Karl Rove’s Crossroads Eclipsed by Koch Brothers and Others
For three election cycles, American Crossroads, the brainchild of Karl Rove and other leading Republican strategists, has been among the most powerful forces in national politics, a shadow party that has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising, data and opposition research to help elect candidates.
.. The nonprofit arm of Crossroads is facing an Internal Revenue Service review that could eviscerate its fund-raising. Data projects nurtured by Mr. Rove are being supplanted in Republican circles by a more successful initiative funded by the Koch political network, which has leapfrogged the Crossroads organizations in size and reach.
.. But Crossroads officials say that there is no threat to their fund-raising base, predicting that many donors will be willing to write two large checks — one to them and another to committees tied to a particular candidate. In 2014, Crossroads, despite a slow start, raised more than $100 million by November.