The largest donor of the 2024 election cycle is also, arguably, the most mysterious.
Since the beginning of 2023, no one has given more to political causes than Timothy Mellon. Through the first five months of 2024, Mr. Mellon gave more than $115 million to various Republican candidates for federal office and conservative causes.
Brendan Glavin, deputy research director at money-in-politics watchdog OpenSecrets, told The Epoch Times what makes Mr. Mellon’s millions so odd is the apparent lack of desire for attention attached to the gifts.
“When you are making these contributions ... it gives you access, it makes you a player,” Mr. Glavin said of the typical so-called megadonor. “It creates a situation where you know people are going to cater to you because they want your money.”
Despite this, Mr. Mellon can only be found in donor records.
The recipients of his money and his associates often decline to speak about the 81-year-old investor, who apparently lives close to Saratoga, Wyoming. He’s hard to reach. Even biographers writing about his influential family can’t get a word from him.
Old Money
Timothy Mellon is an heir to the Mellon family fortune. Forbes estimates the entire group of descendants of Irish immigrant Thomas Mellon is worth more than $14.1 billion.The family’s wealth dates back to the 19th century and its name is attached to companies such as The Bank of New York Mellon Corp. and institutions such as Carnegie Mellon University. Timothy Mellon’s grandfather, Andrew Mellon, and his father, Paul Mellon, were instrumental in the foundation of the National Gallery of Art in Washington.
As the U.S. treasury secretary, Andrew Mellon served from 1921 to 1932 under Republican Presidents Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover.
Timothy Mellon founded a privately held transportation company—Guilford Transportation Industries—in 1981, which acquired several New England-area railways. In 1998, Guilford paid $24.5 million for the name and assets of the airline Pan American World Systems and renamed itself Pan Am Systems. In 2020, that company was purchased by CSX Corp. for an undisclosed amount.
Mr. Mellon also sat on the board of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation from 1981 to 2002. Maggie Slowey, a spokeswoman for the foundation, told The Epoch Times, “Neither Tim Mellon nor any other family member has any current connection to the Foundation nor have they, in recent years, played a significant role in the Foundation’s giving strategy or day-to-day operations.”
Mr. Glavin said Mr. Mellon is the only eight-figure political donor of this cycle to come from so-called old money. Most others, he said, have made their fortunes as investors or entrepreneurs relatively recently.
Liberal commentator and former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich has called Mr. Mellon “the poster child” for the perils of generational wealth in America.
“Timothy Mellon ... is the product of a tax system pioneered by his grandfather that allows the perpetuation of dynastic wealth and the maintenance of its political power,” Mr. Reich wrote on his blog in February.
Silent Partner
In 2024, Mr. Mellon is drawing attention for simultaneously bankrolling the presidential campaigns of former President Donald Trump and independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.Representatives of MAGA Inc. declined to comment, citing the group’s policy not to comment on donors.
Mr. Glavin said the $50 million contribution was one of the largest in American history. Donor records indicate it is the biggest single gift of Mr. Mellon’s federal giving career.
Mr. Mellon’s May donation brought his overall support for MAGA Inc. since the beginning of 2022 to $76.5 million, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) records. He is currently the PAC’s biggest individual sponsor.
Additionally, since the beginning of 2023, Mr. Mellon has donated $25 million to American Values 2024. The hybrid PAC is helping Mr. Kennedy. Mr. Mellon is also the biggest individual backer of the PAC.
Democrats see this connection as clear evidence that Mr. Mellon is backing Mr. Kennedy exclusively to foil President Joe Biden’s reelection effort. In a March release, Alex Floyd, the Democratic National Committee’s Rapid Response Director, called RFK Jr. a “stalking horse to help Trump return to the White House.”
Mr. Glavin agreed with the Democratic analysis, saying he believes the funding is a “tactical move” to help former President Trump’s chances in November.
In a May 26 interview with host Brian Tyler Cohen, Mr. Kennedy said he'd met Mr. Mellon twice.
Deep Mellon–Kennedy Connections
The Mellon family’s links to the Kennedys stretch back to the 1960s.According to author Meryl Gordon’s 2017 book, “Bunny Mellon: The Life of an American Style Legend,” Timothy Mellon’s mother, Rachel “Bunny” Mellon, was a friend of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s uncle President John F. Kennedy. Bunny Mellon redesigned the White House Rose Garden during his presidency.
Ms. Gordon told The Epoch Times that Mr. Mellon declined to be among the hundreds interviewed for the book.
Much of what is known about Mr. Mellon comes from a self-published 2016 autobiography, “panam.captain,” that is no longer publicly available. Skyhorse Publishing is due to publish a new version of “panam.captain” in July.
At some point after June 2020, when The Washington Post published an article claiming Mr. Mellon used “racial stereotypes to describe African Americans,” the book was scrubbed from the internet. The Epoch Times cannot independently verify the newspaper’s claims about the book’s content.
According to screenshots of the book’s website captured when it was still live, “panam.captain” could be purchased with a donation to groups apparently picked by Mr. Mellon. None of the groups Mr. Mellon solicited donations for—Hillsdale College, the Pan Am Historical Foundation, and Landmark Legal Foundation—responded to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.
Since its foundation in 2006, the New York-based imprint has published numerous books by and about Mr. Kennedy and others associated with the non-profit organization Children’s Health Defense. Skyhorse’s “panam.captain” will feature a quote from Mr. Kennedy on its front cover.
Skyhorse President Tony Lyons co-founded American Values. In FEC filings, Mr. Lyons is listed as the group’s treasurer.
Furthermore, three of the six reviewers of “panam.captain,” listed on the Skyhorse website, are connected to either Children’s Health Defense or American Values. Mr. Kennedy, the group’s founder; Mary Holland, the group’s CEO; and Gavin de Becker, founder of private security firm Gavin de Becker & Associates, all provided quotes in praise of Mr. Mellon and the book.
According to federal records, Mr. de Becker is the second-largest sponsor of American Values behind Mr. Mellon. His firm is also providing security for Mr. Kennedy during his presidential run. As of the end of May, Mr. de Becker had sent $14 million to American Values since the beginning of 2023.
“These pages reveal Tim Mellon’s open-mindedness in action—and show that it’s possible to resist tribalism,” Mr. de Becker’s review said.
The Power of Money
According to donation data collected by OpenSecrets and shared with The Epoch Times, Mr. Mellon has donated about $239 million to federal and state political causes since he began giving in 1990.Most of the money went to Republican candidates or conservative causes; $22,800 has gone to Democrats or liberal causes; and about $25 million has gone to Mr. Kennedy’s American Values 2024.
Records show Mr. Mellon did not begin to make significant contributions until 2018.
After his presidential donations, Mr. Mellon’s most significant contributions have gone to the Congressional Leadership Fund and the Senate Leadership Fund. Since 2018, Mr. Mellon sent a combined $75 million to the funds.
Both are conservative PACs helping Republicans win seats in the House and Senate.
Representatives of the Congressional Leadership Fund and Senate Leadership Fund did not respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times.
In August 2021, Mr. Mellon reportedly donated about $53.1 million in stock to the state of Texas to aid in Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s effort to build a wall along the U.S. southern border. The state is building the border wall as part of Mr. Abbott’s Operation Lone Star.
The report about Mr. Mellon’s border wall donation was initially published by the Texas Tribune Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headed by Sonal Shah. Ms. Shah is a former member of the Obama administration and former leader of Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 presidential campaign. Mr. Buttigieg is now the Secretary of Transportation.
Mr. Abbott’s office declined to comment on Mr. Mellon’s reported donation. Instead, it directed The Epoch Times to file a public records request. On July 16, the open records division of Mr. Abbott’s office sent documents to The Epoch Times that confirmed Mr. Mellon had donated stock worth about $52.7 million in August 2021.
In 2022, Mr. Mellon sent about $29 million to eight different PACs backing Republican Senate candidates. Most of his chosen candidates were not successful and the Democratic Party retained control of the chamber in the mid-term election.
The increase in Mr. Mellon’s giving matches up with what Mr. Glavin of OpenSecrets described as an “explosion” in the amount of money a handful of extremely wealthy people are injecting into American politics.
The same report found that donations from the top 1 percent of the wealthiest Americans accounted for 96 percent of super PAC funding in 2018.
Mr. Glavin said most Americans don’t know who the big donors are that channel money into competitive races.
Donors get access to politicians, Mr. Glavin said. Those who give the most get the most. However, only the people with the money and the people with the power know precisely how much influence donors may have on politicians.
“They don’t always have to necessarily ask for something because they’ve already chosen the candidate that they know agrees with them,” Mr. Glavin said.
