Groups With Liberal Ties Tapped To Re-Elect The GOP Establishment

WASHINGTON — Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) got a boost in the last election from a little-known nonprofit called Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. The group calls itself conservative, but its support for greater federal funding of alternative energy drew the attention of Tennessee tea party groups, who decried what they saw as its liberal agenda.

Tea party activists were further agitated by the scant information available about Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. It pushed for increased public and private investment in alternative energy. It ran an issue ad praising Alexander’s “bold” energy plan in 2013. But whose money was funding that message?

If the tea party groups had known the full story, they might have gone ballistic.

A Huffington Post examination of tax records, accessed on CitizenAudit.org, found that in its first year of operations, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions was funded with $1 million in seed money from two nonprofits often linked to liberal causes. From June 2012 through June 2013, the group received $500,000 each from the Advocacy Fund and the Trust for Energy Innovation.

Aside from intervening in elections to push establishment Republicans, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions has also registered to lobby on energy issues, using lobbyists from McDonald Hopkins and Crossroads Strategies. In 2013, that effort included McDonald Hopkins’ Jennifer LaTourette, wife of former Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio), a central player in the anti-tea party effort from his position as head of the moderate conservative Main Street Partnership.

Earlier in 2014, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) gave opening remarks at a panel discussion hosted by Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions. Following the election, the group presented Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) and Rep. Chris Gibson (R-N.Y.) talking about the need for free market solutions to advancing alternative energy. Both Ayotte and Portman are up for re-election in 2016.

Ayotte’s remarks at the latter event have already been turned into an issue ad promoting her position on “American energy independence.”

The Huffington Post