# Liz Uihlein **Elizabeth "Liz" Uihlein** (née Hallberg) co-founded [[Uline]] with her husband [[Dick Uihlein]] in 1980, selling carton-sizers out of the basement of their Lake Forest, Illinois home. She is the company's **president**. (Sources disagree on whether she or Dick holds the CEO title.) Uline is now the country's dominant shipping-supplies distributor, headquartered in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin since 2010, and its private profits are one of the largest single sources of Republican money in the United States. ## A different lane from Dick The couple's money is usually reported as one fortune, but the giving splits in a way that matters: - **Dick** funds the insurgent infrastructure: [[Restoration PAC]], [[Club for Growth]], election-denial groups and primary challenges to incumbents. In 2022 he gave **$80.7 million** on his own, the second-largest total of any individual donor in the country. - **Liz** concentrates on the **party committees** (the RNC, NRSC and NRCC) and writes a political column in the Uline catalog that goes to millions of business customers. No formal role for her at Restoration PAC is documented. - **Joint giving** spans both lanes. In 2024 the couple gave **$10 million** to [[MAGA Inc.]], and nearly $20 million to Restoration PAC and [[Fair Courts America]] in 2023–24. ## The pandemic In 2020 Liz Uihlein called the pandemic "overhyped" and lobbied Wisconsin legislators to overturn Gov. Tony Evers' public-health orders. A Uline call-center memo told employees "please do NOT tell your peers about the symptoms." Both Uihleins announced they had COVID-19 that November. ## Wisconsin as the operating theater Since Uline moved to Wisconsin, the state has become the couple's main battleground: - **[[2025 Wisconsin Supreme Court Election]].** Wisconsin lets donors route unlimited money through the state party, and Liz gave the Wisconsin GOP **$2.075 million** and Dick $1.65 million. The party passed the money to the conservative candidate, Brad Schimel, who lost. - **2026 governor's race.** Both Uihleins gave Rep. Tom Tiffany the $20,000 legal maximum. According to a Wisconsin Examiner report, they also gave $4 million to the Wisconsin GOP, which had transferred more than $6.1 million to Tiffany out of his $8.7 million raised by July. Two $500,000 checks to the College Republicans of Wisconsin also flowed partly to his campaign. - **Uline itself.** In May 2026 the company paused a 1.2-million-square-foot distribution center in Kenosha County, citing "unsettlement in the economy." Construction is not expected to resume before 2027, which makes it a small data point on tariff-era uncertainty from inside the donor class. ## Why she matters Liz Uihlein is the case against treating mega-donors as one person. The household funds both the party apparatus and the movement trying to discipline it. Her name on the Wisconsin party-transfer reports is how the money is routed, legally, into candidate campaigns. See [[Uihlein Family]] for the dynasty-level map and [[Dark Money]] for the routing. ## See also - [[Dick Uihlein]] · [[Uihlein Family]] · [[Uline]] · [[Uihlein Family Foundation]] - [[Restoration PAC]] · [[Restoration of America]] · [[Fair Courts America]] · [[MAGA Inc.]] · [[Club for Growth]] - [[2025 Wisconsin Supreme Court Election]] · [[Dark Money]] · [[Philanthropy Ecosystem]] · [[Elite Theory]]