Dark money network spending more than ever in 2026 cycle
When Rep. Andy Barr (R-KY) won the Kentucky Republican Senate primary in May, news outlets identified President Donald Trump’s endorsement of Barr as a key factor in his victory. While Trump’s endorsement undoubtedly provided a significant boost to Barr’s campaign, the seven-term congressman was also aided by sources of support that are much more difficult to trace.
Barr was a beneficiary of more than $14 million in secretly-sourced funds channeled into the primary by a network of connected nonprofits that is on pace to spend more money than it ever has to influence federal elections. According to an analysis by CREW, nonprofits in this network have already contributed more than $33.1 million to federal super PACs in the 2026 election cycle, exceeding the more than $14.6 million that network nonprofits contributed to super PACs in the 2024 cycle as well as the more than $22 million they contributed in the 2022 mid-terms.
Since the nonprofits, which are organized under section 501(c)(4) of the tax code, can spend money on elections without disclosing their donors, the true source of the funds remains secret. This lack of disclosure is why such politically-active nonprofits are commonly referred to as dark money groups.
So far this cycle, thirteen different nonprofits in the network have directed funds to 31 federally-registered super PACs, including 11 super PACs that received contributions from more than one of the nonprofits. Those super PACs have targeted elections on the local, state and federal level, though the majority of the funding that moved through the nonprofits went to supporting Republican U.S. Senate candidates.
The more than $33.1 million in CREW’s analysis represents just the ground floor of how much this dark money network is pumping into the 2026 election cycle as it only includes contributions reported to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and does not include spending on so-called “issue” ads that target candidates or contributions reported only on the state or local level. Here’s a breakdown of the network’s super PAC contributions:
Keep America Great PAC, Inc., a super PAC that backed Barr, raised more than $16 million through June 30, 2026, with nearly two-thirds of that money, $10.64 million, coming from a trio of network nonprofits: American Jobs and Growth Fund, Conservative Agenda for America and Defend US, Inc. Another super PAC that paid for ads attacking one of Barr’s primary opponents, former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, received almost all of its funds, $3.85 million, from a fourth nonprofit, Coalition for American Prosperity & Growth, which was known as the Coalition for Ohio Prosperity and Growth until it changed its name in December 2025. A fifth nonprofit, however, America Works Fund, Inc., which was previously known as Ohio Works, Inc., contributed $81,000 to a super PAC that supported Cameron.
The more than $14.5 million five of the nonprofits channeled into the Kentucky Senate race is the most that the network has poured into a single election so far this cycle. The race that’s seen the second largest influx of funds via the network is the Texas Senate race, where America Works Fund contributed $8.9 million to a super PAC that backed Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) in his losing primary campaign. The nonprofit, which previously served as the vehicle to oppose an Ohio redistricting reform initiative in 2024, contributed to the pro-Cornyn super PAC using both its old name and its new name.
The nonprofits in the network are not formally related organizations, at least as defined by the IRS, but they share common characteristics like a minimal public presence, a lack of actual employees and the use of rented mailboxes for their addresses that give the impression they are little more than legal entities with bank accounts that can be directed toward political and policy fights while keeping the financial supporters of those fights secret. CREW, which has been tracking the network for more than a decade, identifies nonprofits as part of the network based on financial connections, including grants transferred among them and support for the same super PACs, as well as their ties to a small group of political operatives and compliance professionals working behind the scenes.
The most readily apparent tie among all of the nonprofits in the network is that the same accountant, Brad Elgin of Total Business Solutions, prepares their annual tax returns. Elgin prepared the most-recently available tax returns of all of the network nonprofits that have contributed to federal super PACs in the 2026 cycle. He also previously prepared the taxes of other nonprofits that have contributed to federal super PACs in earlier election cycles but have either shut down or are so far dormant in 2026.
A political consulting firm called the Clark Fork Group also appears to play a central role in the network and has been reported as a contractor by 10 nonprofits connected to the network. During a now-closed FEC investigation that was prompted by a CREW complaint, a lawyer defending a network nonprofit described Elgin as a “Certified Public Accountant who regularly works” with Clark Fork Group partners Thomas Norris and Joel Riter “on various clients and projects.”
A peek behind the curtain
Documents the FEC obtained in that investigation, many of which the agency initially posted online before pulling them down after CREW reported on them, offer rare insight into how the network operates. In particular, they reveal how the Clark Fork Group’s Norris and Riter secretly managed the nonprofit the agency investigated by recruiting someone outside their inner circle to be the sole director and officer who essentially served as a figurehead that represented the group on paper. The records also include a stark admission that the nonprofit was created with the specific purpose of influencing elections in mind.
In April 2017, a week after a nonprofit called Independence and Freedom Network was incorporated, Norris emailed an associate of his from the cement industry, asking if he was “still willing to be on the ‘dark side’” by serving on the board of a 501(c)(4) organization, as Norris and his associates were “establishing some more c4’s [sic] for the 18 cycle” so they could “help elect folks to push the Presidents [sic] agenda.” After the associate agreed to serve on the board, he was provided paperwork to sign that effectively handed control to Norris and Riter by authorizing them to create and use the nonprofit’s bank account. The document also named Elgin as the “Treasurer’s Designee” who could essentially act as the group’s treasurer.
In a deposition, the nominal board member recruited by Norris told FEC investigators that he had no real knowledge of the group’s operations until he was asked by Norris and Riter to dissolve the nonprofit and its subsidiary in December 2020 – months after CREW updated its complaint that spurred the FEC’s investigation to include Independence and Freedom Network. “I incorporated it,” the board member said of the nonprofit, adding, “the next thing I knew, I was asked to dissolve it. In between, nobody reported to me on any of its activities.”
All but one of the currently active nonprofits assessed by CREW to be part of the network feature single member boards like Independence and Freedom Network did. While either Norris or Riter are the named board members for three of the nonprofits, the revelations from the FEC’s investigation of Independence and Freedom Network raise questions about whether they are playing large roles behind the scenes of some or all of the others.
Not just super PAC contributions
This dark money network’s spending in the 2026 election cycle is undoubtedly more than the $33.1 million so far in federal super PAC contributions. Nonprofits in the network contribute to state and local level political committees and they pay for ad campaigns, either directly or through subsidiaries, that target candidates and ballot referendums. They also invest in political infrastructure that can benefit politicians without much or any public disclosure.
For instance, nonprofits in the network long supported the late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), going as far back as his 2016 presidential campaign when a nonprofit affiliated with both Norris and Riter contributed $250,000 to Security is Strength PAC, a super PAC that backed him. Two other nonprofits in the network, the American Exceptionalism Institute and the Government Integrity Fund, provided the same super PAC a combined $4.4 million in 2020 when it aided Graham’s Senate re-election.
As Graham was running for re-election this year, nonprofits in the network again supported him. A nonprofit called American Jobs and Security contributed $450,000 to Security is Strength PAC as well as $48,000 to another pro-Graham super PAC called Project 2026, which also received $350,000 from America Works Fund but later refunded it.
But the super PAC funding was not the only way that the network backed Graham. In mid-2024, an entity called Security is Strength LLC, which can at times appear interchangeable with the similarly-named PAC but has described itself as a “non-profit issue advocacy organization formed to highlight policies aimed at keeping South Carolinians safe, secure, and prosperous,” launched the first of several six-figure advertising and direct mail campaigns promoting Graham.
Unlike the nonprofits that directly contributed to the pro-Graham PACs, Security is Strength LLC was not formed as a section 501(c)(4) social welfare organization, but was instead incorporated in Ohio in February 2024 as a domestic nonprofit limited liability company, which suggests that it may be a subsidiary of another nonprofit organization. As CREW has documented, the nonprofit network tied to Norris and Riter has regularly utilized a type of subsidiary known in tax law as a disregarded entity to both broaden and further obscure its activities.
On their most recently available tax returns, the 13 network nonprofits that have already contributed to federal super PACs in the 2026 cycle reported to the IRS that they directly controlled a combined 30 disregarded entities with names like Public Safety Alliance of Oklahoma, Heartland Conservative Coalition LLC and Teachers First LLC. A search of ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer database does not return results for any nonprofits listing the current Security is Strength LLC as a disregarded entity.
The emphasis on current is important because the group that backed Graham in this cycle is the second iteration of Security is Strength LLC. A different corporate entity with the same name was formed in 2018 in Ohio but shut down in 2020. The same lawyer who signed the paperwork to dissolve the original Security is Strength LLC also signed the incorporation paperwork for the second, now active Security is Strength LLC.
The original Security is Strength LLC was a disregarded entity of a network nonprofit called the Government Integrity Fund, which, as noted above, had previously helped fund the the Security is Strength super PAC. The previous Security is Strength LLC also boosted Graham and even used the same website URL as the current iteration.
The spending by the old Security is Strength LLC appears to have been part of the Government Integrity Fund’s expensive plans to aid Graham’s 2020 re-election, which went beyond super PAC contributions and paid communications promoting the senator. Details about the group’s ambitious under the radar efforts, which would normally be kept out of public view, are available thanks to the release of millions of internal documents from the e-cigarette maker Juul Labs as part of the company’s 2021 settlement with the North Carolina Attorney General’s office.
In particular, in the Spring of 2019, as part of an effort to solicit a contribution from Juul for the Government Integrity Fund that appears to have resulted in the company’s then-CEO making a large donation, a former senior Graham staffer who once served as executive director of Security is Strength PAC shared a proposal for a “South Carolina Canvassing and Data Research Plan” for the Government Integrity Fund that was explicit about its goal of supporting Graham’s re-election efforts in 2020.
“The program described in this document combines traditional and new voter contact and data methods to build profiles of voters to ensure the re-nomination of Senator Lindsey Graham in the 2020 South Carolina Republican Primary and reelecting him in the 2020 General Election,” stated the proposal, which metadata suggests was written in 2017 by Riter. The proposed canvassing and data plan shared with Juul was not cheap. “In order to do this in a truly robust manner that will impact the outcome of the election, we estimate it will require a budget of $140,000 a month to fund activities for the next three years.”
The Government Integrity Fund appears to have dedicated significant resources to the type of voter contact project the proposal described. In both 2019 and 2020, the Government Integrity Fund’s top independent contractor was a door-to-door canvassing firm called In Field Strategies, that engaged in a South Carolina project in 2019, according to a company Instagram post, and identifies “Lindsey Graham for U.S. Senate” on its website as a “notable race” it worked on. Security is Strength PAC also paid In Field Strategies $479,000 in 2020 for canvassing and get-out-the-vote phone calls that benefited Graham.
Like the first iteration of Security is Strength LLC, the Government Integrity Fund formally shut down in December 2020, just over a month after CREW filed a complaint with the FEC related to its political activity. That means it can’t be the parent nonprofit of the new Security is Strength LLC, even as the revived LLC has carried on the old group’s pro-Graham mantle.
Although it has not reported to the IRS that it has any relation to the new Security is Strength LLC, another network nonprofit that financially supported Graham, American Jobs and Security, appears to have at least one connection to it. One of the press releases posted on the Security is Strength LLC website for its 2024 pro-Graham advertising lists Walter Whetsell of Starboard Communications as the group’s spokesperson. In 2024, American Jobs and Security reported that it paid Starboard Communications, which is also a major vendor for Security is Strength PAC, $254,669 for issue advocacy communications.
Like most of the nonprofits in the network, little is known about American Jobs and Security, which was incorporated in 2022 by a lawyer known for his work with dark money groups. The group has no website, no employees, and its sole board member reportedly dedicates just two hours a week to the organization, which raised and spent more than $9.8 million in 2024. That year, American Jobs and Security contributed $600,000 to two federal super PACs, spent almost $2 million on issue advocacy communications and distributed more than $4.6 million in grants to other nonprofits in the network or their subsidiaries.
With three months to go until election day, it’s a safe bet that American Jobs and Security, along with the rest of the dark money network, will facilitate the use of even more money provided by anonymous donors into the 2026 mid-terms. Whether that money is channeled into federal super PACs, as more than $33.1 million already has been, or through more under the radar avenues, voters will be in the dark about who is spending so much to influence their decisions at the ballot box and potentially influence the decisionmaking of the politicians who benefit from it.