Political causes[edit]
In the 1990s, the Amway organization was a major contributor to the Republican Party (GOP) and to the election campaigns of various GOP candidates. Amway and its sales force contributed a substantial amount (up to half) of the total funds ($669,525) for the 1994 political campaign of Republican congresswoman and Amway distributor Sue Myrick (N.C.).[48] According to two reports by Mother Jones magazine, Amway distributor Dexter Yager “used the company’s extensive voice-mail system to rally hundreds of Amway distributors into giving a total of $295,871” to Myrick’s campaign.[48][49] According to a campaign staffer quoted by the magazine, Myrick had appeared regularly on the Amway circuit, speaking at hundreds of rallies and selling $5 and $10 audiotapes.[48] Following the 1994 election, Myrick maintained “close ties to Amway and Yager”, and raised $100,000 from Amway sources, “most notably through fundraisers at the homes of big distributors”, in the 1997–98 election cycle.[49]
In October 1994, Amway gave the biggest corporate contribution recorded to that date to a political party for a single election – $2.5 million to the Republican National Committee – and was the number one corporate political donor in the U.S.[48] In the 2004 election cycle, the organization contributed a total of $4 million to a conservative 527 group, Progress for America.[50]
In July 1996, Amway co-founder Richard DeVos was honored at a $3 million fundraiser for the Republican Party, and a week later, it was reported that Amway had tried to donate $1.3 million to pay for Republican "infomercials" and televising of the GOP convention on Pat Robertson's Family Channel, but backed off when Democrats criticized the donation as a ploy to avoid campaign-finance restrictions.[48][51]
In April 1997 Richard DeVos and his wife, Helen, gave $1 million to the Republican National Committee,[49][51] which at the time was the second-largest soft-money donation ever, behind Amway's 1994 gift of $2.5 million to the RNC.[49] In July 1997, Senate Majority leader Trent Lott and House Speaker Newt Gingrich slipped a last-minute provision into a hotly contested compromise tax bill that granted Amway a tax break on its Asian branches, saving it $19 million.[49]
In a column published in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram newspaper in August 1997,[52] reporter Molly Ivins wrote that Amway had "its own caucus in Congress...Five Republican House members are also Amway distributors: Reps. Sue Myrick of North Carolina, Jon Christensen of Nebraska, Dick Chrysler of Michigan, Richard Rombo of California, and John Ensign of Nevada. Their informal caucus meets several times a year with Amway bigwigs to discuss policy matters affecting the company, including China's trade status."[53]
A 1998 analysis of campaign contributions conducted by Businessweek found that Amway, along with the founding families and some top distributors, had donated at least $7 million to GOP causes in the preceding decade.[51] Political candidates who received campaign funding from Amway in 1998 included Representatives Bill Redmond (R-N.M.), Heather Wilson (R-N.M.), and Jon Christensen (R-Neb).[49]
According to a report by the Center for Public Integrity, in the 2004 election cycle, members of the Van Andel and DeVos families were the second, third and fifth largest donors to the Republican party.[53]
Dick DeVos, son of Amway founder Richard DeVos and past president of the company, served as Finance Chairman of the Republican National Committee,[54] and his wife Betsy DeVos served as chair of the Michigan Republican Party from 1996 to 2000 and 2003 to 2005.[55]
