Though State Representative Jody Barrett (R-Dickson) warned of the potential for out-of-state money to influence Tennessee politics just last month, Federal Election Commission (FEC) data shows the House Freedom Action Fund super political action committee (PAC) spent over $450,000 to support his candidacy for the special election in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District.
House Freedom Action is a super PAC affiliated with the U.S. House Freedom Caucus, whose other affiliated PAC, the House Freedom Fund, has endorsed Barrett’s campaign.
To support Barrett’s candidacy, the super PAC enlisted the political consulting firm Neighborhood Research and Media to create advertisements, which both support Barrett in his campaign for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District, and oppose other candidates.
A campaign report submitted last Tuesday showed House Freedom Action paid Neighborhood Research and Media a total of $457,337.27 for advertisements, including the most recent spending, $34,270 to oppose the candidacy of Matt Van Epps, who President Donald Trump endorsed last week, and $69,579.69 to support Barrett.
Neighborhood Research and Media is a North Carolina firm operated by Rick Shaftan (pictured above, left), a longtime Republican political consultant who expressed his strong opposition to President Donald Trump, during both his 2016 and 2024 presidential campaigns, through posts to social media.
An early supporter of the 2024 presidential campaign launched by Governor Ron DeSantis, Shaftan wrote in a February 2023 post to X, “No one wants to give a second chance to a failed and defeated whiny washed-up 78-year loser.”
Shaftan would go on to repeatedly accuse Trump of being “washed-up,” after first appearing to use the term to describe Trump in a late 2022 response to the suggestion that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis would make a good vice president for Trump.
Why on earth would DeSantis want to lose with a proven washed up loser when he can win on his own?
Pathetic propaganda from the Trump "campaign" you choose to parrot because you wish it were true.
It's not. And no one but the few remaining hard-core cult members believe it.
— Rick Shaftan — Neighborhood Research and Media (@Shaftan) December 8, 2022
“Why on earth would DeSantis want to lose with a proven washed up loser when he can win on his own?” Shaftan questioned, before describing Trump’s voter base as “hard-core cult members” who believe “propaganda” pushed from the president’s campaign.
He later used the term in a May 2023 post that appeared to suggest Trump should retire from politics.
“Time for this 78-year old #WashedUpLoser to go to the Glue Factory,” wrote Shaftan, alluding to the early industrial practice of selling lame horses to be slaughtered for use in glue factories.
DeSantis beat Gillum in spite of Trump, not because of him.
The favor was repaid in 2020.
Time for this 78-year old #WashedUpLoser to go to the Glue Factory.#LosersForTrump
— Rick Shaftan — Neighborhood Research and Media (@Shaftan) May 10, 2023
Throughout much of 2023, Shaftan appeared confident that the criminal and civil fraud cases against Trump would be the president’s undoing.
“Folks, there is no way this is going to help Trump. Those of you who think otherwise are amateurs and rookies who have never been through this,” he wrote in March.
On July 19, just three days after the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) informed Trump he was the target of a grand jury probe, Shaftan wrote that it was bad news for Trump’s campaign.
“The Target Letter is not helping Trump, and his support is beginning to collapse,” Shaftan claimed. “The feds are much more effective at making their case than the buffoonish Alvin Bragg, whose case is going nowhere.”
He wrote later that month that Trump would spend his final days in a prison cell as the result of his criminal cases.
“Donald Trump thinks he will be the first person to avoid prison after being found guilty of witness tampering, obstruction of justice, destroying evidence, wire fraud and possibly RICO,” wrote Shaftan.
“Folks, it just doesn’t happen. He will die alone in prison,” the consultant told his followers. “You can criticize the messenger, but read the indictment. It’s as solid as they get and we haven’t heard all the wiretaps yet.”
Donald Trump thinks he will be the first person to avoid prison after being found guilty of witness tampering, obstruction of justice, destroying evidence, wire fraud and possibly RICO.
Folks, it just doesn't happen. He will die alone in prison. He may think he will just win…
— Rick Shaftan — Neighborhood Research and Media (@Shaftan) July 29, 2023
By August, the consultant would claim the legal threats hurt Trump’s fundraising numbers in addition to his popularity.
“You know Trump is slipping. He isn’t reporting his post-indictment fundraising numbers anymore and his cult supporters are getting increasingly angry and unhinged,” claimed Shaftan.
He wrote, “The end is near, maybe nearer than we all think.”
While less than enthusiastic about the criminal case brought against Trump by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the consultant seemed to celebrate the results of the New York civil fraud case against the president just months later.
“Trump is getting mentally unhinged as he sees his real estate empire taken from him, his campaign fundraising dry up, his co-defendants flipping and pleading out, his legal bills exploding and his family life in shatters,” Shaftan wrote on September 30. “He will get more cringeworthy as he gets more and more unhinged.”
Shaftan’s post was published to X during the same month that the civil fraud case against Trump, brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James, was decided by New York Judge Arthur Engoron, who ruled that Trump and his company illegally inflated the value of their assets in order to obtain more favorable financing. James responded to the verdict by ordering the cancellation of business certificates for Trump’s companies.
Trump later paid a $175 million bond as he sought to reverse the decision. With Trump back in office, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) was reported earlier this year to be probing James for possible violations of Trump’s civil rights.
Shaftan continued to oppose Trump’s candidacy even after DeSantis left the race and endorsed the president, leaving the Republican nominating process a two-man contest between Trump and Nikki Haley, the former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and Governor of South Carolina.
“Looks like Haley won six [South Carolina] delegates,” wrote Shaftan on February 25, 2024, after Trump easily won the Republican primary contest in Haley’s home state.
Shaftan claimed, “This is actually a long-term disaster for Trump, he lost nearly every suburb in the state other than those around Myrtle Beach, ironically filled with Northerners.”
Haley would exit the race less than one month later, on March 6, leaving Trump as the de facto Republican nominee for president in 2024.
It was on the same day in February 2024 that Shaftan extended his ire to a prominent supporter of Trump’s 2024 campaign, describing the speech delivered by Steve Bannon at CPAC 2024 as “beyond pathetic.”
The consultant wrote, “My focus is salvaging the downballot from these weirdo freaks.”
This is beyond pathetic.
My focus is salvaging the downballot from these weirdo freaks. https://t.co/zgK7pEXAsv
— Rick Shaftan — Neighborhood Research and Media (@Shaftan) February 26, 2024
This was not the first time Shaftan derided one of Trump’s supporters, however, as he appeared to target American Conservative Union (ACU) chairman Matt Schlapp the previous month, after CPAC, which is organized by Schlapp’s ACU, endorsed Trump’s presidential bid.
“Pervert endorses Pedophile,” wrote Shaftan.
Shaftan’s position on DeSantis later appeared to morph, with the consultant appearing to blame his colleagues for allowing the governor to become a “pathetic punching bag” for the Trump campaign and its surrogates.
“That depends on whether our candidates fight for what they believe in or let wimp grifter consultants turn them into pathetic punching bags,” said Shaftan in September 2024.
He appeared to write of DeSantis in October 2024, “I remember the pathetic punching bag who had no rationale for his candidacy,” while using the hashtag, “#WorstCampaignEver.”
Potentially reflecting animosity generated during the 2024 campaign, Shaftan wrote later on the same day that he was advising voters in Pennsylvania to vote for the Libertarian Party candidate over U.S. Senator Dave McCormick (R-PA), who won a tight race that year, unseating former Senator Bob Casey (D-PA), who had held the seat for the Democrats since 2007.
The no holds barred approach to opposing Trump’s campaign was not new for Shaftan, who continued to warn against Trump’s candidacy even after he secured the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 2016.
“Told you this guy was an election disaster waiting to happen, but some were taken in by a cult of personality,” wrote Shaftan on October 7, 2016, the same day secretly recorded audio was published, showing the presidential candidate engaged in “locker room talk” while being transported to a television set with Billy Bush.
Told you this guy was an election disaster waiting to happen, but some were taken in by a cult of personality.
— Rick Shaftan — Neighborhood Research and Media (@Shaftan) October 8, 2016
The support from House Freedom Action, utilizing Shaftan’s firm, come after Barrett criticized U.S. Representative Andy Ogles (R-TN-05), a member of the U.S. House Freedom Caucus, for receiving similar support from out-of-state sources.
Complaining that “billionaires” are allowed to, “write big, fat checks,” which are then used to support or oppose specific candidates in Tennessee, Barrett questioned the crowd at a September candidates forum, “Do you know how much money Andy Ogles has in his campaign account right now? $60,000.”
He stated, “How do you think he’s going to get reelected? It isn’t going to happen with $60,000. He’s going to get a whole heck of a lot of PAC money that comes in and lifts him up.”
The House Freedom Fund, another Freedom Caucus-aligned PAC, spent more than $90,000 to support Ogles’ candidacy in 2022.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Image “Jody Barrett” by Jody Barrett and “Rick Shaftan” is by Rick Shaftan.
We’ll be voting Jody Barrett.