Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas speaks during a Senate Judiciary Committee business meeting to vote on Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson on Capitol Hill, April 4, 2022 in Washington, DC.
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- Sen. Tom Cotton has denounced Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
- He’s called for sanctioning Russia and supplying Ukraine with more weapons.
- A Cotton campaign donor has made millions off a bet on commodities affected by Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas — one of the Republican Party’s more hawkish members — received tens of thousands of dollars in campaign cash from a hedge fund investor who’s reportedly made millions of dollars from commodity speculations that have paid off since Russia invaded Ukraine, according to federal campaign finance records.
Federal Election Committee records show that Soroban Capital Partners LP founder Eric Mandelblatt and his wife, Danielle Mandelblatt, last year spread $43,000 in political contributions between political action committees that support Cotton.
A screenshot of Federal Election Commission records showing Tom Cotton-related campaign contributions made by Eric and Danielle Mandelblatt.
Insider/screenshot
The Mandelblatt funds were sent to Cotton Victory, Cotton for Senate, Inc., and the Republican Majority Fund — Cotton’s leadership political action committee — in September 2021.
Eric Mandelblatt last year also made modest contributions — $2,500 each — to the campaigns of Republican Sens. Tim Scott of South Carolina and Jerry Moran of Kansas, federal records indicate.
In March, the Wall Street Journal reported that Mandelblatt’s Soroban Capital Partners had made “at least several hundred million dollars” from “bullish bets on commodities … following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”
One of Soroban Capital Partners’ late 2021 investments was in Suncor Energy Inc., which this year chartered an oil tanker owned by Russian company Sovcomflot PJSC. The United States sanctioned Sovcomflot in February, according to Bloomberg.
In January, with tensions between Russia and Ukraine rising, Mandelblatt predicted a commodity boom.
“We are in the early innings of a generational investment opportunity,” Mandelblatt wrote in an annual letter to investors dated January 20, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Cotton’s personal office and campaign staff did not respond to Insider’s multiple requests for comment about accepting contributions from anyone making money off of the Russia-Ukraine conflict and whether he would consider giving the money back.
Ted Koch, the treasurer of Cotton Victory, Cotton for Senate, Inc., and the Republican Majority Fund, also did not respond to repeated requests for comment about the issue.
In 2015, Cotton’s campaign refunded $1,500 it received from the leader of a White supremacist group.
Cotton, who won re-election in 2020, is one of the Senate Republicans seen as a potential contender for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024, particularly if embattled former President Donald Trump decides not to run.
Cotton voted with the full Senate on Thursday to revoke permanent normal trade relations with Russia and ban the importation of Russian oil to cripple Russian President Vladimir Putin’s finances as punishment for invading Ukraine.
Contributing to the 100-0 votes, which have become extremely rare in the bitterly divided Senate, tracks with Cotton’s Biden bashing and war hawkishness since Ukraine was attacked in late February.
“Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked, naked war of aggression must face the most severe consequences,” Cotton said February 24, the day Russia invaded Ukraine.
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