Jasmine Crockett's Blue Chip Strategy
What her FEC filings tell us about fundraising today
Let me start by apologizing to all the nice subscribers I’ve gained whose kindness I repaid by immediately ghosting them. November and December have become busier than I anticipated, which is one of those good problems I suppose. At some point I’d like to write about Zohran’s win in the mayoral, the attacks he faced, and what it teaches us about opposition research, but that will have to wait. Today I’d like to share some quick thoughts on the entry of Rep. Jasmine Crockett into the Texas Senate race.
I don’t have fully formed thoughts on Rep. Crockett and what her candidacy means for Democrats’ chances in the Senate. You can find endless takes on that subject and I wouldn’t have anything original to add. What I did find intriguing, however, is what Crockett reveals about the modern political fundraising environment and its players.
A Blue Chip Client for Blue Chip Strategies
Crockett is famous for her media virality and preternatural ability to cast herself as a leading antagonist to President Trump. She’s genuinely a new media powerhouse. I mean, just look at whatever this is. And Crockett AI videos are a whole genre, just search for ‘jasmine crockett candace owens debate’ to get a baffling taste of ai narrated videos depicting arguments that never happened.
That all has translated into healthy fundraising: she went from raising $970,008 in the 2021-2022 cycle, which was her only contested federal election, to $3,114,949 in 2023-2024, to over $6.5 million so far in 2025. And that’s without reporting the fourth quarter and what is sure to be a formidable haul from her Senate announcement. Exponential fundraising growth is a serious achievement for any member of the House, and it’s surely one reason she feels confident she has a chance to win statewide.
As is the case for any candidate that interests me, I decided to poke around in her FEC reports. You can find a lot out about a candidate from how they choose to spend their money. She’s far from the first to spend donor money on nice hotels, so I’ll leave that coverage to the people who care more about that sort of thing. What caught my eye was her largest vendor: Blue Chip Strategies LLC. Over $850,000 this year, reportedly for “Advertising,” “Digital Consulting,” and “Fundraising Consulting.” In total, Crockett has paid Blue Chip $1.16 million in twenty-four separate payments dating back to February 2024.
That’s a lot of money for any vendor, though presumably much of it is covering the actual digital media buys themselves—ads on Facebook and Instagram, barraging people’s emails and text messages, the usual ingredients for online fundraising success. Sure enough, when you check Meta’s ad library, Crockett began posting fundraising ads in earnest as of May 2024, shortly after she first reported paying Blue Chip. According to Meta, Crockett’s various committees have spent $1.7 million on their platforms between December 2018 and December 2025, which lines up relatively well with the Blue Chip Strategies figure. The first ad of this era highlighted her spat with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. Keep that in mind for later.
None of this is particularly interesting until I decided to look up Blue Chip Strategies. Only I found they have no web presence. A digital fundraising firm with no active website or social media account. I did stumble across “www.bluechipstrat.com,” but it’s private. A trip to the wayback machine shows it hasn’t been active in years and what was on there was the usual pablum about message development, crisis communication, and “Emmy Award Winning Story Telling.” Also this line from the CEO of the Harris X Poll: ““I’ve never seen ads score so well. They test off the Richter scale.”"
Checking their address in the FEC filings, you find a mailbox at Atlanta area UPS store. Looking the Georgia Secretary of State, it appears they used a registered agent to avoid listing principals.
Now I’m intrigued.
Blue Chip Strategies’ Clients
Blue Chip is listed as a vendor for 13 federal campaign committees since 2019. The breakdown is as follows:
1. Marcus for Georgia
Candidate: Marcus Flowers (Georgia)
Total Amount: $5,094,288.39
Number of Payments: 69
Purpose: Digital Advertising, Media Production, Technology Fees, Text Messaging, Reimbursements
Timeline: 2021-02-24 to 2022-11-09
2. Jasmine for Us
Candidate: Jasmine Crockett (Texas)
Total Amount: $1,162,055.05
Number of Payments: 24
Purpose: Advertising, Digital Consulting, Fundraising Consulting, Online Advertising
Timeline: 2024-02-28 to 2025-06-27
3. Booker for Kentucky
Candidate: Charles Booker (Kentucky)
Total Amount: $269,070.00
Number of Payments: 7
Purpose: Digital Consulting, Mileage Reimbursement
Timeline: 2022-09-22 to 2023-08-29
4. Matt Lieberman for Senate
Candidate: Matt Lieberman (Georgia)
Total Amount: $218,476.58
Number of Payments: 23
Purpose: Fundraising Consultant, Media Buy, Media Production, Reimbursements
Timeline: 2019-09-04 to 2020-09-08
5. Anna Kaplan for New York
Candidate: Anna Kaplan (New York)
Total Amount: $167,494.35
Number of Payments: 8
Purpose: Digital Advertising, Media Production
Timeline: 2023-06-23 to 2024-02-15
6. Roland Gutierrez for Texas
Candidate: Roland Gutierrez (Texas)
Total Amount: $89,371.48
Number of Payments: 5
Purpose: Fundraising Consulting
Timeline: 2023-10-06 to 2024-02-09
7. Youth Save Democracy PAC
Purpose: A PAC dedicated to mobilizing young voters to elect Democrats to the House.
Total Amount: $59,903.05
Number of Payments: 6
Purpose: Digital Advertising
Timeline: 2023-08-08 to 2023-12-18
8. Sarah Riggs Amico for Georgia, Inc.
Candidate: Sarah Riggs Amico (Georgia)
Total Amount: $54,000.00
Number of Payments: 5
Purpose: Fundraising Consulting Services
Timeline: 2020-02-04 to 2020-06-02
9. Georgia Federal Elections Committee
Purpose: The federal account for the Democratic Party of Georgia.
Total Amount: $50,000.00
Number of Payments: 1
Purpose: Fundraising List Purchase
Timeline: 2022-11-17
10. Dana Barrett for Congress, Inc.
Candidate: Dana Barrett (Georgia)
Total Amount: $48,850.00
Number of Payments: 13
Purpose: Fundraising Consultant(s), Video Production
Timeline: 2019-10-30 to 2020-08-31
11. Sites for Congress
Candidate: Jeffrey Sites (Ohio)
Total Amount: $40,892.00
Number of Payments: 3
Purpose: Digital Advertising
Timeline: 2023-11-08 to 2023-12-01
12. Kaine for Virginia
Candidate: Tim Kaine (Virginia)
Total Amount: $33,195.30
Number of Payments: 2
Purpose: List Acquisition
Timeline: 2023-07-18 to 2023-08-18
13. Web3 Forward
Purpose: A PAC supporting candidates aligned with the development of Web3 and blockchain technologies.
Total Amount: $15,447.68
Number of Payments: 2
Purpose: Editing, Media Production - Not For Independent Expenditure
Timeline: 2022-06-14 to 2022-08-24
Overall Total: $7,303,043.88
The Marcus Flowers Connection
That Marcus Flowers number is bonkers. Flowers reported raising $16.9 million total for his now-forgotten, doomed campaign against Marjorie Taylor Greene. That’s the 6th most of any House candidate in the 2021-2022 cycle, behind only then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, Katie Porter, Minority Leader Pelosi, Adam Schiff, and Majority Leader Steve Scalise. And nearly a third of it went to Blue Chip. Suddenly it seems like less of a surprise that hiring Blue Chip was timed with Crockett seeing the profit in beefing with MTG.
The above numbers shouldn’t be considered comprehensive: presumably there are state clients, 501(c)(4) clients, and others who wouldn’t report to the FEC.
But who is Blue Chip Strategies exactly? Luckily I’m not the first person to look into this. In a well-reported piece on how Greene and Flowers were both raking in donations online, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution noted “Bobby Kaple, a former TV news anchor and unsuccessful congressional candidate, and Michael Carcaise, a Colorado-based political consultant, started Blue Chip Strategies in 2019.”
Kaple was a former journalist at CBS46 in Atlanta who jumped into the primary against Republican Rep. Karen Handel in 2017. He came in third with 26.2% behind Lucy McBath (36.3%) and Kevin Abel (30.5%), who both advanced to a runoff. McBath would go on to win the primary and eventually the general.
Although ending in defeat, that primary appears to have served as something of an origin story for Blue Chip Strategies. A quick perusal of Kaple’s FEC filings shows that the campaign paid Michael Carcaise $34,956.23 between November 2017 and June 2018 for payroll, “Consultant - General,” and “Consultant - Campaign.”
While Carcaise keeps somewhat of a lower profile, Kaple has kept to his TV roots to become a talking head on local Atlanta TV. You can see his picture above.
Crypto Consultants
The FEC allows us to make a reasonable guess about how Kaple and Carcaise first came across Crockett. You’ll notice that Web3 Forward was listed as one of the clients for Blue Chip Strategies. Web3 was one of a collection of crypto PACs that popped up in 2022, spending $1.32 million in support of Jasmine Crockett in her campaign to replace Eddie Bernice Johnson in TX-30.
Here’s their statement shared with the Texas Tribune:
“Web3 Forward is supporting Crockett because of her commitment to give Texans the opportunity to build and use next-generation Web3 technologies that put power back in the hands of users, democratize financial access, and empower individuals to retake ownership of the internet and their own data.”
Notably, Carcaise was listed as the treasurer for Web3 Forward.
Web3 was funded by some of the biggest names of the era in crypto, per CNBC:
“Web3 Forward and Crypto Innovation are funded primarily by the GMI PAC, another super PAC that has seen massive donations from cryptocurrency leaders. The contributions include $2 million in January from FTX CEO Samuel Bankman-Fried. The group also got $1 million each in May from Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, two managing partners at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, records show. The firm’s portfolio includes cryptocurrency companies. Former Trump White House communications director and SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci donated $100,000 to Crypto Innovation in March, according to an FEC filing. GMI PAC’s founding board of directors includes CMS Holdings co-founder Dan Matuszewski, Framework Ventures co-founder Vance Spencer, and FTX Digital Markets CEO Ryan Salame, according to crypto news outlet The Block.”
In October 2022, Kaple pops up as a “Senior Advisor to GMI PAC” in two stories pushing polling about the impact of so-called crypto voters. GMI, a reference to the crypto aphorism “Gonna Make It,” also had a 501(c)(4) arm called GMI Policy Institute. And wouldn’t you know it, Bobby Kaple and Michael Carcaise are two of the three directors for GMI Policy Institute. The “Director and President” was Colorado resident Chase Goodwin, who during this same period shows up in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution story as Marcus Flowers’ campaign manager. Goodwin claims to have worked for John Barrow in the past, but I’ve already gone down enough of a rabbit hole.
GMI PAC has since dissolved, only to be replaced by a collection of super PACs called Fairshake, Protect Progress, and Defend American Jobs. According to Politico: “The crypto super PACs are being spearheaded by Michael Carcaise, according to a person with knowledge of the groups’ operations. Carcaise previously served as treasurer and as a strategist for the now-defunct GMI PAC.”
Combined, these three groups spent roughly $290 million in the 2023-2024 cycle supporting and opposing dozens of candidates. Bernie Moreno alone earned $40 million in support from Defend American Jobs in his campaign against Sherrod Brown. Fairshake spent $10 million opposing Katie Porter and $2 million against Jamaal Bowman, while Protect Progress dropped $10 million each in support of Elissa Slotkin and Ruben Gallego.
Clearly Carcaise has leveled up from milking long-shot House races.
Segment Insight
This brings us back to Crockett. While doing this little dive, I noticed another mystery vendor in her filings: Segment Insight LLC. Hidden behind a registered agent in Delaware, the company was formed in April 2023. Again, no web presence of note. I can’t claim anything for certain about Segment Insight, but its list of clients looks awfully familiar:
1. Jasmine for Us
Candidate: Jasmine Crockett (Texas)
Total Amount: $159,387.00
Number of Payments: 14
Purpose: Advertising, Digital Consulting, Email Services, List Acquisition
Timeline: 2024-02-28 to 2025-06-12
2. Anna Kaplan for New York
Candidate: Anna Kaplan (New York)
Total Amount: $117,101.00
Number of Payments: 4
Purpose: List Acquisition
Timeline: 2023-08-17 to 2024-01-08
3. Roland Gutierrez for Texas
Candidate: Roland Gutierrez (Texas)
Total Amount: $44,223.00
Number of Payments: 2
Purpose: List Acquisition
Timeline: 2023-10-06 to 2024-01-08
4. Youth Save Democracy PAC
Purpose: A PAC dedicated to mobilizing young voters to elect Democrats to the House.
Total Amount: $40,266.30
Number of Payments: 4
Purpose: List Acquisition
Timeline: 2023-09-08 to 2023-12-18
5. Robert Garcia for Congress
Candidate: Robert Garcia (California)
Total Amount: $10,000.00
Number of Payments: 1
Purpose: Digital Advertising
Timeline: 2025-06-10
6. Committee to Elect Shomari Figures for Congress
Candidate: Shomari Figures (Alabama)
Total Amount: $5,000.00
Number of Payments: 1
Purpose: List Acquisitions
Timeline: 2025-07-30
7. Sites for Congress
Candidate: Jeffrey Sites (Ohio)
Total Amount: $1,200.00
Number of Payments: 1
Purpose: List Acquisition
Timeline: 2023-12-01
Overall Total: $377,177.30
Six of the seven reported clients also reported paying Blue Chip Strategies. A side business for Kaple and Carcaise perhaps? Hard to say, but too interesting not to include.
Tail Wagging the Dog
So where does this leave us?
The through-line here isn’t really about Crockett, although the crypto connections are certainly eyebrow raising. It’s about what digital fundraising has become. Blue Chip Strategies perfected an all too common formula: find a Democrat willing to position themselves as a villain’s antagonist, run the content machine, and collect a percentage of whatever comes in. Whether the candidate wins is almost beside the point.
Marcus Flowers raised $16.9 million and lost by 30 points. Nearly a third of that—$5 million—flowed through Blue Chip. Most of that was likely pass-through spending on the actual ads, texts, and emails that fuel the fundraising machine. But consultants take their cut on volume, and volume is what the MTG-antagonist strategy delivers. A campaign that raises $17 million and loses is more lucrative for everyone involved than one that raises $4 million and wins.
Crockett’s exponential fundraising growth—from $970K to $3.1 million to $6.5 million and counting—is legitmately impressive. But it may tell us more about her consultants’ sophistication and Crockett’s media savviness than her electoral viability statewide. Given she’s declared, I certainly wish her the best. I’d much prefer Senator Crockett to Senators Cornyn, Hunt, or Paxton.
Republicans say they’re gleeful about Crockett entering the race. Regardless of her chances, they’re probably correct in that she’ll be useful for their own fundraising as well. That’s the attention economy when it comes to politics: it rewards the fight, not the outcome. Everyone eats along the way.
A Clapback Epilogue
This is something so strange I wasn’t sure where to put it, so I’m dropping it at the end. That very first Facebook ad of the Blue Chip era I mentioned to link to a shopify store called the TheClapbackCollection. Here you can make an actblue donation in return for items like a “Bleach Blonde Bad Built Butch Body” shirt, a “Chile” hoodie or Jasmine Crockett is “My Type” paraphernalia. You can see Crockett herself modeling The leading image for this piece is a screengrab from a video modeling the shirt.
But at the very bottom of the page, above the pay-for box for “Jasmine for Us,” there’s a button reading “Political Consultant-Book Now.”
And when you click it, you’re taken to a page apparently offering “Government Relations and lobbying” alongside other political services.
A WhoIs search shows the webpage was registered in May 2024, after she had been elected, by Crockett staffer Ayala Carmen. The email appears to be one she and her staff used while she was in the Texas State House representing the 100th district.
I honestly have no idea what this is. If anyone can explain why a sitting Congresswoman’s campaign merchandise store has a buried button offering government relations and lobbying services, I’m all ears. A legacy page from her state house days? Staffer mistake? Probably nothing? Bizarre.
Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving!
Crockett is crashing out https://torrancestephensphd.substack.com/p/the-crash-out-of-jasmine-rachett