Hijacking Campaign 2021 | Independent Expenditures | Issue Ads | Candidates | Campaign 2021
Posted: March 12, 2021
Updated: July 30, 2021
This committee is used by the American Federation for Children to make independent expenditures in Wisconsin legislative and statewide elections. The federation is a Washington D.C.-based group that supports school voucher programs in Wisconsin and around the country. Since 2010 the group has made over $4 million in independent expenditures to influence partisan elections in Wisconsin. This is the first time it has done such spending in the officially non-partisan State Superintendent of Public Instruction election.
Less than four weeks before the April 6 election, the group first reported spending $56,500 for online ads opposing Pecatonica Area Schools district administrator Jill Underly for state school superintendent. Underly defeated educational consultant Deborah Kerr in the April election. The office's then-incumbent, Carolyn Stanford Taylor, appointed to fill the position in January 2019 by Democratic Governor Tony Evers, did not seek election.
Subsequently the federation reported spending nearly another $153,000 for videos and online advertising opposing Underly.
A video produced by the group accused Underly of being a hypocrite for repeatedly calling herself an advocate for public schools because she once sent her children to a private school.
Last active election: 2020
This organization is registered with the Wisconsin Ethics Commission as an independent expenditure committee following the January 2010 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. FEC.