Public records show Mandera, his relatives, and businesses tied to him have contributed more than $100,000 to Giannoulias’ campaign operation, including at least $80,000 to the Citizens for Giannoulias committee since 2022. Filings also list a $6,900 in-kind contribution in 2024 for a Cubs suite used as a fundraiser venue, according to disclosures reported by the Chicago Sun-Times.
Money Trail: Who Gave What
Campaign finance databases list several Mandera family members among the donors. Records compiled by TransparencyUSA show Michael Mandera giving $5,000 to Citizens for Giannoulias, while a separate entry shows Nick Mandera also contributing $5,000 to the same committee. Those individual donations appear alongside additional filings from entities associated with the Mandera business network in the group’s Illinois database TransparencyUSA.
Company Record: EEOC Judgment
Mandera’s trucking firm, Custom Companies, previously faced a major federal sexual harassment case. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued over what it described as a sexually charged workplace, and in 2007, a federal judge entered a final judgment of more than $1.1 million and ordered broad injunctive relief. Court orders cited management’s role and barred certain company practices tied to adult-entertainment events. The judgment and remedies are detailed in the agency’s summary of the case EEOC.
Strip-Club History And Alleged Connections
Before his trucking and cannabis ventures, Mandera ran a Near North topless club through the 1990s and 2000s under names including Thee Dollhouse and VIP’s, surviving a yearslong licensing battle with City Hall documented in local reporting DNAinfo. Former Chicago police officer Fred Pascente later wrote that he worked at Thee Dollhouse, recounting his time there in his memoir Barnes & Noble. Other coverage has linked Mandera’s club to reputed organized-crime associates and to figures who had previously run Las Vegas establishments with notorious reputations, highlighting the venue’s colorful orbit even by Chicago standards.
Why It Matters
The Mandera money is drawing scrutiny because of the overlap between Giannoulias’ office and Mandera’s businesses. As secretary of state, Giannoulias oversees driver licensing and vehicle services, including commercial driver licensing, responsibilities that directly intersect with trucking interests. Those duties are laid out on the agency’s driver services portal, Illinois Secretary of State.
Giannoulias has already faced questions about his past at his family’s Broadway Bank, which made large loans to individuals with criminal records while he was a senior loan officer, an episode dissected by fact-checkers during his earlier statewide campaigns PolitiFact. That history, paired with the fresh flow of cash from a donor whose businesses and old strip club have drawn federal, municipal and organized-crime-related scrutiny, is likely to fuel new questions from voters and watchdogs if Giannoulias formally jumps into a Chicago mayoral race…