FEC fines Jeb Bush super PAC for accepting foreign contributions

The Jeb Bush super PAC Right to Rise has been fined a record $390,000 by the Federal Election Commission for illegally soliciting a contribution from a foreign national.

The Chinese-owned corporation that made the donation, American Pacific International Capital, was fined $550,000. The settlement agreement, posted online by the nonprofit Campaign Legal Center, states that American Pacific International Capital made a $1.3 million contribution to Right to Rise.

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Per the settlement, Bush's brother, American Pacific International Capital board member Neil Bush, solicited the contributions, knowing that "fellow board members Gordon Tang and Huaidan Chen were foreign nationals." Because of a legal memo drafted by Right to Rise's counsel, they thought the contributions were acceptable, the settlement states, and "the commission did not find that the violations were knowing and willful."

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.