The politics of a hedge fund king

When he visited Connecticut last week to pick up some Fairfield County cash, Mitt Romney attended a fundraiser at the 35,000-square foot Stamford home of a kindred soul, the “hedge fund king,” Steven Cohen, owner of SAC Capital Advisors.This would lead one to believe Cohen likes Romney a lot and he probably does, but in the last presidential election, many candidates were led to believe Cohen liked them, including Bill Richardson, Rudy Giuliani, Chris Dodd, Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Barack Obama. Cohen, whose estimated worth is around $8 billion, gave a little something, by his standards, to all of them and more generously to some, because he hedges his political bets the way he hedges his investments.Cohen’s hedge fund industry hopes future presidents and members of Congress will continue to reward it with tax rates in the 15 percent neighborhood and minimal government regulation of its endeavors, and it invests in candidates for high offices accordingly. The candidate’s views on such things as entitlements, immigration, deficits, contraception, et al. are not considerations. If Cohen’s name or that of his company is familiar, it may be because both have appeared on lists of top contributors to Connecticut’s former senator, now the film industry’s man in Washington, Chris Dodd.Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors appears fifth on the list of Dodd’s top contributors over his Senate years, with its $297,000 lagging behind only Citigroup, United Technologies, Royal Bank of Scotland and JP Morgan Chase in the ranks of Dodd admirers, according to the Center for Responsive Government. It is, of course, just a coincidence that Dodd was chairman or ranking member of the committee that regulated these fine companies for many of those years.Cohen didn’t forget Dodd when he ran and came in last for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination either, giving the senator $9,200, which was more than the $7,650 he gave Hillary Clinton, the $4,800 to Rudy Giuliani and $1,500 to Bill Richardson.But Cohen gave the most to the party nominees — $13,850 to John McCain and $40,926 to Barack Obama. The figures come from www.campaignmoney.com, which tracks political contributions.Cohen’s generosity didn’t end there — far from it. According to the website, he gave just under a quarter of a million dollars — $247,561, to be precise — from numerous committees, with names like SAC Capital Advisors, Cohen Law Group and many others, to McCain, Obama and lots of other candidates and campaign committees from both parties. You cannot accuse him of partisanship — but then again, you probably can’t accuse him of political conviction either. In 2008, we should note that most of the Cohen money went to Democratic presidential candidates, as 2008 was considered a Democratic year even before Wall Street destroyed the economy in the final months of the Bush presidency. It will be interesting to see what Cohen has been doing in this cycle in addition to throwing his home open to the Romney for President campaign.And speaking of Romney, even though he was more than willing to donate a few thousand dollars to very long shots like Giuliani and Richardson four years ago, then presidential candidate Romney does not appear on the list of Cohen’s recipients. Romney was among the omitted with Mike Huckabee, Fred Thompson and Dennis Kucinich. Cohen’s helped three Connecticut congressmen, John Larson at $2,500 and Chris Murphy and Joe Courtney at $250 each. Interestingly, Cohen did not find a candidate in his home 4th Congressional District worthy of a contribution and he ignored the Senate race between Linda McMahon and Dick Blumenthal.Cohen did spend a lot of money on both parties’ campaign committees, betting that even if the Democrats won the presidency, Republicans would continue to have an influence in Congress, especially in the Senate.Accordingly, we see $30,500 going to the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee and almost as much, $28,500, to the Democratic Senatorial committee. Cohen gave a token $2,300 to the Democratic majority leader in the Senate, Harry Reid, and a bit more — $13,600 — to Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader who would hopefully block any Democratic-inspired financial reform nonsense.This is just one example — a home-grown snapshot — of one billionaire’s influence on our political life before the Supreme Court made it even easier this time around. Simsbury resident Dick Ahles is a retired journalist. Email him at dahles@hotmail.com.