US Defense Firms Gave $2 Million to Election-Denying Candidates After Post-Jan 6 ‘Pause’ - Report

According to a report, the five largest US defense contractors have resumed their donations to politicians who have endorsed former US President Donald Trump’s claims that the November 2020 US presidential election was fraudulent.

The Pentagon-focused news outlet found that Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, and General Dynamics have donated a total of nearly $2 million to Republican candidates in the November 2022 elections who voted against certifying the 2020 election results.

After Trump lost the 2020 vote to Democratic challenger Joe Biden, he launched a political movement to 'Stop the Steal,' which culminated in the storming of the US Capitol by thousands of his followers. At the time, Congress was meeting to certify the results of the Electoral College vote, the Constitutionally-mandated process by which the election results are made official and the peaceful transfer of power maintained.

Although the rioters temporarily dispersed Congress and looted the national legislative building they failed at their goal of capturing the election results, and after police cleared the building, lawmakers were able to reconvene and complete their task of certifying Biden's win. However, 147 Republican congress members still voted against certification of the results, signaling their support for the actions by Trump’s followers earlier that day.

In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo insurrections loyal to President Donald Trump rally at the U.S. Capitol in Washington. U.S.

In the wake of the attack, many core Republican leaders distanced themselves from Trump and his followers’ actions, who was later impeached and then acquitted of charges that he had incited the insurrection. Corporations rushed to end or suspend their relationships with Trump and his sympathetic lawmakers, ranging from AT&T to Airbnb, Target, and Bank of America.

That includes the aforementioned defense contractors, as well as Maxar, Hunting Ingalls, Leidos, and BAE Systems, and others.

“Lockheed Martin routinely evaluates and updates our political action committee contribution strategy to reflect our core values and the constantly changing political landscape and priorities,” the defense firm said a week after the riot. “As we enter a new political cycle, we are not making political contributions as we continue this evaluation to ensure our political donation and engagement program remains aligned with our business priorities.”

However, according to filings with the US Federal Election Commission (FEC), between January 2021 and August 2022, Lockheed gave $450,500 to the reelection campaigns of 91 different GOP lawmakers who rejected the legitimacy of Biden’s election victory. The firm has donated a total of $3.2 million during this election cycle.

When asked about the donations by Defense News, Lockheed said: “Our employee PAC program continues to observe long-standing principles of non-partisan political engagement in support of our business interests.”

At the time of the riot, Boeing claimed it “strongly condemns the violence, lawlessness and destruction that took place in the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021”. However, in the time since, Boeing has given the most money to election-denying lawmakers of any defense firm: $455,000 to 68 lawmakers.

Defense corporations aren’t alone in this behavior though: as of a June tally, 15 other major corporations had also resumed donations to election-denying Republicans after having previously paused them, including BlueCross BlueShield, Walmart, and Walgreens. Dozens more have resumed donations to PACs and other fundraising groups that then pass money to election-denying lawmakers.

Nor is the practice of claiming a political position and then donating to politicians who oppose it a practice limited to the situation surrounding the Capitol insurrection either. Activists have tracked the public-facing statements on LGBTQ rights by various corporations and put them up against the politics of the politicians they donate campaign funds to, and found that many firms given high marks by the national LGBTQ rights NGO Human Rights Campaign for their pro-LGBTQ policies were also financially backing the politicians pushing some of the harshest anti-LGBTQ bills in the country.

This dynamic came under a microscope earlier this year when Disney condemned Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law, and local journalists pointed to the company’s financial backing of every single one of the bill’s endorsers.

In response to Disney’s condemnation, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ironically accused the company of being under the control of the Communist Party of China.