共和党总统候选人和生物技术企业家维韦克·拉马斯瓦米周一推出了一个名为“Vivek Kitchen Cabinet”的委托筹款项目，一位竞选财务专家表示，这似乎是此类项目中的第一个。
在一个自录音再现装置发出的高音拉马斯瓦米写道:“从今天开始，*任何人*都可以为Vivek 2024活动筹集资金&赚取10%的佣金。"
他在宣布该倡议的视频中表示，这是出于“使赚钱能力民主化”的愿望，将传统的竞选筹款系统描述为管理阶层的“寡头垄断”。
“如果有人...会为我或其他候选人筹集到10%的资金，那还不如是你，”他说。“让我们分散管理。”
这种语言呼应了拉马斯瓦米的向共和党选民进行更广泛的游说，包括承诺通过颠覆官僚制度来提振经济(他将这一点与特朗普式的对“觉醒”价值观而非“美国国家认同”的攻击结合在一起)。
Ramaswamy的竞选首席执行官Ben Yoho在接受美国广播公司新闻采访时表示，他们希望在周一收到第一千份申请，此前在启动的头几个小时内收到了大约300份申请。
Yoho说，在背景调查后被接受的申请人将被视为该活动的自由职业者，并根据筹集的资金总额支付佣金。
该公告在社交媒体上引起了一些负面反应，用户将“厨柜”比作多级营销计划，参与者通过招募他人获得佣金。
Yoho为这一倡议辩护说，这是一个标准的做法，“这是一个平底委员会，就像我们支付我们的政治筹款人在这里的工作人员。...这只是扩大了我们基层支持者的机会。”
竞选财务律师、前民主党全国委员会首席法律顾问乔·伯肯斯托克(Joe Birkenstock)表示，虽然基于佣金的筹款概念并不全新，但他还没有见过任何人在让支持者参与之前执行这一概念。
“这并不罕见，你看‘局外人’候选人往往是那些追求这种新颖策略的人，”他说。“我想他们会发现果汁真的不值得榨。但是我不能举出其他已经出错的例子。我只是觉得他们在探索一个未知的领域。我认为他们需要为许多惊喜做好准备。”
“这与其说是出于具体的法律原因，不如说是出于某种整体的合规策略，而且，你知道，在某种程度上，只是出于光学原因，”他说。
据《福布斯》(Forbes)估计，拉马斯瓦米的净资产至少为6.3亿美元。他说，他已经为自己的竞选捐款1，500万美元，并且已经超过了4万名捐款人的门槛，以便在8月份进行第一场共和党初选辩论——如果他在全国选民调查中继续获得至少1%的支持的话。
五点三十八分投票平均数目前他的支持率约为4%。
有鉴于此，当被问及新计划背后的原因时，Yoho说，虽然Ramaswamy将继续投资于他的竞选活动，但未来辩论门槛和未来费用的不确定性是相当大的因素。
“我们必须建立基层团队，不仅包括志愿者活动，还包括能够推动这场运动的基层军队小额捐款人...我们需要快速增加资源来击败乔·拜登。
拉马斯瓦米并不是唯一一个希望采用不同寻常的策略来增加捐款的白宫候选人:北达科他州州长道格·伯格姆(Doug Burgum)为捐款至少1美元的支持者提供20美元的礼品卡。
Vivek Ramaswamy's unusual fundraising plan: Supporters get commissions for bringing in donations
Republican presidential candidate and biotech entrepreneurVivek Ramaswamyon Monday launched a commission-based fundraising program called "Vivek Kitchen Cabinet," which one campaign finance expert said appears to be the first of its kind.
In atweet, Ramaswamy wrote that "starting today, *anyone* can fundraise for the Vivek 2024 campaign& make a 10% commission."
He said in a video announcing the initiative that it came out of a desire to "democratize the ability to make money," casting the traditional system of campaign fundraising as an "oligopoly" of the managerial class.
"If somebody ... is going to make 10% of the money they would raise for me or other candidates, it might as well be you," he said. "Let's decentralize that."
That language echoes Ramaswamy'sbroader pitch to GOP voters, including a pledge to boost the economy by upending bureaucracy (which he blends with a Trump-style attack on "woke" values compared to "American national identity").
Ramaswamy's campaign CEO, Ben Yoho, said in an interview with ABC News that they hope to reach their first thousand applications for the program on Monday after receiving around 300 applications within the first several hours of the launch.
Applicants accepted after a background check will be considered freelance contractors for the campaign and paid their commission on total funds raised, Yoho said.
The announcement drew some negative reactions on social media, with users likening the "kitchen cabinet" to a multi-level marketing scheme, in which participants receive a commission for recruiting others.
Yoho defended the initiative as standard practice, saying, "This is a flat-base commission, just like we pay our political fundraiser who's on staff here. ... This just expands that opportunity to our grassroots supporters."
Campaign finance attorney and former Democratic National Committee Chief Counsel Joe Birkenstock said that while the concept of commission-based fundraising is not entirely new, he has not seen anyone execute it before involving their supporters.
"As is not uncommon, you see 'outsider' candidates tend to be the ones who pursue these kind of novel strategies," he said. "I think they're gonna find that the juice really isn't worth the squeeze. But it's not something I can point to other examples having already gone wrong. I just think they're kind of tackling a little bit of uncharted territory. And I think they need to be ready for a lot of surprises."
"That's less for specific legal reasons than for kind of overall compliance strategy, and, you know, to some extent, just for optics reasons," he said.
Ramaswamy, with an estimated net worth of at least $630 million, according to Forbes, has said he's contributed $15 million to his own campaign and has already surpassed the 40,000-donor threshold to make the first Republican primary debate stage in August -- if he also continues to get at least 1% support in national voter surveys.
FiveThirtyEight'spolling averagecurrently has him at about 4%.
Given this, when asked about the reasoning behind the new program, Yoho said that while Ramaswamy will continue to invest in his campaign, uncertainty about future debate thresholds and future expenses were considerable factors.
"We have to build the ground team, both in regards to volunteer activities, but also the grassroots army small-dollar donors that will be able to lift this campaign up ... and we need a quick surge of resources to defeat Joe Biden," he said.
Ramaswamy isn't the only White House hopeful employing unusual strategies to increase donations: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum is offering $20 gift cards for supporters who donate at least $1.
