National Black Republican Association
Dear Republican Friends,
Does your prestigious organization have any direct association with Ed Couzar and the Black Republican Fund? Solicitation are being sent out, via scam direct mail, requesting donations and naming themselves as "The Black Republican Fund-- A project of the VIGOP." It seems to come out of the same location in Arlington, VA with solicitations sent out from Base Connect (AKA ForthRight Stategy) in Washington, DC, claiming to raise money for "black" candidates, but according to the FEC, is keeping most of the money to pay themselves and their cronies. Please let me know if this direct mail campaign has anything to do with your organization.
Thanks,
Herb Schoenbohm
Virgin Island Republican Party Vice Chairman
_________________
FROM: National Black Republican Association
TO: Mr. Herb Schoenbohm, Virgin Island Republican Party Vice Chairman
Dear Mr. Schoenbohm,
Thank you for your e-mail and inquiry. Please know that our organization has absolutely nothing to do with that Black Republican Fund, Mr. Ed Couzar, nor any of those other suspicious groups being run by that direct mail, fundraising company operating in the state of Virginia, with Mr. Scott MacKenzie functioning as the treasurer for all of the groups.
As the below article, which appeared in the New York Times on May 6, 2014 shows, that direct mail company is operating a huge scam to milk hard-working Americans out of their money for the primary benefit of the owners of that company. They are the equivalent of a cancer that grows and feasts on our body politic and preys on innocent people. It's too bad there is no legal way to stop them. Bad publicity could ruin them, but they have a way of morphing, shifting names and addresses, so no one can pin them down. May they roast in Hell!
Regards,
Frances Rice
Chairman
____________
A Mysterious Republican Committee in the Virgin Islands
By Derek Willis
MAY 6, 2014
Committee
|
Contributions
|
Percent spent
|
Tea Party Victory Fund
|
$159,219
|
50.0
|
Freedom's Defense Fund
|
$2,065,638
|
8.6
|
VIGOP
|
$221,279
|
6.7
|
Warriors for Liberty
|
$324,913
|
4.5
|
Afghanistan & Iraq Veterans for Congress
|
$349,423
|
2.6
|
The Conservative StrikeForce
|
$2,623,955
|
2.0
|
Conservative Majority Fund
|
$3,512,012
|
1.9
|
Black Republican
|
$477,339
|
1.0
|
Veterans Victory Fund
|
$433,610
|
0.1
|
Millions Raised but Little Spent on Elections
Total contributions to and the percentage spent on election activity by PACs that employ Scott B. MacKenzie as treasurer.
There are a few things you should know about the Virgin Islands Republican Party: It has no full-time staff, has not had regular meetings for nearly two years, and only about 4 percent of the $200,000 it has raised since last fall has gone to party coffers.
Through the end of March, it moved exactly $7,927 to the party. Most of the contributions, solicited by mail sent to people across the United States, end up in a bank in Fairfax, Va., and are used to solicit yet more donations.
The Virgin Islands committee has made two donations — to Republican candidates running for the Senate in South Carolina (Tim Scott) and Oklahoma (T. W. Shannon). Its third donation was to a Georgia state superintendent candidate.
The Virgin Islands committee spends the overwhelming bulk of its money not for basic political activities like voter registration or party messages, but to raise more money. A few other conservative political committees employ this technique, and the biggest beneficiaries are a number of fund-raising companies in Northern Virginia.
Philanthropic experts often gauge charities by their efficiency in spending money for the main purpose of the organization. These political committees are spending tiny fractions of their overall revenue — mostly raised in small amounts from retirees — on political activity.
The expensive direct-mail fund-raising campaign is the hallmark of committees that employ Scott MacKenzie, who is treasurer of the Virgin Island committee, known as VIGOP.
The VIGOP committee is different from other state party committees in several respects. First, it appears to raise no significant money from the territory, whereas most state parties depend on in-state support from individual donors. Second, it has no local bank account listed on its registration form, and the same person — Mr. MacKenzie — is listed as both the custodian of the committee's records and its treasurer. Third, no Virgin Islander is listed on the committee's forms.
Finally, most state parties link their federal and nonfederal accounts so that they can share administrative expenses between them (see an example here), but the VIGOP committee has no record of any shared expenditures. In fact, the federal committee is focused on elections outside the territory.
The fund-raising approach of the Virgin Islands committee is unusual for party organizations, but it's not unusual for Mr. MacKenzie. In addition to the party committee, Mr. MacKenzie is the treasurer of nine other active political action committees that have raised a combined $10.1 million from individuals since the beginning of last year.
The committees include the Conservative StrikeForce, Freedom's Defense Fund and the Black Republican PAC. Almost all of them employ similar techniques: using direct mail to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars, most of which is spent on more fund-raising activities, although in the past some of the committees ran television advertisements.
Mr. MacKenzie, who lives in Arlington, Va., and previously worked on the presidential campaigns of Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp and Patrick Buchanan, did not respond to several attempts to reach him for comment.
With the exception of one committee, the Tea Party Victory Fund, which spends about half of its money on elections, these PACs spend less than 10 percent of their money on getting someone elected. Combined, the PACs have spent $418,392 — or 4.1 percent of the money raised — on candidates.
Total contributions to and the percentage spent on election activity by PACs that employ Scott B. MacKenzie as treasurer.
Committee
|
Contributions
|
Percent spent
|
Tea Party Victory Fund
|
$159,219
|
50.0
|
Freedom's Defense Fund
|
$2,065,638
|
8.6
|
VIGOP
|
$221,279
|
6.7
|
Warriors for Liberty
|
$324,913
|
4.5
|
Afghanistan & Iraq Veterans for Congress
|
$349,423
|
2.6
|
The Conservative StrikeForce
|
$2,623,955
|
2.0
|
Conservative Majority Fund
|
$3,512,012
|
1.9
|
Black Republican
|
$477,339
|
1.0
|
Veterans Victory Fund
|
$433,610
|
0.1
|
Source: Federal Election Commission filings through March 31, 2014.
Most of the money raised by these committees goes to direct mail companies in the Washington area, including Base Connect, which lists Mr. MacKenzie's company as a "strategic partner" on its website, and Century Data Mailing Services, which shares an address with Base Connect.
The Virgin Islands committee pays smaller amounts as fund-raising commissions to Coast to Coast Strategies, which is run by the former Michigan Republican party chairman Saul Anuzis. The method has left VIGOP owing more than $123,000 to a handful of Virginia and Washington companies.
The committee was authorized by John Canegata, who became the party chairman in 2012. "Our goal with this new federal account is to be effective in electing Republicans nationwide and to build some bridges from these 'tiny insignificant islands' that I love," Mr. Canegata said in an email. "To that end we expect that most of our programs will be federal expenditures, although we will occasionally transfer money to the territorial account for local VIGOP activities." As treasurer, Mr. MacKenzie "has no authority to spend or disburse funds," he wrote. (See all of the committee's expenditures.)
The committee's existence does not appear to be well known among Republicans in the Virgin Islands, which is mostly made up of three islands: St. Thomas, St. Croix and St. John. Two former party leaders contacted by a reporter said they had no knowledge of the committee's existence and painted a picture of a party in disarray since Mr. Canegata's elevation as chairman. "I have never, ever heard of this," said Herb Schoenbohm, the former party chairman, who now leads the St. Croix branch of the party organization.
The federal committee shares a post office box in Christiansted, a town on St. Croix, with Mr. Canegata, who also is a candidate for the territorial Senate. Mr. Canegata said the committee's outward focus was partly a result of the political circumstances of the Virgin Islands: Democrats outnumber Republicans by 17 to 1 in the territory.
The bulk of the committee's money comes in donations of less than $200, the reporting threshold for federal fund-raising, and VIGOP told the Federal Election Commission that it does not use its solicitations to register voters or advocate the election or defeat of any candidates. The donors are mostly described in F.E.C. filings as retirees and homemakers, and several have made multiple donations to the committee in the past four months. Most of them appear to have contributed to other Republican candidates and causes across the nation, suggesting that they have been regularly contacted by conservative political groups.
