I suppose that it should come as no surprise that when Jim Ellis found himself under indictment for his role in the DeLay fundraising schemes, that he would turn to the special interests for help.
Ellis is best known for running DeLay's political fundraising schemes. However, Ellis also has extensive ties [1] to Majority Whip Roy Blunt's fundraising operation that date to the beginning of Blunt's career in House leadership. In fact, Ellis was running both PACs in the spring of 2000, when DeLay's ARMPAC made $150,000 in contributions [2] to Blunt's ROYB fund.
According to the Houston Chronicle [3]:
A Washington lobbyist is organizing a golf fundraiser for the secretive fund that is paying for the legal defense for two of U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's political associates who have been indicted on charges of illegally using corporate money to influence Texas elections in 2002.
They've even decided to use the old DeLay-Blunt standby, the golf tournament [4]. Blunt spends so much time on the links with the special interests, raising money for his campaign, and for others [5], that last year, he spent $1,764 from his campaign funds on golf gloves [6].
In fact, for DeLay, Blunt and Ellis, golf and fundraising are so intertwined that on April 7, 2000, on the same day [7] that the ROYB PAC made a $10,000 contribution to the DeLay foundation, presumably at a golf tournament, Blunt was also writing a check for $10,100 check to the Tour 18 Golf Course for his own fundraising expenses. You don't suppose they were mixing charitable and political activity do you? Surely that's just a coincidence. Ellis was employed by both DeLay and Blunt at the time.
Using funds he raised from the special interests, Blunt has already contributed [8] to the Ellis defense fund. I would say there's probably a good reason why.