MINNEAPOLIS (Legal Newsline) – A Minnesota federal judge has ruled against the Republican fundraising platform WinRed as it battled the Democrat attorneys general of four states.
WinRed sued the AGs of Maryland, Minnesota, New York and Connecticut as it fought accusations it violated state laws by using “pre-checked” recurring donation boxes to raise money for conservative candidates and groups.
WinRed said Democrats use the same recurring donation method and that it was only targeted by the AGs to slow fundraising activity for the 2022 mid-term elections.
But the company seemingly will have to comply with the investigations of the AGs, as Judge John Tunheim ruled Jan. 26 that the relevant state consumer protection laws are not preempted by the Federal Election Campaign Act.
He also found his Minneapolis court lacked jurisdiction over the AGs of New York, Connecticut and Maryland because “conspiracy-based personal jurisdiction does not apply to this case.”
“(I)t is untenable that Congress intended the practical effect of preempting all state laws if the activity is somehow connected to federal elections,” the decision says. “WinRed contends that because its sole activity is with respect to federal elections, the investigation is necessarily preempted.
“Taken at its extreme, this would have the Court find that FECA preempts state employment or labor laws as applied to any entity that solely engages in federal elections because all their activity would be ‘with respect to’ federal elections.
“Such an interpretation stretches FECA’s preemption clause beyond its express bounds.”
The AGs are Keith Ellison of Minnesota, Brian Frosh of Maryland, Letitia James of New York and William Tong of Connecticut.
"Four Democrat Attorneys General are exploiting their positions of power for partisan gain and targeting WinRed for fundraising tactics that Democrats themselves pioneered and still use to this day. While pursuing these actions, these Democrat AGs are actively fundraising on ActBlue," a statement released by WinRed after the filing of its complaint said.
The letters WinRed sought to block seek information on its organization, ownership, leadership, business model, clients and internal communications.
WinRed emerged in 2019 to combat the success of ActBlue, which has funneled billions of dollars in donations from more than 13 million left-leaning donors since its inception in 2004.
Ellison has been using ActBlue’s website for fundraising since at least 2008, while Frosh has used it since 2013. In 2020, several individuals who donated to former President Donald Trump's re-election campaign complained the pre-checked boxes used by WinRed cost them more money than they wished to donate. ActBlue also received numerous complaints about the policy but solved the issues individually without altering its approach to contributions.