During the first three months of 2019, Congressman Cline’s campaign committee reported raising $64,160.50.
Now the reporting is in for the first half of the year. Cline’s receipts for that period total $215,352.50, which means he took in another $151,192 between April and June.
Perhaps the most interesting contribution came from the political action committee of Nike Inc., which gave $1,000 to Cline’s campaign on June 20.
Yes, that Nike. The company whose marketing strategy is based on “selling rebellion.” The company that featured Colin Kaepernick– the former NFL player detested by the political Right for kneeling during the National Anthem– in an advertisement last year.
Nike’s decision to create explicitly politically charged ads featuring Kaepernick for the 30th anniversary of the brand’s iconic slogan, “Just Do It,” caused shock waves — and conveniently for Nike, those shock waves were among the very authority figures its customers like to reject. There were immediate threats of boycotts, including from President Trump.
Open Secrets reports:
Although Nike appears to send a specific socially conscious message in the cultural realm, in the political world Nike employees and its PAC contributed $424,000 to the Republican party and its candidates in the 2018 election cycle, compared to only $122,000 to the Democrats — the party typically associated with ‘progressive’ values today.
Nike gave 78 percent of political contributions to Republicans this cycle. With a couple notable exceptions like the 2008 and 2016 election cycles, Nike has a track record of giving much more to Republicans than Democrats in the past decade. During the 2010, 2012 and 2014 election cycles, Nike gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Republicans, with 76 percent, 69 percent and 59 percent of their contributions going to the GOP in each of those cycles respectively. Nearly half of Nike’s political spending has come from individual contributions made by co-founder Phil Knight and his wife Penny.
So in the end, Nike (like most giant corporations) sees its interests as more aligned with Republicans like Cline. And Cline has no problem taking campaign cash from giant corporations like Nike.
Other noteworthy donations to the Cline campaign in the second quarter of 2019:
• Microsoft Corporation: $1,000
• Goldman Sachs: $2,500
• Toyota of North America: $2,000
• Gentworth Financial: $1,000
• Northrop Grumman: $1,000
• AT&T: $2,000
• Verizon: $1,000
• Google: $1,000
• Target Corporation: $1,000
• Cox Enterprises: $1,500
During the same period, Cline paid $35,937.32 to Republican fundraising consultant Laura Kilgore McMenamin of Alexandria.
Cline Watch 