The Fat Cat Hedge Fund Behind Rand Paul

Bloomberg reports:

Senator Rand Paul has preached the political peril of being too close to financiers as he gears up for a likely 2016 presidential bid.

“We cannot be the party of fat cats, rich people, and Wall Street,” the Kentucky Republican told the audience at the Freedom Summit in New Hampshire in April. “Corporate welfare should once and for all be ended.”

At the same time, the founders and employees of Mason Capital Management, a $13.6 billion New York hedge fund, have become leading contributors to Paul’s political aims. The hedge fund has offices in London and San Francisco and offers clients offshore investments through a limited partnership in the Cayman Islands, among other strategies.

Company co-founder Kenneth Garschina has also given $250,000 -- the single-biggest contribution -- to America’s Liberty PAC, a so-called super political action committee run by longtime supporters of Paul. He has contributed $15,100 directly to Paul’s campaign or to funds the senator controls. Michael Martino, Garschina’s co-founder, has given $12,600 to Paul’s campaign and funds.

In all, 17 of the company’s 33 employees have given at least $75,000 to Paul and funds he controls since he started his first U.S. Senate campaign in 2010, according to Federal Election Commission data compiled by Bloomberg. Mason Capital staff members have been Paul’s second-largest source of campaign funds, according to Opensecrets.org, a website operated by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics...In 2009, Garschina made one stray donation to a Democrat: $2,400 to former Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd, who was weighing new trading and banking rules for Wall Street... 

“I’m not a very public person and would rather not have something written about myself,” Garschina said. His wife, designer Sara Story, and their vacation home outside of San Antonio, Texas, were both featured in an April article of Architectural Digest.