INDIANAPOLIS – Rep. Braun was caught once again lying to Hoosiers yesterday as previously unaired footage from an IN Focus interview filmed after the end of the fundraising quarter showed him repeating the false claim that his fundraising did not rely on loans.

On an IN Focus interview from earlier this month that aired yesterday, Rep. Braun repeated his false claim that he was no longer personally funding his campaign, saying he was fundraising “the old fashioned way” and was no longer self-funding because the primary had “tapped him out.” Those claims were proven to be untrue, however, after reports like the Indy Star’s showed that Rep. Braun made several loans to himself of roughly $350,000 after the primary. All told, Rep. Braun funneled almost $1 million of his own money into his campaign during the second quarter and only raised $1.4 million from other donors.

So far, Rep. Braun has yet to explain why he lied about his fundraising efforts, even when asked directly about it. His claim about fundraising the “old fashioned way” is especially hard to believe considering he used several personal loans to skirt campaign contribution laws in a scheme similar to one that was described as a “legal form of money laundering.”

“There’s nothing “old fashioned” about giving yourself a million dollars, skirting contribution laws and then lying about it in the hopes of covering up your lackluster fundraising efforts,” said Michael Feldman, spokesman for the Indiana Democratic Party. “Rep. Braun may hope that if he says his false claims enough times, he can will it into existence. But every time he repeats his lie, it becomes clear that he thinks there’s nothing wrong with trying to pull the wool over Hoosiers’ eyes on something as straightforward as a fundraising report.”

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