MAGA accused of shady dirty trick in important swing district

Republicans are suspected of using dark money in a widely-distributed ad attacking two of the four Democratic candidates seeking to flip a swing district in the upcoming midterm elections.

In a story first broken by Punchbowl congressional reporter Ally Mutnick, it appears that Lead Left PAC — the organization behind the commercial — uses a website with metadata connecting it to WinRed, a website that solicits contributions for Republican candidates and committees. Mutnick determined that the PAC has spent more than $500,000 in the Philadelphia area market to air the commercial, which addresses the race for Pennsylvania’s 7th congressional district.

The district, which contains Carbon, Lehigh and Northampton counties and a small part of Monroe, is considered a key tossup in the upcoming midterm elections. The Republican incumbent, Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, won the 2024 election by a single percentage point, one of the narrowest margins in any congressional race that year. As such, whichever Democrat wins the nomination is expected to have a realistic shot of being elected given the competitive nature of the race.

“A recent poll, paid for by the Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC that endorsed [Bob] Brooks, shows him leading his primary opponents with 24%, followed by McClure (17%), Obando-Derstine (12%) and Crosswell (9%),” reported Armchair Lehigh Valley, a local political news site. “However, most voters (36%) were undecided and a small number (2%) favored a candidate not on the ballot. The poll of 400 likely voters was conducted April 16-19 by GBAO and had a margin of error of +/- 4.9 percentage points.”

In the ad, which prominently featured images of President Donald Trump, an ominous voice urges viewers to “look closer. Bob Brooks’ group funded election deniers and anti-abortion extremists. Ryan Crosswell, a lifelong Republican from Trump’s Justice Department. They didn’t stand up to Trump. They helped Republicans.”

There is no evidence that Brooks funded election deniers or anti-abortion extremists, and Crosswell resigned from Trump’s Justice Department to protest its decision to drop a criminal case against former New York City Mayor Eric Adams.

“We need a Democrat who will take on Trump,” the ad concludes. “As county executive, Lamont McClure kicked ICE out of Northampton. He takes on Trump and wins. Vote for progressive Democrat Lamont McClure for Congress. Lead Left PAC is responsible for the content of this ad.”

Speaking to AlterNet about the ad ostensibly supporting him, McClure made it clear that he is not affiliated with the PAC and denounces the use of dark money.

“By now, you may have seen television ads running paid for by a PAC called Lead Left,” McClure told AlterNet. “I want to be clear. I'm running my own campaign and I've never heard of Lead Left before today. Our political system is broken and we have to put an end to all of the dark money being spent on our campaigns. I hope all of the candidates will join me in calling for the immediate cessation of dark money SuperPAC spending on all of our campaigns.”

He added, “Throughout this campaign at every forum and debate we've had, I have called for a Constitutional Amendment to overturn the Supreme Court's disastrous decision in Citizens United. I renew that commitment today.”

Brooks also condemned the advertisement — and seemed to implicitly share McClure’s suspicion that dark Republican money rather than McClure himself was behind the spot.

“Republicans are targeting me because I’m the candidate they fear the most,” Brooks told AlterNet. “They don’t want to face me in November because they know this firefighter will smoke Ryan Mackenzie, flip this seat, and stop Donald Trump’s cruel agenda.”

He added, “This is exactly what’s wrong with our broken and corrupt political system. A MAGA super PAC can parachute in at the final hour and spend millions of dollars in Republican dark money to spread lies about me and my record of service to the Lehigh Valley.”

Brooks did, however, call for McClure to denounce the commercial. (He was not informed of McClure’s comment to AlterNet prior to this article’s publication.)

“I’m calling on my opponent Lamont McClure to immediately denounce this MAGA dark money spending,” Brooks told AlterNet. “Any Democrat who fails to condemn attacks funded by Donald Trump’s allies is unqualified to be the Democratic nominee in this race.”

Mackenzie, for his part, told AlterNet that “all the Democratic candidates are carbon copies when it comes to their radical left policies, but as soon as the DCCC decided to support scandal-plagued Bob Brooks, the dark money started flying around."

Lead Left and Crosswell did not respond to requests for comment.