A campaign organization run by former Wyoming congresswoman Liz Cheney has been actively paying into and receiving donations through a Democratic fundraising platform this year.
According to campaign finance information filed with the Federal Election Commission, Cheney’s Our Great Task super political action committee paid $8,662 to ActBlue Technical Services in June. It also received $159,510 through the group in June.
People can directly donate to Our Great Task on ActBlue, showing that Cheney is looking to appeal to voters of all stripes with her campaign to prevent former President Donald Trump from winning another term.
This aligns with the mission of her group, which states on its website that “Republicans, Democrats, Independents must work together to ensure Donald Trump and those who have enabled him are defeated.”
Cheney’s group calls stopping Trump “the cause of our time.”
She was Wyoming’s congresswoman from 2017-2023, rising to the No. 3 position in the Republican caucus before losing that role for her opposition of Trump.
The Significance
Cheney, a lifelong Republican, would have been unlikely to use ActBlue in the past when she was one of the most conservative members of Congress.
A Cheney spokesman did not immediately respond to Cowboy State Daily’s request for comment.
ActBlue is a fundraising platform for the Democratic Party and its candidates. It allows candidates to have their small-dollar donors donate directly to ActBlue without having to cut a check or go through their own personal donation page. Then, ActBlue wires the money to the candidates while taking a small cut for itself.
“As a nonprofit, we’re driven by the belief that our democracy works better when more people participate in civic life and when our campaigns and nonprofits are powered by the people they serve,” ActBlue says on its website. “That’s why we’ve built a powerful online fundraising platform for Democratic candidates up and down the ballot, progressive organizations, and nonprofits.”
In 2020, Politico reported that signing up for ActBlue was at the top of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s checklist for new candidates.
Former Democratic National Committee chair and 2004 presidential candidate Howard Dean, who helped found the platform, told Politico that, “It’s transformed Democratic politics, and it’s enabled us to compete with the big bucks boys on the other side.”
Cheney Breaks
Cheney’s participation with the progressive organization is another step in her move away from present-day Republican Party circles dominated by support for former President Donald Trump.
She was one of Trump’s most outspoken critics after he challenged the results of the 2020 election.
Trump endorsed U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman during the 2022 Republican primary, who beat Cheney by about 38 percentage points.
Cheney has two PACs involved in the current election cycle, The Great Task and Our Great Task.
She launched The Great Task, a traditional PAC, during her 2022 primary campaign. Our Great Task was filed with the FEC on March 11.
Not Just ActBlue
In April 2022, The Washington Post reported that Cheney had by August 2021 stopped using WinRed, the small-donor fundraising platform Republicans created at the urging of Trump and the Republican National Committee.
At the time, she started using Anedot, a competing online payment processor for Republicans that was started more than a decade ago. Cheney is still paying into this system and doing so more than ActBlue.
Our Great Task paid $27,153 to Anedot this year in credit card processing fees. The Great Task paid Anedot $26,765.
Both PACs have been busy during the 2024 election season.
The Great Task has received $1.05 million in contributions since 2023 and has spent $4.6 million. From this total, $3.6 million was transferred to Our Great Task.
Our Great Task raised $3 million and spent $195,899 in 2024.
Neither PAC appears to be giving directly to any candidates and appear to be focusing their spending efforts on their own advertisement efforts against Trump.
Leo Wolfson can be reached at leo@cowboystatedaily.com.
