Over the weekend, while nation-wide attention was focused on the racist comments reportedly made by Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, some conservative commentators were focused on something else: Sterling’s party affiliation.
Specifically, certain conservatives were taking the media to task for supposedly ignoring Sterling’s ties to the Democratic Party. But a bit of context was missing. Sterling is a registered Republican.
A search of The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder’s website using Sterling’s name, date of birth, and address turns up a Republican registration, and the registrar-recorder’s office confirmed the information to TPM on Monday. (The initial tip came to TPM from public records compiler eMerges.)
(Search result on Monday for Donald Sterling’s voter registration.)
Conservatives — including Matt Drudge, The National Review, and The Daily Caller — have taken time since the Sterling story broke to describe him as a Democrat or point to Sterling’s past contributions to Democratic politicians.
Sterling has given money to Democrats, though his most recent donations appear to have taken place more than a decade ago. According to the Center For Responsive Politics, those donations include $2,000 to then-Sen. Bill Bradley (D-NJ) in 1989, $1,000 to future California Gov. Gray Davis (D) in 1991, and $1,000 to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) in 1991. Records kept by the National Institute on Money in State Politics also indicate that Sterling gave another $5,000 to Davis in 2002.
By Monday afternoon, The National Review had updated its piece on Sterling’s political ties. The correction read as follows:
“An earlier version of this post identified Sterling as a Democrat. Although his political donations appear to have been exclusively to Democrats, his official party affiliation is not known. A Clippers representative did not respond to requests for his present political affiliation.”
(h/t Mother Jones)
Wow. There is more botox in that pic than in an entire lot of badly-canned tuna.
Good to see that the plastic surgeons in the greater LA metroplex have been keeping busy.
facts have a liberal bias
Not surprised he is a republican. He has the same traits as Bundy and the guy who said that those of us who are not the 1 percent are Nazis.
Remember when Jack Abramoff got his ass in trouble back in 2006, bribing everybody in sight? Remember that? Except for the Credít Mobelier scandal back in 1869 it was the biggest bribery scandal in American history.
The Republicans were screaming he was giving money to the Democrats and it turned out to be THEM.