After failing to prevent Donald Trump from winning the presidency for the second time in 2024, campaign finance records show that the Lincoln Project — a political committee founded by anti-Trump former Republicans — continued to route hundreds of thousands of dollars from its donors into firms owned by its leaders.
Now, as the Lincoln Project grapples with its reputation for self-dealing, Steve Schmidt, one of the organization’s co-founders, is pushing the so-called Save America Movement — a campaign seeking to raise $100 million to defeat key Republican members of Congress in the midterm elections.
SAM, notably, would not answer questions on whether it would contract with firms owned by Schmidt or other members of its leadership team when reached by the Washington Examiner.
The Lincoln Project’s history of self-dealing, however, is not in question.
Of the $4.9 million spent by the committee between Nov. 6, 2024, the day after the presidential election, and June 30, 2025, the most recent date for which data are available, roughly $1.5 million went to firms where Lincoln Project leaders have ownership stakes, according to a Washington Examiner review of campaign finance filings.
Taking in the most money among these firms, at roughly $460,000, was Third Act Media, a company in which North Carolina business records list Benjamin Howe as being one of two people with ownership stakes. Howe was identified as the Lincoln Project’s senior creative director in a September 2024 podcast produced by the organization.
Notably, the Lincoln Project fired Howe in 2020 after old social media posts resurfaced of him using the words “vagina” and “twat” as insults, sparking outrage from women’s rights activists.
While Howe’s dismissal garnered widespread legacy media coverage in 2020, his apparent rehiring as of 2024 has not attracted as much attention. Howe and the Lincoln Project have both downplayed this arrangement, with the former not listing the organization on his LinkedIn profile and the latter not listing Howe as a staff member on its website. A 2024 podcast revealed that Howe and Lincoln Project co-founder Rick Wilson are longtime friends.
Wilson himself is still profiting off of the contributions of the Lincoln Project’s donors.
Intrepid Media, which Florida state business records identify Wilson as its CEO, received more than $230,000 in payments from the Lincoln Project after the 2024 election, according to campaign finance records. Wilson’s son, Andrew, also received a generous salary thanks to the Lincoln Project’s donors, taking in over $47,000 for just seven months of work.
As far as Schmidt is concerned, a 2021 Associated Press investigation found that his compensation was not publicly disclosed, noting that he was likely paid with donor dollars through a third-party consulting firm. Schmidt left the Lincoln Project later that year amid fallout from the group’s handling of sexual assault allegations against fellow co-founder John Weaver.
PRO-HARRIS DARK MONEY GROUP SHOVELED MORE THAN HALF A MILLION DOLLARS TO FIRMS OWNED BY ITS FOUNDERS
Other Lincoln Project companies owned by the Lincoln Project’s leadership team that saw cash directed to them by the political committee following the 2024 election included Joe Trippi’s Lever Communications, Stuart Stevens’s Message Mountain Productions, Jeff Timmer’s Two Rivers Public Affairs, and Trygve Olson’s Viking Strategies.
Timmer is the Lincoln Project’s chief operating officer, while the other three men are senior advisers to the organization. All four of their firms raked in well over $100,000 from the organization.
The Lincoln Project did not respond to a request for comment.
