Staff has had a practice over many years to inform candidates that the national LP almost never contributes cash directly to campaigns, with the only instance being $50,000 in 2011.  "Almost never" no longer applies with the LNC having given cash contributions to the John Moore, Mark Miller and Mark Wicks campaigns, paying filing fees in Montana in 2016, and perhaps a few other instances I'm not thinking of at the moment (there have been a few requests that the LNC has voted down over the past several years if I remember correctly). Going forward, I think it's misleading for me to tell candidates the national LP almost never contributes. Instead, I'll be informing candidates that staff is not authorized to give cash contributions from the national LP directly to candidates, the LNC makes those decisions. Though cash contributions from the national LP are still rare, to get a cash contribution from the national LP, contact the LNC to make your case--probably starting with your regional representative if you have one--otherwise with the chair, vice chair, and at-large members.

I'll do a phone conference session on candidate recruitment tomorrow night.

Two popular questions that often come up regarding candidates are:

1: "What kind of support can the national LP give to candidates?" I'll mention the above, along with other minor less direct support.

2:  "Why doesn't the national LP pick one candidate for a state level race for the entire nation to get behind, instead of running for lots of office?" Among other things, I plan to say we are not putting all of our eggs in one basket. Things don't work well that way. We are gong to recruit as many candidates as possible for the 2018 election, with 2,000 being our stretch goal. But, for those interested in focusing on a single campaign, Laura Ebke's re-election campaign would probably be a top choice. The LNC would probably need to vote to endorse an "actual" top choice, but the sense I get is that Senator Ebke would likely be that top choice.

For the intermediate to long-term, if requested, staff could probably come up with a more objective and strategic decision making process for cash contributions to candidates, or perhaps the LNC could form a committee for that. In the short run, I think what I outlined above is how things are actually working.

Wes Benedict, Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee, Inc.
1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314
(202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict@lp.org
facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational
Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership

Colleagues:

I have seen that Sen. Laura Ebke in Nebraska has started fundraising.  I am seeking cosponors for the following motion:

Donate $5,000 to the Laura Ebke re-election campaign.

I was unable to find any FEC reason we cannot donate (and we've donated to state rep campaigns before).  Nebraska seems not to have a donation limit, even for out of state money, so we should be fine there.  I am not aware, therefore, of any legal issues, but please speak up if I have missed anything.

Joshua A. Katz

At-Large Representative,

Libertarian National Committee

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