Candidate’s father steers six figures into PAC attacking rival in Kansas GOP primary
Amanda Adkins’ father has steered more than $100,000 into a super PAC airing ads attacking Sara Hart Weir, one of Adkins’ top rivals in the GOP primary race for Kansas’ 3rd congressional district.
Alan Landes, Adkins’ father, was the sole donor to the Heartland USA PAC as of March 31 after making two donations totaling $113,146, according to Federal Election Commission records.
Landes retired last month as president of Herzog Construction Company in St. Joseph, Missouri.
The late Stan Herzog and the companies his family founded have long been among the most prolific supporters of Republican candidates in Missouri. Over the last five years alone, nearly $3 million in donations from Herzog companies have gone to various political action committees in Missouri.
The existence of the PAC backing Adkins’ candidacy appears to be an effort to recreate that influence in Kansas.
This week, the PAC launched an ad campaign attacking Weir and promoting Adkins’ candidacy as the August 4 Republican primary quickly approaches in Kansas. The PAC has paid for more than $166,000 in broadcast and cable airtime.
The PAC had already spent down most of Landes’ initial donations. It will file a report with the Federal Election Commission later this month that will reveal whether Landes was the source of the additional money to pay for the ads.
The ad centers on Weir’s work on behalf of former Democratic Rep. Dennis Moore’s campaign in 2004 as a recent college graduate and accuses her of posing as a Republican.
“She even worked for Dennis Moore. You know, the guy who voted for Obamacare and Nancy Pelosi,” the ad states over an animated image of Weir switching from a red baseball cap with a GOP elephant to a blue baseball cap with a “D” for Democrat.
“Playing dress-up is fun for kids, not for Congress,” the ad states regarding Weir, before shifting to an image of Adkins and her family promoting her as “the real thing.”
Both women are competing to take on freshman Democratic Rep. Sharice Davids in the swing district. Adkins, 45, is a Cerner executive who has previously served as Kansas Republican chair and campaign manager for Sam Brownback during his Senate tenure. Weir, 38, is the former president of the National Down Syndrome Society.
Also competing in the primary are former Roeland Park Mayor Adrienne Vallejo Foster, 47, former state Rep. Tom Love, 67, and former Burns and McDonnell executive Mike Beehler, 60.
‘A broken campaign finance system’
Weir condemned the ad, which portrays her as a child, as sexist even as it seeks to boost another female candidate.
“Kansas families are hurting in the midst of a global pandemic, but instead of offering solutions, career insider Amanda Adkins chose to launch her campaign with a sexist ad financed by her father about what I did for a few weeks in the summer following my college graduation,” Weir said in a statement.
“It is insulting and Amanda, her father, and anyone else who financed it should be embarrassed and demand this sexist attack ad be pulled.”
Landes did not immediately respond to a phone call or email Tuesday on whether he remained the PAC’s sole donor and how much money he planned to spend before the August primary.
Adkins’ campaign did not respond to multiple phone calls and emails about the ad, but Adkins personally posted a response on Weir’s Facebook page Tuesday evening after Weir and her supporters had criticized the ad in a thread.
“MY FATHER was my conservative inspiration. A boy from from the farm, married 50 years, GOP family, built a successful local company into a national success. What say you?” Adkins wrote on Weir’s page in response to critics.
The PAC emailed The Star late Tuesday with copies of Weir’s past voter registration forms showing she was registered as Democrat in Kansas from 2000 to 2006 to back up of one of the claims in the ad, but it did not answer a question about whether Landes remains the PAC’s sole donor.
The PAC paid more than $98,000 last year to Axiom Strategies, the same Kansas City-based political firm advising Adkins’ campaign.
“Axiom did one project for Heartland USA PAC in 2019 in accordance with our federal firewall policy and has not worked with the PAC since. Axiom is not involved with the current efforts of the PAC,” said Rob Phillips, the chief operating officer of Axiom, in an email.
The strategy of a parent pouring six figures into a PAC is reminiscent of 2018 when a super PAC funded by Republican Steve Watkins’ father financed a TV ad blitz that elevated his son in a crowded GOP primary in the adjacent Kansas’ 2nd congressional primary.
Steve Watkins, Sr., a Topeka physician, put more than $765,000 into the Kansans Can Do Anything PAC, most of it before the primary, on the way to his son’s election to Congress.
“The phenomenon of family-funded super PACs are a symptom of a broken campaign finance system,” said Brendan Fischer, director of federal reform at the Washington-based Campaign Legal Center.
Fischer said that PACs funded by family members undermine the requirement that super PACs be independent from a campaign. The federal law’s current wording allows them to exist as easy avenue for wealthy parents to put more money toward their children’s election than would be allowable by giving directly to the campaign.
Adkins’ mother, Grace Landes, has donated $5,200 to Adkins’ campaign this cycle, a small fraction of the amount her husband put toward the PAC.
“It gives a candidate who comes from a wealthy family an advantage,” Fischer said. “Unless the campaign finance system is reformed we are likely to see this phenomenon of family-funded super PACs continue to arise in Kansas and across the country.”
Among two of Adkins’ biggest assets on her personal financial disclosure are a pair of family trusts, one named after each of her parents, both valued at between $1 million and $5 million.
Brooke Goren, the spokeswoman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, accused “Adkins and her family are trying to buy this seat.”
This story was originally published July 7, 2020 at 4:07 PM.
