Campaign donor's contributions raise questions

Reporting from Chicago Chicago and Chicago — Big campaign donors typically come with deep pockets and influence. But in Illinois this election cycle, no one who isn't himself running for office has given more to the nation's federal campaigns than Shi Sheng Hao of Roselle, Ill., a virtual unknown in business and political circles.

Before September 2007, Hao's name had never appeared in the 15-year-old federal database of campaign contributors. Since then, however, his donations have topped $120,000 -- including $70,100 on a single June day to Republican presidential candidate John McCain.

Over the same time frame, a network of Hao relatives has kicked in more. The take from this group over the last 13 months exceeds $269,000, most of it to McCain and the Republican National Committee, records show.

Hao didn't register to vote at the suburban address attached to his donations until October 2007, a month after he wrote his first political check, $25,000 to the Republican National Committee.

The circumstances surrounding Hao's sudden and prolific political activism are curious and his whereabouts unclear. His name isn't listed on property records or the mailbox at the unassuming tract home listed on his donations. Hao lives "overseas," insisted a man who answered the door at the Roselle home recently. The man declined to identify himself.

The story of Hao -- whose varied roster of business associates appears to include a Taiwanese government investment arm as well as the mastermind of a decade-old Democratic fundraising scandal -- is an eyebrow-raiser in the current election climate.

Ethnic Chinese donors became an issue in the battle for the Democratic nomination last year because some didn't seem to live where they claimed on contribution records. Now, Republicans are raising questions about the authenticity of many small donations Democrat Barack Obama has received from abroad.

Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics, said the timing of the Hao-related contributions appeared troubling, though there could be a plausible explanation.

"Large contributions from people who have never given previously do generally provoke questions about who they are and what they're up to and, most importantly, what they're looking for," said Krumholz, whose nonpartisan group closely tracks political donations. " . . . The public needs to be concerned because there are fraudulent donations and persons use them to gain influence and access in Washington."