Cambridge Analytica, the data firm accused of improperly gathering and using personal data from millions of Facebook profiles, is now facing allegations it violated federal election law.
Common Cause, a government watchdog group, filed complaints with the Department of Justice and Federal Election Commission claiming Cambridge Analytica and SCL Group, its sister company, violated a federal law that prohibits foreign nationals from conducting election-related activities during two election cycles.
According to the complaints, a combined 20 U.S. political committees hired Cambridge Analytica during the 2014 and 2016 election cycles, including Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz’s presidential campaigns, and a super PAC started by John Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who President Trump tapped as his next national security adviser.
Common Cause alleges employees of the two companies broke a law that bars foreign nationals from “directly or indirectly participat[ing] in the decision-making process of any … political committee … such as the decisions concerning the making of … expenditures” in connection with U.S. elections.
Individuals named in the complaint are Alexander Nix, Cambridge Analytica’s CEO who is currently suspended, Alexander Tayler, the company’s chief data officer and acting CEO, Mark Turnbull, managing director of Cambridge Analytica’s political division, Nigel Oakes, co-founder of SCL Group, and Christopher Wylie, a former employee of Cambridge Analytica.
All are foreign nationals, according to the filings.
“We are a nation of laws and our campaign finance laws must be enforced by the FEC and the Justice Department in order to safeguard the integrity of our elections from foreign interference,” Karen Hobert Flynn, president of Common Cause, said. “These companies and individuals ignored the law, enriched themselves performing millions of dollars of prohibited work for candidates and committees, and then boasted abut the effectiveness of their activities in swaying U.S. elections.”
In a letter to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, Common Cause alleges Cambridge Analytica and its employees “participated in the decision-making” for its U.S. political clients regarding “expenditures and disbursements for political advertising, research, data analytics, polling, focus groups, message development, marketing and more.”
The complaints filed with the Justice Department and Federal Election Commission cite an undercover investigation published by London’s Channel 4 News last week that show Nix discussing the extent of Cambridge Analytica’s work with the Trump campaign.
“We did all the research, all the data, all the analytics, all the targeting, we ran all the digital campaign, the television campaign and our data informed all the strategy,” Nix said.
Turnbull was also filmed discussing how Cambridge Analytica created attack ads targeting Hillary Clinton that were funded by the Make America Number 1 super PAC.
The filings from Common Cause cite a memo Laurence Levy, a lawyer who was advising Cambridge Analytica, sent to GOP donor Rebekah Mercer, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, and Nix warning them of potential violations of federal election law.
Levy urged Nix to recuse himself from “substantive management of any such clients involved in U.S. elections” and “ensure that only U.S. citizens are making decisions about U.S. election activity.”
Common Cause alleges in its complaint that Mercer, Bannon, and Nix ignored that advice.
“It defies believe that even after their own attorney warned them that they would be violating the prohibition on performing certain election-related activities in U.S. elections that they did so anyway,” Paul S. Ryan, vice president for policy and litigation at Common Cause, said. “A full investigation must be conducted, and if Cambridge Analytica and its staff did in fact repeatedly violate our laws, then there must be punishment levied sufficient to deter similar lawbreaking in future.”
Cambridge Analytica has come under fire after it was reported the company improperly harvested and misused data from 50 million Facebook profiles to influence voters during the 2016 election.
Tayler, who was named the company’s interim CEO following Nix’s suspension, denied any wrongdoing and said Cambridge Analytica takes the “disturbing recent allegations of unethical practices in our non-US political business very seriously.”
“As anyone who is familiar with our staff and work can testify, we in no way resemble the politically-motivated and unethical company that some have sought to portray,” Tayler said in a statement Friday. “Our staff are a talented, diverse, and vibrant group of people.”
