Jenna Jacobson, a Democrat candidate for the 17th Senate District in southwestern Wisconsin, has raised a significant number of donations from states outside Wisconsin in the Democrats’ attempt to wrestle political control from Republicans in Madison. A Heartland Post analysis of campaign finance reports found that almost 400 of her 2026 donations — more than one in three — came from addresses outside the state. The out-of-state total raised was approximately $82,000.
Friends of Jenna S. Jacobson reported just over 1,000 contributions totaling $472,027.01 in its 2026 July continuing report and fall pre-primary report.
This concerted effort by the Jacobson campaign to raise campaign contributions from outside of Wisconsin comes on top of the Democrat Party’s continuing scheme to raise enormous amounts of money from ultra-wealthy elites from California and New York like Reid Hoffman and George Soros. Heading into the crucial elections this November, Soros of New York has given at least $2.75 million this cycle to the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. J.B. Pritzker, Democrat Governor of Illinois, has given $1.5 million to the effort, and Reid Hoffman, founder of the networking app LinkedIn and a visitor to Epstein Island, has given $1.45 million. According to public campaign finance records, Soros, Hoffman, and Pritzker have given at least $30 million to the effort to hijack political control of Wisconsin in the last ten years.
Jenna Jacobson’s campaign finance reports show California dominating the list of out-of-state donations. Records show 186 contributions from the liberal bastion California alone. Linus Upson of Woodside, California, gave $4,000 in two contributions. Ari Weinstein of OpenAI, Thomas Rothman of the Sony entertainment conglomerate, and Barry Boothe of San Francisco each gave $2,000 to Jacobson.
The 17th Senate District is in southwest Wisconsin and includes Crawford, Grant, Green, Iowa, and Lafayette counties, plus part of Dane County. Jacobson is from the Dane County part of the district and was first elected to the State Assembly in 2022. Her opponent, Sen. Howard Marklein, is from Spring Green. Senator Pat Testin (R – Stevens Point) has called the Marklein seat one of the ‘Core Four’ races that will determine control of the Wisconsin State Senate heading into the next redistricting cycle. The stakes could not be higher.
Jacobson has also seemingly raised a significant number of donations through the ActBlue campaign donation system, which is currently under congressional investigation. Jacobson’s report is littered with small donations of odd dollar amounts. There is a $26.26 contribution from Cynthia Yin of San Mateo, California, or a $4.55 donation from Neeharika Bhatnagar of Painted Post, New York. According to campaign finance reports, Finn Sullivan of Minneapolis gave $1.50, $2.50, and $1.00 in three separate donations, all on April 16th of this year.
Wisconsin Congressman Bryan Steil, Chair of the House Administration Committee, oversaw a joint hearing this summer in which numerous ActBlue employees and Board members invoked the Fifth Amendment to avoid incriminating themselves when asked about potential illegal foreign contributions and influence within the ActBlue system.
Why the Investigation Matters
https://heartlandpost.com/steil-vows-further-pressure-on-actblue-after-president-repeatedly-pleads-the-fifth/
The stakes are significant because ActBlue has become one of the most important fundraising platforms in modern Democratic politics.
Federal law prohibits foreign nationals from contributing to U.S. federal candidates and political committees. It also prohibits straw-donor arrangements designed to conceal the true source of a contribution or evade campaign-finance limits.
Critics argue that weaknesses in online verification could create opportunities for those laws to be circumvented.
In addition to this fundamental threat of foreign influence in our elections, critics also point out that ActBlue and other national campaign donation systems allow a Wisconsin political race to be decided by individuals who do not live in Wisconsin. Many Wisconsinites are asking why so many Californians and New Yorkers, who will never have to live with the ramifications of their out-of-touch liberal policies and how those policies will fundamentally change the Wisconsin way of life we all cherish, care about a local state senate race?
These are not neighbor-to-neighbor donations. This is a national political strategy aimed at wrestling control away from the hardworking Wisconsin taxpayer.
While Jacobson is entitled to raise money wherever she wants, voters of the 17th should take note of who is writing the checks to support her campaign. When nearly 400 contributions flood in from outside Wisconsin, the campaign is no longer just a debate among neighbors or Wisconsinites; it is part of a cynical effort by outsiders to force their views on all of us who call Wisconsin home.
