Rauner Campaign Using Koch Brothers Data Mine In Re-Election Effort

[Snarkoleptic]

https://news.illinoisworkingtogether.org/rauner-campaign-using-koch-brothers-data-mine-in-re-election-effort-b1f08cd8bc35

AKA "Cranky billionaires already won, but want to continue screwing us."

As Governor Bruce Rauner denies a campaign reboot, new campaign finance reports show the governor’s political operation has recently spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on voter data and analytics firms including i360, a company owned by billionaires Charles and David Koch, and Applecart, a firm that culls information about voters from church lists and high school yearbooks.

The filing, showing the Rauner campaign’s expenditures from January to March of 2017, show what looks to be a monthly fee of $750 paid to i360 for “software”. Previous filings show a total of more than $34,000 paid to i360 by the Rauner campaign since December of 2013. Rauner’s filing also showed a March payment of $338,092 to Applecart, a data mining and analytics firm based in New York. Rauner has paid Applecart more than $650,000 since taking office.

In a 2014 article, Politico described i360 as “the Koch data mine”, noting that after its launch, i360 merged with “a Koch-funded data nonprofit” and received investment from the Koch-affiliated Freedom Partners. A 2016 Time Magazine article called i360 founder Michael Palmer “the eyes and ears for the network led by industrial billionaires Charles and David Koch.”

This is not the first link between the governor and the Koch Brothers. Rauner attended a Koch Brothers “donor summit” in Palm Springs, California last January.