More on the Electronic Freedom Fund, the new deep-pocketed conservative 527 on the scene.
The group works exclusively with a two-year-old California consulting firm called Meridian Pacific, which, in further testament to its GOP bonafides, is headed by a onetime senior Republican National Committee official.
John Peschong joined Meridian Pacific in 2005, after seven years as the Western States Director for the RNC. Meridian Pacific recently handled a half-million-dollar series of television and print buys for the Economic Freedom Fund, a right-wing “527” group.
As a so-called 527 group, EFF is barred from coordinating its activities with specific parties or candidates. Peschong did not immediately return a phone message asking about his involvement with the group’s activities.
As we reported earlier, EFF’s sole backer is Robert Perry, who funded the infamous Swift Boat Veterans for Truth group during the 2004 elections. The group was so successful in smearing Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry that the group’s name became a verb: “To swiftboat” now means to unfairly malign a candidate through a broad and intense media campaign focused on a single topic.
Meridian Pacific has been caught pulling some dirty tricks of its own: last year the firm was accused of stealing electronic documents from a local governmental organization to benefit its corporate client, Pacific Gas & Electric. When it received the documents from MP senior executive Tom Ross, PG&E notified the organization, local law enforcement, and the FBI. And fired Meridian Pacific. (In later news accounts, Ross blamed a 21-year-old intern for the fiasco. The firm insisted it had done nothing illegal or unethical.)
No federal campaign has reported payments to Meridian Pacific this cycle, although in June the National Republican Congressional Committee paid the firm $2,085 for “generic office equipment” and “generic current computer equipment,” federal filings show.
Update: An earlier version of this post incorrectly stated that Pacific Meridian had been fined in 2004 for failing to report donations. That is not the case.
