ICYMI: NYT Report Breaks Down Loeffler’s False Claims and Financial Conflicts in Office

Truth about Loeffler’s “hardscrabble” origins and shady business ties revealed in new profile of Loeffler’s fraudulent campaign

ATLANTA — After unelected “political mega-donor” Senator Kelly Loeffler has spent the past few months misleading Georgia voters and trying to cover for her shady business past, a new New York Times profile breaks down Loeffler’s true backstory — and all the false claims Loeffler has yet to account for:

CLAIM: Loeffler talks on the trail about living “paycheck to paycheck” while criticizing coronavirus aid for out-of-work Georgians.

REALITY: The NYT report found “there is little evidence of a hardscrabble upbringing,” noting that her “prosperous farming family” even “received $3.2 million in federal farm subsidies” over the years while Loeffler has railed against coronavirus relief as “government dependency.” In fact, Loeffler’s real “political roots run to Wall Street, where her husband and chief financial backer, Jeffrey Sprecher, is the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, and her second-largest donor, Kenneth Griffin, is a hedge fund titan.”

CLAIM: Loeffler has bragged about her business success at ICE and shrugged off her conflicts of interest.

REALITY: The NYT report shows that ICE “was adept at exploiting the soft spots in regulation” like the “Enron loophole” to make money even when Georgians got stuck with the bill after financial disaster. And Loeffler’s continued investments and connections to ICE have led to “completely glaring” conflicts of interest in Washington, where she oversees a top regulator for ICE on the Senate Agriculture Committee. 

CLAIM: Loeffler talks about having “earned” her Senate seat and downplays her efforts to buy her appointment.

REALITY: In addition to her long “political mega-donor” history, the NYT found that Loeffler — who had not donated to Governor Brian Kemp in 2018 — made “the maximum allowable” donation to Kemp’s reelection campaign “in the weeks between Mr. Isakson’s hospitalization and retirement announcement.” This payout to Kemp comes in addition to Loeffler’s infamous pledge to spend millions to buy her seat outright in the election.

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