She’s back. Peg Luksik, the perennial candidate who most recently challenged Pat Toomey in the 2010 GOP primary for U.S. Senate, has formed a super PAC to boost 2012 Senate hopeful Sam Rohrer.
The PAC, called Sam vs. the Machine, emphasizes Rohrer’s independence from the Pa. GOP (he challenged Corbett for the gubernatorial nod in 2010 and is running against endorsed candidate Steve Welch this cycle).
“Sam Rohrer is the RIGHT man; with the RIGHT political philosophy; at the RIGHT time,” she writes. “We need a conservative Senate nominee, not the Party’s warmed over Democrat-Lite candidate.”
A Political Action Committee registered with the Federal Election Commission. As such, it is forbidden from coordinating with Rohrer’s or any other campaign. It’s the second super PAC to get involved in the Pa. Senate race. The first one sent out mailers on behalf of David Christian, a Bucks County businessman and veterans’ advocate.
So far, Sam vs. the Machine has made only two recorded expenditures: $1,200 for the website (which is pretty sharp, though very similar to Luksik’s) and $4,900 for direct mail.
On the site, Luksik criticizes Welch, and Tom Smith, for switching parties. Welch, an entrepreneur from Chester County, switched from GOP to Dem in 2005, and back to GOP in 2009. Smith, a former coal company founder, had been a lifelong Democrat until 2011.
“Our focus is quite narrow, as we plan to recruit the ground troops necessary to push Sam over the top on Primary Election Day, April 24th. Sam vs the Machine is the vehicle by which we will identify and turn-out the votes needed to make Sam victorious on election night.”
A fiercely pro-life activist, Luksik ran for Governor in 1990, losing the GOP primary to Barbara Hafer by about 8 points. She ran again in 1994 as the Constitution Party candidate, garnering 12.8 percent. She took 18.6 percent of the GOP primary vote against Toomey in 2010.
In other Rohrer news, this week he earned the distinction of being the first Senate hopeful to be fact-checked by a national, left-leaning website. ThinkProgress declared as false his claim that the absence of a Senate-passed federal budget gives President Obama full discretion over spending.
Rohrer’s statement is 100 percent false. Article I of the U.S. Constitution explicitly says “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law” — a power expressly given to Congress. While Congress has not opted to make its appropriations through an overarching budget in recent years, it has passed multiple appropriations bills — some funding individual items and some omnibus bills covering multiple parts of government. Each of those appropriations bills has been signed by the president.
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13 Responses
The pay raise is good rhetoric that whips up voters but it in the end had no impact on the state budget.
Does anyone really think that Rohrer would have turned down his payraise (which he voted for) if the public didn’t get so angry over it? He got buyer’s remorse. It’s not like his vote was needed to pass the thing. He could have voted against it on moral grounds if he weren’t such a Charlatan.
Notice he did nothing about the pension increase because no one was holding feet to the fire. We need someone of principle who will do the right thing the first time and of their own valition.
Sam Rohrer did not benefit from the payraise and in fact, led the opposition to have it repealed, and it was repealed.
Pay raise Roher is not the man we need in DC, we need someone who is not part of the career Politican club that he is. A proven leader like Dave Christian is a man for these times!
If you look at campaign finance records for Peg Luksik and also look at any records available for the Center for American Heritage, I believe you would see she is not a bundler and has no great track record of amassing large campaign contributions.
The name is honest. It allows people who have maxed out on their donations to the Rohrer Campaign to direct their donations to this PAC who will advertise for Sam Rohrer /against his competitors.
Gladhearth,
Every movement has a weakness. The weakness of the grass roots Tea Party Movement has been fundraising. Why is that a weakness? While we have been able to put up candidates for city and borough council, school board , county row offices, state committee and county committee, we do not have the fundraising track records to be able to truly back a primary challenge in races on a state and federal level.
Usually leadership donates time, energy and funds shortages and covers upfront expenses.
Many local participants see more value in donating to a national group that they see on FOX News than they are to supporting local efforts.
That said, many of these folks are the same ones who do go and vote and bring about the changes. They are new to the political process and really do not understand the dynamics of change at the grass roots level and that it requires funding those efforts to unseat RINO’s locally.
I have been very frustrated by the 9-12 and Tea Party movement. The ones in my area just talk and have meetings, and they do not do anything that would produce real change, like find primary opponents to RINOs and help good conservatives who have the courage to run and challenge RINOs. In fact they often give RINOs a platform to come in and speak to their groups, which is ok, good to hear from elected representatives, but they do not challenge their records at all! One local group recently had a the biggest RINO in the world come in and speak and they thought he was a rock star just because he voted for the new Voter ID law! Nevermind that the guy is a pay raiser, pension raiser, voted for the Rendell tax hike and stimulus, the gas tax and much worse. Thank God someone not even affiliated with the group came in passed out a flier with the politician’s voting record on it, which left the 9-12ers assembled in breathless amazement. Where was the leadership of the 9-12 group to do what someone not even affiliated with the group had the good sense to do? We will never get anywhere in this country so long as the only major party that is supposedly committed to the constitution is actually nothing but a bunch of self-serving careerists. Limbaugh and Beck and company are blowhards who do nothing but shoot fish in a barrel all day by breathing fire at liberals and liberalism, not realizing apparently that the GOP is now nothing more than an accessory to the growth of government with career RINOs who do not challenge anything.
I get what you’re saying about Rohrer, but this looks more like incompetence than hubris to me. I agree they ought to change the name though.
I do not understand folks who are enamored with Rohrer. This is the straw that broke this camel’s back. I’m tired of carrying water for this guy in the 9-12 movement. The man is a Charlatan. I said it.
The first straw was spending 18 years in the legislature and accomplishing nothing…nothing except to usher in a 50% pension increase in 2001 (which he now enjoys) and midnight pay raise in 2005. He’s the type of legislator that CAP PAC would primary today yet he’s lauded because he gives a good speech. Heck, Obama gives a good speech.
The second straw was telling leaders in Americans for Prosperity that he was going to be around to build something. But 6 months later he’s looking for the exit to pursue personal ambition over the movement. I have a real problem with leaders who speak in moral terms and act in the opposite.
This last one really gets me. Rohrer talks about respect for the rule of law, which is very important to me personally. The 5th Principle of the 9/12 project is, “If you break the law, you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it.” Yet here is Rohrer supposedly with an independent superpac with his name in it. They don’t even try and pretend that there’s no coordination between the two. For goodness sakes, the first page of the instructions from the FEC for forming a superpac reads, “A political committee which is not an authorized committee can not include the name of any candidate in its name,” You can’t miss it. Ever wonder why candidates’ names are not in superpacs? Maybe it’s because they’re not so superior to believe they’re above the law. They at the very least need to change the name of this group if they have any values at all.
And someone needs to explain to me if this is incompetence or hubris. It’s late and I’ll probably regret saying it in the morning, but I’m done with this jerk.
It looks like this superpac is accepting foreigners’ donations. Amateur hour?
Oh, I’m sure the stewardship will be as careful, and as of little profit to Peg, as were the exercises in churning gullible donors for Mark Russell.
That website is $199. Someone is on the take.
That’s funny. I’m sure it will be well run. Maybe she can use what she raises to pay down the $41,214 debt her campaign carries. Careful who you give your money to.