When First Lady Tammy Murphy was still a candidate in the race for U.S. Senate, it was widely known that she would get support from a super PAC to help her win the Democratic primary. A PAC called Garden State Integrity had been established by a Murphy ally on the day she launched her campaign, and would likely have spent millions on her behalf had she not dropped out of the race months before the primary.
But what was not widely known until now was that her main Democratic opponent, Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown), was seemingly set to receive support from a super PAC, too.
The PAC, called Leadership With Integrity PAC, was formed on February 23, when the battle between Kim and Murphy for the seat then held by indicted Senator Bob Menendez was in full swing. Within a month of its creation, the PAC received $880,000 in contributions from six individuals and trusts; three of the donations were for $250,000 each. (Unlike candidates, who are subject to strict donation limits, super PACs can receive unlimited donations.)
Then, after Murphy dropped out of the race on March 24 and Kim became the prohibitive frontrunner for the Democratic nomination, donations to the PAC largely dried up. It received two more contributions worth $110,000 total on March 26 – contributions that may have already been in the works before Murphy’s exit – and three more donations of $30,000 each in April and May, and it has not reported raising anything more since then.
At the time, there was nothing explicitly connecting the super PAC to Kim, and it went unreported on. That changed earlier this month, when Leadership With Integrity spent $423,266 on digital advertising and mailers supporting Kim in his general election campaign against Republican Curtis Bashaw, a race Kim is considered likely to win.
Given the timing of the creation of the PAC and its contribution history, it seems unlikely that its money was originally intended for the general election. Instead, it suggests that the PAC was meant to provide support for Kim in his primary fight against Murphy, which was expected to cost millions of dollars on both sides; had the race not ended so abruptly, Leadership With Integrity may have continued to raise huge sums of money and used them to boost Kim over Murphy.
Kim was not legally allowed to coordinate with the PAC – and there’s no indication that he did – but he did confirm that he was aware of its existence before it began making expenditures on his race last week. Still, he said that the PAC’s involvement in his race wouldn’t stop him from fighting to limit the tide of money in politics.
“Congressman Kim has been a leader in tackling the corrupting influence of big money in politics since before he entered Congress,” Kim spokesperson Katey Sabo said in a statement. “He has practiced what he’s preached by never taking a dime of corporate PAC money, never coordinating with super PACs, and never giving up his push to overturn the Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court. In the Senate, he will continue this fight and work to restore trust and integrity into our politics.”
Jill Slattery, who is listed as the PAC’s treasurer and custodian of records, did not respond to multiple phone calls requesting comment; two email addresses associated with the PAC likewise did not respond.
The PAC also has a website, but it contains virtually no information other than a brief mission statement – one that bears some similarities to the type of messaging Kim’s campaign used during the primary.
“Leadership with Integrity PAC believes that our elected officials should serve their constituents, not the special interests and political elites,” the website states. “We are working to elect leaders who believe in transparency and accountability – leaders who will fight to restore integrity in government.”
And it’s clear that the donors who chose to contribute to Leadership With Integrity PAC were Andy Kim fans. Five of the PAC’s early donors, including the three donors who gave $250,000 each (philanthropist Jean Su Maeng-Kim, investment banker Anthony Kim, and writer Janice Lee), had previously given $6,600 donations to Kim’s Senate campaign, the maximum amount allowed under federal law; two of them had also donated to Kim’s own PAC supporting Asian American political candidates, In Our Hands PAC.
The PAC also appears to have made a specific effort to solicit donations from Korean Americans. Most of the PAC’s largest donors are Korean American or have Korean surnames; Kim himself is the son of Korean immigrants, and would be the first Korean American ever elected to the U.S. Senate. (Several of the donors share Kim’s last name, though Kim’s campaign confirmed that none are related to him.)
To be clear, none of this points towards any wrongdoing by Kim. Super PACs are a part of American politics, for better or for worse, and Kim has little say in the matter if a group of his supporters wants to form one to support his campaign.
But the existence of the super PAC does provide a new angle on the brutal Democratic primary between Murphy and Kim that never came to pass.
Murphy, the wife of Gov. Phil Murphy, was criticized from the moment she launched her campaign, both by Kim and by others, as a product of the New Jersey political establishment propped up by party bosses and wealthy donors. Garden State Integrity, which was led by a top Phil Murphy staffer and which listed an address just a couple miles away from the Murphy family’s home, only reinforced that image.
Over the course of its existence, Garden State Integrity raised $2.1 million from 28 donors, with donations ranging from $1,000 to $100,000. The super PAC spent some of that money during the primary campaign on opposition research, but most of it was still sitting in the bank when Murphy ended her campaign; some of the donors’ contributions were then refunded, while the remainder was donated to other Democratic PACs like American Bridge, a major Democratic opposition research group.
Kim, meanwhile, cast himself throughout the campaign as a reformer who wanted to reduce the influence of money in politics. He had the endorsement of End Citizens United – a group dedicated to overturning the Supreme Court decision that deregulated super PAC spending – and said in a debate that super PAC money “has unleashed an incredible amount of damage upon our democracy”; he also repeatedly hit Murphy over her willingness to accept donations from corporate PACs.
And yet, reviewing Kim’s various attacks against Murphy, the topic of her own super PAC never seemed to come up. He didn’t take an opportunity at the lone debate between the two candidates to criticize her for it, and a Politico story about Garden State Integrity and Murphy’s conflicting views on dark money does not feature any comment from Kim.
Given that Leadership With Integrity was in the process of being established at the time, there may have been a good reason for that.