In the News
News Telegram: Reforming contribution limits
By Scott BlackburnIn November, the State House saw two incumbent members lose their election, the same number of representatives that were kicked out for criminal convictions during the past term. Of the 160-member House, the voters decided that only two incumbent politicians didn’t deserve another two years on the job.A similar story played out in the State Senate. Only one incumbent senator lost. Forty seats and one defeat.Why do incumbent politicians get re-elected at such an incredible rate? There are a thousand-and-one reasons, but one often-overlooked variable is that incumbent politicians get to make the campaign finance and election rules. Incumbents set the deadlines for candidate filing, they establish the guidelines for airing the political ads (that criticize their own job performance), and perhaps most importantly, they enact the laws on campaign contributions.This is not to say that incumbent politicians are purposefully rigging the game in their favor. But even if we knew that Exxon Mobil had the purest of intentions, would we trust it to write regulations on oil drilling that were fair to its competitors? Of course not.
Huffington Post: Super PACs: Just Helping Out a Friend
By Taylor Lincoln and Andrew PerezThe Center for Competitive Politics, which supports the Citizens United decision, promptly issued a response to our report, indicating both that there’s nothing “surprising” about friends of candidates running super PACs that support them and, anyways, any suspicion of coordination between the groups and candidates is just “the stuff of conspiracy theorists and hysterics.”Our report does not level any allegations of coordination, a legal violation that can hardly be proven without being privy to private conversations. We do, however, allege that many single-candidate groups are not plausibly independent of the candidates they assisted. And that helping out a friend, as referenced by CCP, is a case in point for that thesis.Note: They’re not coordinating but they’re not independent? Coordination “can hardly be proven without being privy to private conversations?” Sounds conspiratorial.
NPR: 5 Years After Citizens United, Secret Money Floods Into U.S. Politics
By Peter OverbyBRAD SMITH: We do not have foreigners running our elections. We are not more oligarchical, right? We don’t have these kinds of problems. Corporate money is not swamping the system, and elections are more competitive.
CCP
It’s Aliiive? President Obama to Revive Push for Contractor Disclosure?
By Luke WachobThe Daily Beast reports that at tonight’s State of the Union address, President Barack Obama will again criticize the Supreme Court’s decision in 2010’s Citizens United v. FEC on the eve of its fifth anniversary and propose a new version of a previously-abandoned draft Executive Order expanding disclosure requirements for companies holding government contracts.Back in 2011, the White House planned to issue an executive order requiring companies that seek federal contracts to publicly disclose contributions to groups that air political advertisements, including ones that air few such ads and therefore keep their donors private. However, the administration abandoned the effort in 2012 after meeting stiff bipartisan opposition in Congress and from nonprofit groups. Then-House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat, warned, “You know, I think the issue on contracting ought to be on the merits of the contractor’s application and bid and capabilities… I think there [are] some serious questions as to what implications there are if somehow we consider political contributions in the context of awarding contracts.”If The Daily Beast’s report is correct, the administration is unwisely considering a revival of this proposed executive order, with the slight change that in this version only companies that actually receive federal contracts will be subject to its provisions. In the old version, which CCP also vocally opposed, any company seeking a federal contract would have been forced to comply. (It bears noting that this change is likely a result of the recently signed into law CRomnibus’s inclusion of a policy rider preventing funding for an executive order that would mandate disclosure of contributions by contractors applying for federal contracts.)
Independent Groups
Wall Street Journal: Ex-McConnell Aide Launches GOP Senate Super PAC
By Rebecca BallhausA former chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) on Tuesday launched a super PAC aimed at preserving the party’s control of the Senate in a challenging 2016 election landscape.The group, called the Senate Leadership Fund, will serve as a counterweight to the Democratic Senate Majority PAC, whose formidable fundraising kept Democrats competitive in several key races in 2014.
SCOTUS/Judiciary
Wall Street Journal: Supreme Court Divided Over Judicial Candidate Campaign Donations
By Jess BravinConservative Supreme Court justices, however, challenged whether Florida’s rule truly fought corruption or its appearance, grounds which the court previously has found can justify campaign finance restrictions.While judicial candidates can’t ask anyone for money, they can hand a list of prospects to campaign chairmen, and then follow up with thank-you notes to make sure contributors get the message.Does “the incremental difference” between a direct request and that made by a middleman have “any significant relationship to any interest that this rule is supposed to serve?” said Justice Samuel Alito.
Citizens United
Washington Post: The legacy of ‘Citizens United’ strays from the Supreme Court’s vision
EditorialWhat went wrong? The court’s vision of disclosure and transparency is nowhere in sight. In fact, campaign finance in the United States has, by many measures, fallen into an era dominated by “dark money,” with donors hiding in the shadows and hundreds of millions of dollars of contributions flowing through politics without a trace of who gave it or why.
Candidates, Politicians, Campaigns, and Parties
Politico: 4 GOP hopefuls expected to attend Koch event
By Kenneth P. VogelFour leading Republican presidential prospects are expected to appear this weekend in the California desert before an exclusive gathering of rich conservatives convened by the Koch brothers’ political operation, several sources tell POLITICO.Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Marco Rubio of Florida, and Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin received coveted invitations to speak to the vaunted network assembled by the billionaire industrialist megadonors Charles and David Koch, the sources said.
