December 01, 2020 01:29 PM UTC

Cruz Gets Q-Balled By Lauren Boebert

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• by: Colorado Pols

Salon reports on another amateur-hour stumble by Rep.-elect Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert, in the process of which calling attention to substantial help Boebert got this year from a major far-right Republican luminary:

The Federal Elections Commission (FEC) sent a letter last week to Representative-elect Lauren Boebert, R-Co., asking the QAnon sympathizer to disclose her campaign’s fundraising ties to Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tx.

Cruz’s first donation came on the same day the senator asked the Department of Justice to investigate Netflix for alleged child pornography, a cause célèbre for QAnon adherents…

The FEC’s letter says Boebert failed to report the Cruz 20 for 20 Victory Fund PAC as a fundraising partner, even though two reported transfers appear to have come through joint fundraising efforts. Boebert and Cruz both reported the mid-September transfers, which dropped $136,250 in Boebert’s campaign account.

To be clear, this paperwork error can and likely will be written off as a minor rookie mistake. But it’s reportedly just the latest in a string of errors needing correction after Boebert’s underperforming win in a proven safe GOP district this year with a “B-List” campaign staff. There’s no question she’s running out of leeway for these kinds of amateur errors. The response from Boebert’s campaign to the Federal Election Commission after being notified of a previous such error is a true classic:

In June, Boebert received a notice after accepting contributions in excess of the maximum amount, a rule which she allegedly “just plain forgot.”

“There was no intent to try to report contributions illegally as I just plain forgot to watch for large donations [Pols emphasis] as I was preparing the report,” the Boebert campaign’s FEC compliance liaison wrote in reply.

“I just plain forgot to watch for large donations” has got to be one of the most unintentionally hilarious excuses ever offered up to the FEC. If you’re not watching for large donations, what the hell size donations are you watching for? Just the small donations? Maybe there’s some weird bookkeeping circumstance in which this excuse makes sense, but to most of the world it reads nonsensically.

As for Salon’s tie back to “QAnon” with Ted Cruz, we’ll concede it’s a little thin in this particular case. Cruz did call for an investigation of Netflix over the film Cuties in September, but that controversy fizzled after a poster for the film turned out to be much more objectionable than the movie itself. What we can say is Ted Cruz stepped in to help Boebert knowing all about Boebert’s fringy predilections–and given the comparatively narrow win Boebert eked out compared to her Republican predecessor, Boebert needed all the help she could get.

In the end, from the nether reaches of “QAnon” to Ted Cruz’s orbit isn’t that much of a leap.