Despite tea party energy, outside groups funded by Swift Boaters, other old hands

By Dan Eggen and T.W. Farnam
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, October 22, 2010

The Swift Boaters are back.

Funders of the stealth campaign against presidential candidate John Kerry have returned in force six years later, giving millions of dollars to independent groups targeting Democrats in the November midterms, according to election disclosures and other records.

The donations are part of a broader pattern of giving this year dominated by longtime party fundraisers, Wall Street financiers and energy tycoons. Despite the burst of new political energy surrounding the tea party movement, only a thin slice of the population is donating, with the number of Americans giving $200 or more dropping dramatically.

Records suggest that much of the money fueling a wave of negative attack advertising comes from a stable of old political hands with roots going back as far as the Nixon era.

American Crossroads, one of this year's biggest Republican-friendly spenders, has received 42 percent of its money from a dozen supporters of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the independent group that ran ads in 2004 accusing Kerry of lying about his war record, according to a Washington Post analysis. The single biggest contributor to the group, with $7 million, is Bob J. Perry, the Texas home builder who was the top Swift Boat financier.

(More here.)