| Reporting last week found that a lobbyist connected to Kim Reynolds offered $100 cash payments – with $25 bonuses for additional recruits – to pack Zach Nunn’s rally with JD Vance.
A text message obtained by Iowa Starting Line from lobbyist Jake Swanson offered “$100, and for anyone that you recruit, an additional $25” to people who attend the rally.
Nunn has refused to comment, even as the Vice President confirmed that his office didn’t have any involvement in this scheme. So why won’t Nunn?
Zach Nunn owes Iowans the answers to the following questions:
- Did you receive a $100 cash payment?
- Were you aware that attendees were offered $100 cash payments to come see you speak?
- Do you have any information about who was funding this effort?
- Why do you refuse to answer questions about this news?
- Is it because you’re embarrassed that Iowans have to be paid to come to your rally?
DCCC Spokesperson Katie Smith:
“Zach Nunn is so embarrassed that people had to be paid to come hear him speak that he refuses to tell Iowans what he knew about this pathetic lobbyist cash recruitment campaign.”
Read more:
Iowa Starting Line: Reynolds-connected lobbyist recruited paid attendees for JD Vance’s Iowa rally on behalf of ‘an ethanol company’
- An Iowa lobbyist was caught offering $100 cash payments—plus referral bonuses—to pack JD Vance’s Des Moines rally this week.
- Just hours before Vice President JD Vance took the stage in Des Moines, an ethanol lobbyist with deep connections in the Reynolds administration offered money to contacts willing to attend the rally.
- “Gentlemen, Jake Swanson here,” he wrote in a text message. “I wanted to invite you to join me in seeing Vice President JD Vance this afternoon in Des Moines. I do some work for an ethanol company and so if you’re able to join, I will give you $100, and for anyone that you recruit, an additional $25. No limit on referrals, so if someone recruits a group of 20 to show up, that’s $500.”
- Iowa Starting Line obtained the screenshot of the text message which was sent at 1:11 p.m. on May 5, just before a chartered bus was scheduled to depart for the Vance’s event. Iowa Starting Line confirmed its authenticity with one of its recipients.
- Swanson is a registered lobbyist in Iowa and is the founder of High Yield Strategies. According to his own bio, he has nearly a decade of experience in state government, including a stint as lead agriculture and energy policy adviser to Gov. Kim Reynolds, whose glowing recommendation is featured prominently on the firm’s website:
- A review of his lobbying declarations showed that only one client, Great Plains Institute, has a direct connection to ethanol advocacy. The Minneapolis-based nonprofit policy organization advocates for increasing ethanol’s role in the American fuel supply, as part of the Midwestern Clean Fuels Policy Initiative. The initiative supports expanding E15 access and promoting carbon capture at ethanol plants—precisely the policy terrain Vance addressed from the stage.
- Great Plains Institute told Iowa Starting Line that Swanson was under contract, but not for ethanol advocacy. He was instead working on legislation related to authorizing electric transmission lines on highway rights-of-way, which got Reynolds’ signature in April.
- “Our folks that work with Jake (Swanson) don’t have any knowledge about his involvement or activities related to the event with the Vice President,” said Drew Henry, communications director for Great Plains Institute.
- Iowa Starting Line reached out to Nunn’s campaign which did not respond by press time.
- Paying people to attend a political event is unusual and potentially raises legal questions depending on how the money flowed. If the funds originated with a corporate or nonprofit client and were directed toward boosting attendance at an event headlined by a sitting vice president, the arrangement could draw scrutiny under Iowa campaign finance law or federal election rules — particularly if any coordination with the campaign or event organizers occurred.
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