Herman Cain

John Nichols: Cain, Koch, Walker and the smoking man

Herman Cain’s smoking campaign manager, Mark Block, was the Koch brothers’ man in Wisconsin until two days before Gov. Scott Walker’s inauguration. That’s when he switched from controversy-plagued campaigning at the state level to controversy-plagued campaigning at the national level. The group One Wisconsin Now described the plan as “a coordinated plot by the Republican […] [Capital Times]

For a Close Aide to Herman Cain, Scrutiny Comes on Two Fronts

Until this week, Mark Block was famous as the guy who inhaled in a Herman Cain campaign Web video that went viral. Scot Ross, executive director of One Wisconsin Now, a liberal advocacy group, mordantly credited Americans for Prosperity with “derailing a discussion about how we had to move to more clean energy, which is where […] [New York Times]

Cigarette-smoking Cain aide dogged by voter suppression claims

Following the release of an ad showing him puffing on a cigarette, an adviser for Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain is facing some extra scrutiny — and it isn’t just about his nicotine habit. The liberal group One Wisconsin Now revealed audio tapes last year that suggested the then-AFP director was involved in a “voter caging” […] [Raw Story]

Koch group selling Walker agenda ahead of recall

Koch Industries and its front group Americans for Prosperity spent roughly a million dollars helping to put Scott Walker in the governor’s mansion and another half a million dollars protecting his recalled state senators. Now, Koch’s AFP and their sister organization the MacIver Institute are teaming up to help Scott Walker yet again. Just in time […]

Herman Cain’s Koch Connection

Scot Ross, executive director of One Wisconsin Now, talks with Rachel Maddow about the Koch brothers backing of Herman Cain, whose candidacy is oddly successful for someone without a fully formed campaign operation. [MSNBC]

Top Herman Cain aide at center of “smoking” ad has a checkered past.

In 2010, a liberal group, One Wisconsin Now, said it had obtained an audio recording of a tea party meeting that indicated Block was involved in an effort to try to prevent legal voters from casting ballots in Democratic-leaning neighborhoods. A tea party organizer says on the audio that Americans for Prosperity had agreed to […] [Daily Reporter]

Herman Cain, the Koch Industries’ Candidate in 2012

Cain’s dense connections with the Kochs, combined with his and his staffers’ apparent ignorance of even the basic principles of various schools of political and economic thought, are deeply troubling. He is increasingly appearing to be the first presidential candidate who is not only beholden to corporate money, but in fact running on a corporation’s […] [PolicyMic]

Long ties to Koch brothers key to Cain’s campaign

Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain has cast himself as the outsider, the pizza magnate with real-world experience who will bring fresh ideas to the nation’s capital. But Cain’s economic ideas, support and organization have close ties to two billionaire brothers who bankroll right-leaning causes through their group Americans for Prosperity. “Herman Cain is the first […] [The Sacramento Bee]

Cain’s ties to right-leaning billionaires may hurt him

Cain’s links to the Koch brothers could undercut his outsider, nonpolitical image among people who detest politics as usual and candidates connected with the party machine. To some liberals, Cain’s rise with the help of AFP shows the incredible influence that outside groups controlled by superwealthy individuals with specific agendas can have on the political […] [KVVU-TV]

GOP Hopeful Herman Cain and Koch

In late 2010, the liberal advocacy group, One Wisconsin Now, caught a Tea Party organizer on tape discussing Block’s role in a vote-caging scheme apparently designed to suppress voter turnout in two Milwaukee districts that are heavily populated by college students and African Americans. [Alternet]