Stephen Colbert's "Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow" independent expenditure committee has been raising funds to support the comedian's real/parody run for the presidency since last fall. As is required by the Federal Election Committee, Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow is required to disclose its donor list, which it did just before the midnight deadline last night. Among the itemized receipts, which total $1,023,121.24 in donations for the Super PAC, a tipster spotted a familiar name — former mayor of San Francisco and current Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom:

colbert_newsom.jpg


The address listed on Newsom's receipt corresponds to Plumpjack Wines in the Marina, which Newsom owns a stake in. In an email, Newsom's current Chief of Staff Francisco Castillo confirmed without further comment that the Lieutenant Governor did, in fact, make the contribution to American's for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow. [Updated with Gavin's statement below.] So there you have it, folks. The former mayor with the great hair does have a decent sense of humor about the political process. At least enough to donate $500 to the cause of parodying the whole GOP nomination mess.

So far, the Super PAC has been using its donations (gathered mostly from Colbert Report and Daily Show viewers, it seems) to crank out attack ads highlighting the (ahem) intricacies of campaign financing, while generally being hilarious along the way. So, here now to clear up (or possibly obfuscate) the purpose of Colbert's SuperPAC, is a recent attack ad, attacking the GOP candidates' attack ads. Confused yet? Well, "get ready for an orgy of pure distortion":


Update: Mr. Castillo followed up via email to bring us the following (delightful) statement from the hairsom former mayor:

"I agree with Stephen Colbert and the United States Supreme Court that corporations are living, breathing human beings - except for the living, breathing, and human part. I'm also hoping to get an Ambassadorship to Croatia out of it.

"In all seriousness, I applaud Stephen Colbert exposing the absurdity of our current political financing system. I’m proud to support Colbert’s message with a donation. And I like his haircut."

[FEC Filings] (PDF link)
[Colbert SuperPAC]
(Thanks, Will, for the tip.)

Source: FEC filings on ColbertSuperPAC.com [PDF link]