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The text messages came Monday, a day before Kansas residents were to vote on an amendment that would strip protections against abortion from their state constitution.
The text argued that approving the measure, which could allow the Republican-controlled Legislature to ban abortion, would protect “choice.” If the amendment fails, constitutional protections would remain in place, supporting the current law that allows abortion in the first 22 weeks of pregnancy.
“Kansas women are losing their reproductive rights choices,” the text warns. “Voting YES on the amendment will give women a choice. Vote YES to protect women’s health.”
The unsigned the messages were described as fraudulent by multiple recipients, including former Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who also served as Secretary of Health and Human Services in the Obama administration. She told The Washington Post that she was “amazed by the announcement, which clearly shows that there is a very specific effort to use carefully crafted language to confuse people before they go to vote.”
The gambit was all the more troubling to abortion rights advocates and observers because its source was unknown.
But the messages were drafted by a political action committee led by Tim Huelskamp, a former hardline Republican congressman from Kansas, and backed by a fast-growing Republican-leaning technology firm, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity , as they were not authorized to discuss the ad blitz. The people and groups behind the campaign have not been reported so far.
The messages were sent from phone numbers that were leased by Alliance Forge, based in Sparks, Nevada. Founded in 2021, Alliance Forge describes itself as “the nation’s fastest-growing political technology company, proudly serving federal, state and local campaigns across the country. nation.”
The numbers are leased from Alliance Forge by Twilio, a San Francisco-based communications company. The numbers were disabled Monday night, according to Twilio spokesman, Chris Paden, who said the account that hired them was in violation of company policies prohibiting the “spread of misinformation.”
In a statement, Alliance Forge CEO David Espinosa said that “Alliance Forge was not consulted on the messaging strategy or the content of this message.” He said the company was notified Monday evening of “possible content infringement” and “immediately began working with the Twilio team to identify the source and nature of the content.”
The Alliance Forge client that sent the messages was the Do Right PAC, chaired by Huelskamp, who served in Congress between 2011 and 2017. The PAC has raised more than $532,000 and spent more than $203,000 in support of the amendment. according to a statement from last month. Huelskamp did not return calls and a text message seeking comment.
The Kansas Commission on Governmental Ethics said Monday that “under current law, text message advocacy on constitutional ballot initiatives does not require paid disclaimers.”
This election cycle, Alliance Forge has received more than $60,000 from federal campaigns alone, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. Among his clients are Adam Laxalt, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in Nevada, and a committee associated with Kathy Barnett, a political commentator and unsuccessful candidate for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania. Alliance Forge provides text messaging services for both, the documents show.
The texts sent Monday did not mention Alliance Forge or its client, leaving no clear way for the people who received the messages to tell who was looking to encourage them to vote Yes.
The effort offered fresh evidence of the power of text messaging in political campaigning, as well as the stealthy style of communication made possible by the platform. Two days after the 2020 election, a Republican firm run by a top campaign aide to then-President Donald Trump helped send an unsigned text messages that called for supporters in Philadelphia to gather outside a building where local election officials were counting votes. He blasts, “WARNING: Radical liberals and Democrats are trying to steal this election from Trump!”
Reports filed with the Kansas Ethics Commission show strong interest in the outcome of Tuesday’s referendum, the first major vote on abortion since Roe v. Wade was canceled in June. The opposing camps have spent $11.2 million this year, with the Catholic Church and its affiliates giving $3.4 million to support the amendment, which could give lawmakers the ability to impose new restrictions on abortion, and the American Civil Liberties Union liberties and Planned Parenthood have spent $382,000 and $1.3 million, respectively, to oppose it.
Espinosa, an information technology specialist, is among the co-founders of Alliance Forge. The others are Michael Clement, a Republican operative whose LinkedIn profile says he managed the 2020 campaign of Rep. Burgess Owens (R-Utah), and Greg Baylor, former state director of the Republican National Committee and executive director of the Nevada Republican Party.
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