DANA POINT, Calif. — One by one, the wealthy conservative donors stood up Monday and pledged millions of dollars to the favorite causes of billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch.
For more than two hours over lunch, hundreds of donors gathered at a luxury resort overlooking the Pacific Ocean and told each other how much they will give to the various groups backed by the Koch brothers’ Freedom Partners — a network of education, policy and political entities that aim to promote a smaller, less intrusive government.
That network in January set an eye-popping goal of raising $889 million over two years, with the two entities most directly involved in the 2016 elections, Americans for Prosperity and a super PAC, planning to spend $325 million through Election Day.
After Monday’s lunch, the Koch groups are on track to meet that goal, said James Davis, a spokesman for Freedom Partners.
The weekend’s agenda featured a spread of political leaders that included five Republican presidential candidates, five senators and five governors. Donors also heard several times from Charles Koch, the 79-year-old chairman and chief executive officer of the privately held Koch Industries.
“We talk here about dollars and raising money, and they are absolutely critical to getting this done, but they alone will not do the job,” Koch said.
“It took the full commitment of our Founding Fathers or Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony, Martin Luther King and the thousands of other leaders of successful movements,” Koch said. “To defy the tremendous odds stacked against them, they all, not just the Founding Fathers, had to commit their lives, their fortune and their sacred honor. That’s the challenge before us. And the question is, will we rise to it?”
Donors did rise, literally, at the Monday pledge lunch, specifying how much they will give to each of the Koch-approved groups.
The best-known is Americans for Prosperity, which advertises and sends activists to knock on doors as it opposes policies such as President Barack Obama’s health care law.
Democrats have used the $889 million budget figure in their own fundraising pitches, too, decrying the influence of money in politics.
