Todd Boehly and dozens of his colleagues contributed more than $300,000 to the Kansas insurance commissioner’s gubernatorial campaign, weeks after her office helped one of the billionaire’s companies win approval for an extension to new capital rules.
Several of Boehly’s companies, including Topeka-based Security Benefit Life Insurance Co., made collective donations in late December, joined by executives, their spouses and other relatives, Kansas state records show. Commissioner Vicki Schmidt oversees insurance companies in Kansas and is seeking the Republican nomination for governor.
At the time, a National Association of Insurance Commissioners working group was considering a proposal to tighten mortgage investment capital requirements. Supporters hope the change will take effect by the end of 2026.
The measure could be costly for Security Benefit, whose $14 billion in mortgage reserves is by far the largest in the life insurance industry. In a nine-page letter, security interests condemn the proposal and urged the panel to slow down its action.
A few weeks after the donation, Tish Becker, an official in Schmidt’s office, attended a task force meeting and said advocated The changes were postponed until the end of 2027, according to minutes from the February meeting. Becker was not a member of the working group but participated as a visitor. At a subsequent meeting, the group decided to follow Kansas’ proposed slower schedule.
“We support meaningful rules,” Eldridge Industries, Boley’s main holding company, said in an emailed statement. The company and its affiliates “invest in leaders we trust. As a result, we have and will continue to encourage our broad network to support candidates and elected officials who lead with pragmatism.”
A representative for Boley said he and Eldridge Industries executives have not repaid anyone for their contributions.
Schmidt’s campaign said in a statement that “contributions to the campaign have no bearing on the Department of Insurance’s policy decisions.” “Many Kansas businesses, like Security Benefit, have long supported Vicki Schmidt.”
‘Reasonable timetable’
Kansas Insurance Department spokesperson Holli Kroeker said in an emailed statement that the department “has always advocated for the NAIC not to deviate from its normal protocols, which provide a reasonable timeline for implementing all changes to ensure companies can plan appropriately.” “This helps create regulatory certainty and limit unintended disruption to the industry.”
Boley is known for high-profile sports and entertainment holdings, including stakes in Chelsea Football Club, the Los Angeles Dodgers and independent film studio A24. But the centerpiece of his business empire is Security Benefit, a 134-year-old insurance company that sells annuities to retirees and invests much of its cash in assets managed by other units of Eldridge Industries in Miami.
Mortgages accounted for about 25% of Security Benefit’s total invested assets at the end of last year. Nearly all of this is backed by assets managed by Eldridge Industrial affiliates. The company’s overreliance on that asset type has triggered scrutiny from ratings firms, regulators and creditors, Bloomberg reported in 2024.
Read more: Boley’s insurance company reaped benefits from loans to his company and questions raised
In fact, security benefits accounted for approximately 47% of the entire life insurance industry’s mortgage holdings as of December 2024, according to Moody’s.
In a letter to the task force earlier this year, Security Benefit argued that such loans are less risky than their underlying collateral and that the task force has no evidence that they have underperformed in the past. It warned that some companies could be hit by “potentially large capital impacts” and said the task force’s pace was “unnecessarily hasty”.
Security Benefit continued that if the rule changes happen too quickly, insurers may be forced to move assets into illiquid markets at bargain prices.
Supporters of a quicker rule change include representatives from the Iowa Department of Insurance, who said in February that NAIC discussions gave insurers necessary preparation time.
In a recent letter, Iowa officials called mortgages “the asset class most vulnerable to capital arbitrage.” Under current rules, insurers must hold only 6.8% of a mortgage’s value as a capital buffer, regardless of what’s behind it. By comparison, investing directly in equity or other risky assets can require capital charges of 30% or more.
The rule change will allocate capital charges to loans based on underlying collateral. While details are still being worked out, fees could rise from 6.8 per cent to 30 per cent for mortgages secured by interests in private limited liability companies, joint ventures or partnerships. Security Benefit recently disclosed that more than $8 billion of its mortgages are backed by such entities.
Lobby support
“All insurers are entitled to reasonable time to adapt to regulatory changes without undue interference,” Security Benefit said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. Major industry lobby groups supported a slower timeline and the insurer’s mortgages had a “long, successful record of zero defaults,” it added. “Security Benefit has weathered significant regulatory changes before and has the financial strength and flexibility to do so again.”
The Kansas Insurance Department said in a statement that its staff typically attend task force meetings as visitors, but if they do not speak, their attendance is not noted in meeting minutes. A review of the most recent 38 meeting minutes found no other instances in which Kansas was mentioned as participating as a non-member.
Campaign contributions from Boley and his associates account for more than a third of Schmidt’s $895,000 in campaign contributions. Reportedly raising funds Donors from her gubernatorial campaign. She was first elected as Insurance Commissioner in 2018 and her current term is set to expire next year.
kansas law Limit donations The statewide primary campaign cap is $4,000 per donor. Most Boli-related donations are of this maximum amount. In addition to executives from Security Benefit and Eldridge Industries, other contributions were made by employees of New York-based A24; Zinnia Tech Solutions, a Connecticut-based insurance services provider; Metropolis Technologies, a California-based parking technology company; and G-Form, a Rhode Island-based athletic equipment manufacturer.
Even Peter Shapiro, capitol theaterPort Chester, New York, sent $4,000. This is what Boehly holds his Luxurious holiday party. Shapiro did not respond to a request for comment.
Photo: Todd Boehly, Chairman and CEO of Eldridge Industries LLC, attends the Semafor World Economic Summit during the Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank in Washington, DC, United States, Monday, April 13, 2026. The International Monetary Fund said the conflict in the Middle East was a major supply shock that would test the resilience of a world with limited scope for financial support, even as the United States and Iran negotiated a two-week ceasefire.
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