Michelle Rhee Loves Bob Behning and Other Indiana Right-Wingers

by Doug Martin

Michelle Rhee’s political funding machine has entered Indiana, and the fake Democrat who once spoke at the statehouse with former governor Mitch Daniels and has been involved in one scandal after another is now handing cash to the rightest of the right-wing in Indiana, the latest none other than ALEC member Bob Behning.

In 2013, Rhee’s Students First PAC, registered in California, slid Behning $1,000 (page 9). The PAC is also funding the campaigns of Cisco System’s Todd Huston, Religious Right’s Carl Yoder, and ALEC’s Jim Banks. 

But Rhee's is not the only fake liberal outfit which has tossed money to Indiana Republicans to keep Daniels’ corporate-theocratic school locomotive rolling. 

Stand for Children, which used millions in hedge fund money to throw Illinois teachers and students under the bus in 2011, gave the Republican Behning $1,000 (page 7) last year and $500 in 2012 (page 4).

In fact, Stand for Children has financially supported many Republican lawmakers in Indiana, including Tony Bennett, Carl Yoder, ALEC’s David Frizzell, and Todd Huston. 

Yet to keep his base happy,  let it be known that Behning is still a favorite of the rightwing billionaires from Amway and Walmart.  Beginning its funding to Behning in 2009 (page 8 in pdf), the Amway/Walmart/hedge fund/charter school group Hoosiers for Economic Growth handed Behning $3,000 (page 5 and page 10 in the PDF) to help plant a for-profit charter school on every street corner to  duel it out with voucher schools. 

The other guilty parties giving to Behning in 2013?  Eli Lilly—which owns the Mind Trust with Bill Gates and insures that David Harris can make $200,000 per year —gave him $500 (page 7).

K12 online learning’s lobbying branch K 12 Southpoint II, out of Virginia, tossed Behning $1,000 (page 3) in 2012, with the money it had left from buying our neighboring lawmakers in Illinois in 2010.

But let’s be fair.  Alice Walton got a little bit back, since Behning paid around $1000 to Sam’s Club for parade candy and other campaign things recently (page 14).  

Behning gave back to the religious community, too, donating $500 from his campaign chest to the voucher-sponsored Lutheran High School in Indy (page 14).