The Courts
The Hill: ACLU sues Maryland, Kentucky governors over social media censorship
By Mallory Shelbourne
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed lawsuits against the governors of Maryland and Kentucky, claiming they violated constituents’ First Amendment rights by blocking individuals from official social media accounts.
The organization’s Kentucky branch filed a lawsuit Monday on behalf of several constituents, while its Maryland branch filed suit on Tuesday. Both suits ask for injunctions to stop Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin (R) and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) from blocking constituents on social media accounts.
“The highest purpose of the First Amendment is to protect the right of Americans to engage in political speech and to petition the government to address their concerns,” Deborah Jeon, who serves as the ACLU of Maryland’s legal director, said in a statement.
“As the Supreme Court ruled in June, and a federal judge in Virginia echoed just last week, social media has become a vital means for constituents to communicate with their elected officials. It violates both the First Amendment and Maryland’s own social media guidelines for government officials to block out any voices of dissent or those simply raising questions about positions taken by public officials sworn to serve.”
CT Mirror: Ganim to sue over bar to public financing of campaign
By Mark Pazniokas
Bridgeport Mayor Joseph P. Ganim intends to file a lawsuit Tuesday in U.S. District Court challenging the constitutionality of a law that bars convicted felons like him from seeking public financing for a potential run for governor in 2018.
In a draft of the lawsuit provided to CT Mirror, Ganim seeks a declaratory ruling allowing him to participate in the voluntary Citizens’ Election Program (CEP), which provides public financing for campaigns to qualifying candidates who agree to abide by strict spending and fundraising limits. He says the ban undermines the goals of the program…
“He seeks to run for Governor without using funding from special interest groups, donations from outside Connecticut, from lobbyists, or anyone who might expect later favor.”…
“Mr. Ganim’s Right to Free Speech is impaired because the statute excluding him from funding is irrational, does not further a legitimate public purpose or interest, is not narrowly tailored, lacks a rational basis or relationship to a legitimate state interest, is unnecessarily harsh, undermines the CEP’s goals of combatting public corruption and promoting clean elections, and imposes an unfair and unnecessary burden on him by not allowing him to participate in the CEP,” the suit says.
Congress
The Hill: Senate Dems propose crackdown on foreign lobbyists
By Megan R. Wilson
Sens. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) on Monday introduced the Foreign Agent Lobbying Transparency Enforcement Act, which would give the DOJ the ability to impose civil fines on people who don’t comply with the law.
The Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) requires individuals working on behalf of a foreign government or official to register with the Justice Department within 10 days of signing a contract…
Legislation from Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) would give the National Security Division more powers, eliminate filing fees and give agents more time to submit certain required disclosures. The House has companion legislation…
A forthcoming bill from Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) reportedly will close an exemption in FARA that allows people to avoid registering if they represent a private foreign interest and disclose the relationship to the House and Senate under the LDA guidelines.
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette: Donnelly seeks FEC overhaul
Sen. Joe Donnelly, D-Ind., announced Tuesday he had introduced legislation to revamp the Federal Election Commission, which he said “has been undermined by gridlock.”…
The Restoring Integrity to America’s Elections Act, which is companion legislation to a bipartisan bill filed in the House, would reduce the number of commissioners to five, limit each commissioner to one six-year term in office, establish a “blue ribbon” panel to recommend nominees to the president to fill vacancies and delegate some administrative and investigatory responsibilities to the chair, Donnelly’s office said.
Candidates and Campaigns
Independent Journal Review: The Left Insisted That ‘Money Isn’t Speech’ – Until Donald Trump Jr. Met With the Russian Lawyer
By Dan Backer
The Left isn’t wrong-money is not speech. It’s money. But you can’t have any meaningful speech without spending money. It is the oxygen fueling the fire of political speech. Regulating speech-and the money needed to convey ideas to the public-leaves America with less freedom, and worse off.
However, in a strange twist, the Left’s mind-numbing hatred of President Trump has led to a new, absurd position: Speech is money!
After Donald Trump Jr. met with Natalia Veselnitskaya-a Russian lawyer with connections to the Kremlin-to discuss potentially damaging information about Clinton, the Left lost their minds…
Liberal “advocacy” groups Common Cause, Democracy 21, and the Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission accusing Trump Jr. of soliciting and accepting a foreign contribution. Because he gossiped about Clinton…
The Left’s solution is to regulate, regulate, regulate. By restricting what Trump Jr.-or any American-is allowed to hear and say, the Left strikes at the right of every American. It is a fundamental right of every American to speak with anyone they want about anything they want-including useless gossip about presidential politics.
Philly.com: Need a job? Bob Brady and the art of the political buyout
By Andrew Seidman & Jeremy Roebuck
In Philadelphia, a mayoral candidate dropped out of the race, handed his campaign operation to the eventual winner, and later landed a lucrative no-bid contract from the administration.
In New Jersey, a Democratic governor appointed a Republican senator to a government agency, helping flip Senate control to Democrats.
And in Virginia, Republicans persuaded a Democratic state senator to resign, dangling a lucrative job offer on a state tobacco commission and a judgeship for his daughter – and leading to a GOP takeover of the Senate.
Prosecutors’ allegations last week that U.S. Rep. Robert Brady’s 2012 campaign paid a challenger $90,000 to drop out of the race may seem like a particularly brazen power play. But it’s all part of the art of the political buyout – sometimes illegal, sometimes just politics.
When candidates seek exit strategies or see the writing on the wall, they often seek some kind of help from the candidate they endorse. Such transactions may look like backroom dealing, but campaign-finance experts agree that the line between the simply unseemly and the outright illegal can be difficult to determine.
The States
Reason: Seattle’s ‘Democracy Vouchers’ Serve as Campaign Welfare for Well-Established Candidates
By Christian Britschgi
Seattle’s Democracy Vouchers were supposed to break the hold of special interests on elections and open up the field to outsider candidates.
Instead the program-which awards Seattle voters a total of $100 that they can donate to qualified local candidates-almost all of the 315,000 tax dollars raised prior to the city’s primary election Tuesday have gone to only three candidates, one incumbent and two politically connected activists…
Evan Blevins, attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation, says it’s hardly a surprise the benefits of Democracy Vouchers accrue almost exclusively to well-practiced political operatives.
“To receive [the vouchers] you have to leap several hurdles with the Seattle Ethical Elections Commission”, he says, including participation in debates and receiving the contributions and signatures from 400 voters.
Rather than parceling out the four $25 vouchers, Seattle sends all of them out on Jan. 1, encouraging voters to spend their vouchers all at once on the candidates first to the trough.
“It’s going to the people they know, who already have campaigns active,” Blevins tells Reason. “That’s going to be incumbents or well-funded candidates.”
New Jersey 101.5: There’s less money in NJ politics – but that’s not necessarily good
By Michael Symons
The big Democratic and Republican campaign committees, including the state parties and legislative leadership PACs, entered the summer with nearly 30 percent less cash on hand than at the same point before the gubernatorial and legislative elections four years ago.
And the 2013 pace was 13 percent less than four years before that.
People who can’t stand politics might say that’s good, but state Election Law Enforcement Commission director Jeff Brindle thinks even people who don’t like the system would miss the parties if they wither. He says the political money is still flowing, only it goes to less accountable independent groups…
Independent groups don’t face the same requirements for disclosing their fundraising and don’t have contribution limits.
ELEC recommends that the pay-to-play law be revamped to exclude donations to the political parties but include other PACs, as well as higher limits on donations to the political parties.
