Posted on 05/19/2009 4:28:14 PM PDT by smith5460
Chrysler announced the closing of 789 dealerships earlier this month. On today's radio program, Rush Limbaugh spoke for a few seconds about whether or not some of the dealership closings are the result of politics (campaign contributions). After hearing this, I decided to look up the contributions of the dealers on the Internet.
Here are a few examples of the campaign donations made by some of the dealers who will close their doors shortly. I'm not anywhere close to going through the entire list yet. The figures are only from the 2004, 2006, and 2008 Election cycles:
(1) Michael E. Maroone
Mr. Maroone has 6 dealerships in Fort Lauderdale, FL that will close. Since 2003, he has donated $12,700 to the RNC, $10,000 to the Florida Republican party, and $2,300 to Mitt Romney's Presidential campaign.
(2) Vernon Buchanan
Vernon Buchanan is a member of the U.S. House from Florida since 2007. One of his dealerships in Venice, FL will close. In the past 3 election cycles, Mr. Buchanan has given $50,000 to the RNC, $20,000 to the Florida Republican party, $4,000 to President Bush's campaign, and numerous amounts of money to other Republican candidates for Congress.
(3) Larry Crain
Mr. Crain's dealership in Little Rock will close. He has given $1,000 to President Bush, $1,000 to Marvin Parks (U.S. House cndidate in Arkansas), $2,300 to Mike Huckabee's Presidential campaign, and $2,300 to John McCain's Presidential run.
(4) Thomas Ganley
Mr. Ganley has 3 dealership that will close in Lakewood, Ohio. He has given $1,250 to Sen. Voinovich, $200 to Sen. Dewine, $7,750 to the National Auto Dealers Association, and $250 to Steven Latourette.
(5) Ray Huffines
Mr. Huffines will have a dealership in Denton, TX lose. He and his family are huge donors to the GOP. He has gave at least $1,000 each to Sen. Brownback, Gov. Huckabee, and Sen. McCain during their Presidential runs. He gave $3,400 to Sen. Cornyn, $5,900 to Rep. Sam Johnson, $800 to Rep. Tom DeLay, and $5,000 to Jeb Hensarling.
(6) Ronald Hoover
Mr. Hoover has 2 dealerships in Charleston, SC that will close. He gave $1,000 to Pres. Bush, $1,000 to Senator Graham, $750 to Henry Brown, $500 to Charlie Condon, and $500 to the RNC.
(7) Roger Penske
Roger Penske has a delearship in Michigan that will close soon. He has given $28,500 to the republican Senate Committee and $15,000 to the RNC. He gave $2,300 to Guiliani's Presidential run, and more money to Senators Kyl, Alxander, Collins, and Elizabeth Dole. In the interests of fairness, he also gave small amounts to Michigan politicians Kilpatrick, Dingell, and Stabenow.
(8) J.J. Fitzgerald
The most interesting find so far is John Fitzgerald, Jr. and J.J. Fitzgerald III. They have two dealerships that will close soon in Maryland.
While the previous entries gave mostly to Republicans, these two guys gave most of their donations to the Democrats.
The two gave $3,800 to Chris Van Hollen, $1,000 to Rep. Hoyer, over $3,000 to Ben Cardin, and other small amounts to Barbara Mikulski, Wynn, and Dennis Hastert.
Since 2004, they gave $300 to Wesley Clark's Presidential run during the Primaries. In the General Election, they gave $1,000 to John Kerry. In the 2008 Democratic primaries, they gave $2,000 to Hillary Clinton. When the 2008 General Election came down to John McCain vs. Barack Obama, they didn't donate any money to Barack Obama. The Fitzgeralds gave $4,600 from May to September 2008 to John McCain's Presidential run.
I ask you to ponder why American automakers have been being demonized by the media and the left for some time now?
This started before the bankruptcy.
They deliberatley bankrupted the big 3 so that they could take over a profitable business and put democrats in charge. This is much more sinister than you think. They are redistributing businesses that have long been a part of the republican base to their own base.
Look what they did to Wal Mart.
They are doing it right underneath our noses.
Next stops will be for health care and pharmaceuticals.
WE NEED TO PUT A STOP TO THIS.
You're right - if it's true - it's big. And implies worse...
Your data point #6 (The Fitzgeralds) is an absolute jaw-dropper.
I did the NON-closing dealers for the entire state of Iowa.
5.56mm
I have uploaded summary data for the dealers on Pages 11-17 of the Chrysler Report on the blog (see Post #14).
Wisconsin is done, too, non-closures (for comparison).
Have you been able to examine the giving patterns of dealerships not being closed as compared to those that are yet? Did you find a discrepency?
I read an article on American Thinker that said that many of the dealerships that are being closed to not carry all three Chrysler brands, some of them, like the one that is closing in Bellingham, WA, carry other brands in addition to a Chrysler brand. In many cases they are taking that one brand away and giving it to another dealer in the area who sells two of the brands. In the case of Roger Jobs in Bellingham, they are a Jeep/Audi dealer. Now they will be an Audi dealer and the Chrysler/Plymouth dealer down the street will get the Jeeps.
I’d be very surprised if Roger Jobs is a Republican, at least not publicly in Bellingham.
A pretty full sampling from the states of Iowa and Wisconsin. These are just two states, but getting data on the non-closing dealerships is tough.
R: 52900 D: 17700
NADA contributions are stripped; I have no idication they are partisan one way or the other and have ignored them.
Would you care to help? Do you know how to do it?
Ping!
Yes, that’s obvious from looking at the FEC reports. Closee “John Doe” is frequently listed on FEC as “John Doe Lincoln/Mercury” for example.
I wish I had time to help with this. I’m leaving with my son tomorrow for a four day trip for his sport and I have no laptop. I’m very interested in this information. Thank you for all the work you have done.
No problem. Travel safely!
Bump for later study. Please notify us by ping if you find more and we will see what the percentage is.
Please let me know if you need any help going through the list. I can start from the bottom up.
What did you learn?
I’ll do that. I’m trying to finish the list sometime today and publish the detailed findings after that.
That is not a statistically significant difference from the closing dealerships with their giving rations of about 77% R vs. 23% D.
That includes all giving, including by employees of the dealership.
That is from two middle-of-the-road (politically) states. I have not looked at New Jersey, California, Massachusetts, etc. Would expect a slightly lower GOP advantage - perhaps 55% GOP across-the-board (closing and non-closing).
What it means is that car dealerships, like most small businesses, tend heavily GOP.
Well, I've got a garden to plant today, and the weather is nice. Would be interested in your and others' assessment of the data.
One other thing I found peculiar to Wisconsin. A dealer (or former dealer) named Russ Darrow ran for Congress. Several dealerships - even ones that usually give to Democrats - donated to his GOP campaign. This skewed the scale slightly more to the GOP for Wisconsin.
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