Given former Republican Party of Minnesota state chair Jennifer Carnahan's scheduling of party events in South Dakota (one's here), we grew curious about whether any South Dakota politicians took money from her friend Anton Lazzaro.
Sadly, the South Dakota Secretary of State provides no searchable database of state campaign finance donors; curious citizens can go to sdcfr.sdsos.gov--then search each candidate's non-searchable PDF filings for contributor names. Lovely.
But one can search the Federal Election Commission's databases by contributor. We found this July 30, 2020 contribution from Lazzaro to our congressman Dusty Johnson:
Also here.
We're unable to find any connection between Johnson and Lazzaro, however, other than the cash.
That might be why we weren't able to find any reporting on this contribution since the scandal broke in Minnesota, although the contribution was noted online at the time in Dusty Johnson's campaign committee receives $500 from Anton Lazzaro, at Southeast South Dakota News, a Metric Media site.
Well okay then. As the Columbia Journalism Review's TOW Reports noted in 2019, Hundreds of ‘pink slime’ local news outlets are distributing algorithmic stories and conservative talking points. Priyanjana Bengani has made a name exposing the "pink slime." One passage in the article reveals--we assume--why Lazzaro's contribution to the Friends of Dusty Johnson was offered as news in the years prior to Lazzaro's arrest and arraignment:
Many of the stories attributed to automated services (Metric Media News Service, Local Labs News Service, etc.) relied on data releases from federal programs like the Department of Education and Department of Health and Human Services, Congressional Research Service, the Federal Election Commission, and the Census Bureau.
We touched on one Minnesota pink slime outlet in our October 2020 post, "Pink Slime" Metric Media outlet promotes Gruenhagen's Facebook bonding bill take.
We're feeling pretty slimed at this point.
Perhaps Congressman Johnson could donate the money to a South Dakota non-profit that works to end sex-trafficking or to aid its victims, if he has not already done so.
Images: Dusty Johnson (top; Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call file photo); screenshot of the Lazzaro contribution.
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