Supreme Court

SCOTUSblog: Symposium: Don’t tread on my passive political speech

By Elizabeth Slattery

When was the last time a T-shirt changed the way you voted? Probably never, but the state of Minnesota thinks you’re much more impressionable. It’s so concerned that voters might influence others with their clothing choices that it prohibited wearing items that could be construed as “political” – such as a “Please I.D. Me” button or a “Don’t Tread on Me” T-shirt – from polling places on Election Day. Offenders are subject to civil fines of up to $5,000 and the possibility of criminal charges.

Yet, as the Supreme Court has reiterated on numerous occasions, political speech is “central to the First Amendment’s meaning and purpose” and deserves the “fullest and most urgent application” of the First Amendment. Any restriction of political speech must be narrowly tailored to advance a compelling state interest.

That does not mean that political speech is without limits. Allowing campaign surrogates to use a bullhorn to broadcast their message inside a polling place or follow people into the voting booth to make a last-minute pitch for their candidate would interfere with the right to vote free from undue interference. States have legitimate interests in preventing intimidation and violence at the polls and ensuring the integrity of elections.

SCOTUSblog: Symposium: The right to vote in peace

By J. Gerald Hebert

Instead of a line of neighbors whose only distinguishing characteristic is the shared geography that assigned them to that particular polling place, imagine a line in which each voter self-identifies by political tribe. Some people wear “WHITE LIVES MATTER” shirts. Others wear “TUCK FRUMP” shirts. Some wear “THIS ELECTION THE PUSSY GRABS BACK” shirts. And others wear “NRA: GUNS DON’T KILL PEOPLE – I DO” shirts. As voters stand in line, they are confronted with raw political divisiveness. No physical violence occurs, but people spot the differences. One voter makes a snide remark to a similarly clad compatriot about a voter wearing the other tribe’s insignias. Nasty glances are exchanged and mistrust abounds…

The First Amendment protects every American’s right to speak out on contentious issues, including through what they choose to wear, as the court held in 1969 in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. But the state’s compelling interests in protecting the single most fundamental democratic activity amply justify an extremely limited restriction: When We the People step into the sacred space of the polling place – in just that one place and for just those few moments – we do so not with outward displays of loyalty to our political clans, but as the peaceful and unified citizenry of the United States.

Reason: The Supreme Court’s Big Public Sector Union Case Is Really About Free Speech

By Eric Boehm

Writing at The Volokh Conspiracy (which Reason hosts, though it is editorially independent), UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh suggests that the First Amendment argument might not be as compelling as Janus and his allies think.

“The government can constitutionally require people to pay money to the government (in taxes), money that the government can then use for ideological purposes (e.g., supporting a war, opposing racism, promoting environmentalism, and so on),” Volokh writes. “Likewise, the government can constitutionally require people to pay money to unions, money that the unions can then use for ideological purposes.”

The legal distinction, if the justices wish to draw one, could lie in the difference between being forced to pay money to the government and being forced to pay money to a nongovernmental third party.

At least some ears on the bench will probably be receptive to Janus’ position. “Preventing nonmembers from free-riding on the union’s efforts,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in 2014, is “generally insufficient to overcome First Amendment objections.”

“Except perhaps in the rarest of circumstances, no person in this country may be compelled to subsidize speech by a third party that he or she does not wish to support,” Alito concluded.

First Amendment

American Prospect: What First Amendment?

By Eliza Newlin Carney

Conservatives’ blithe dismissal of Trump’s chilling impact is all the more striking given the First Amendment’s increasingly central place in conservative orthodoxy. The conviction, however unfounded, that campaign-finance limits would lead to book banning was at the heart of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling to deregulate corporate political spending. Since Hillary Clinton opposed that ruling, conservatives argue, she posed a greater First Amendment threat than Trump. Besides, they assure, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch will rigorously defend free speech.

But not all First Amendment defenders take Trump’s media wars so lightly. None other than constitutional law expert Floyd Abrams, who led the GOP’s charge to deregulate politics in the name of free speech in Citizens United, warned The Wall Street Journal in a letter that its editorial board is “far too serene” about Trump’s bid to silence author Michael Wolff…

Abrams said he’s “hopeful” that Gorsuch will rigorously defend the First Amendment, but that “no one knows” how he might rule in a case that, say, pitted national security against free speech concerns. Trump has so far been “unable to stifle speech of which he disapproves” noted Abrams, “but the unending drumbeat of criticism, accusation, and denigration of the press takes a toll.”

Independent Groups

BuzzFeed News: Trump Allies Are Profiting From Multiple Trump Groups, Testing Campaign Finance Laws

By Tarini Parti Henry J. Gomez

Two firms led by Brad Parscale, formerly the Trump campaign’s digital director, made at least $5.1 million from Trump’s reelection campaign, the Republican National Committee, and a pro-Trump super PAC called America First Action last year. Parscale himself also earned an additional $15,000 from the reelection campaign in January of 2017.

The super PAC, which filed its latest fundraising reports with the FEC Wednesday, shows nearly $140,000 in payments to Parscale Strategy in the second half of the year – the first filing that shows any payments from an outside group to a Parscale firm while it was also working for the campaign and RNC.

The super PAC also has an affiliated nonprofit, America First Policies, governed by less transparent rules. Parscale cofounded that organization.

“This is potentially problematic,” said Larry Noble, a campaign finance lawyer and general counsel for Campaign Legal Center. “My guess is that they are assuming that the FEC will not go for it, and if it does, they will make some legal argument that the three Republican commissioners will accept.” …

“Both America First Action and America First Policies take seriously their legal obligations, and work diligently with counsel to ensure that all of their activities, including any done through their consultants or other vendors, are legally compliant,” said Erin Montgomery, a spokesperson for the groups.

New York Times: Trump Groups Raised Millions, Then Paid It Out to Loyalists and a Trump Hotel

By Kenneth P. Vogel and Rachel Shorey

The America First groups have been viewed as something of an enigma in campaign finance circles. While many of the Republican Party’s traditional elite donors have publicly kept their distance from the groups, the organizations have the blessing of the administration and have projected confidence in their fund-raising.

But Republican operatives have grumbled that the amount the groups say they have raised have dwarfed the amount they have spent to support Mr. Trump’s political and policy goals during his first year in office.

Candidates and Campaigns 

The Intercept: The Dead Enders

By Ryan Grim and Lee Fang

In his farewell address, President Barack Obama had some practical advice for those frustrated by his successor. “If you’re disappointed by your elected officials, grab a clipboard, get some signatures, and run for office yourself,” Obama implored.

Yet across the country, the DCCC, its allied groups, or leaders within the Democratic Party are working hard against some of these new candidates for Congress, publicly backing their more established opponents, according to interviews with more than 50 candidates, party operatives, and members of Congress. Winning the support of Washington heavyweights, including the DCCC – implicit or explicit – is critical for endorsements back home and a boost to fundraising. In general, it can give a candidate a tremendous advantage over opponents in a Democratic primary.

In district after district, the national party is throwing its weight behind candidates who are out of step with the national mood…

It’s happening despite a very real shift going on inside the party’s establishment, as it increasingly recognizes the value of small-dollar donors and grassroots networks. 

Donors

New York Times: A Billionaire Keeps Pushing to Impeach Trump. Democrats Are Rattled.

By Alexander Burns

Democratic leaders have pressed one of their most prolific donors privately, urging him to tone down his campaign calling for President Trump’s impeachment. They have prodded him in public, declaring on television that they consider impeachment an impractical idea. And party strategists have pleaded with Democratic candidates for Congress not to join in.

But that donor, Tom Steyer, a California billionaire, has only intensified his attacks in recent weeks. Buoyed by tens of millions of dollars in television commercials – financed out of his own pocket and starring him – Mr. Steyer has become one of Mr. Trump’s most visible antagonists, firing up angry Democrats and unnerving his own party with the ferocity of his efforts.

Mr. Steyer is likely to unsettle national Democrats further in the coming weeks, with a new phase of his campaign aimed at pushing lawmakers in solidly liberal seats to endorse impeachment. Having collected more than four million email addresses from people who signed an impeachment petition, Mr. Steyer has begun prodding those voters to call congressional offices and lobby them for support.

The States

Washington Post: Who’s against limiting money’s power in D.C. politics? Perhaps the Democratic mayor.

By Peter Jamison

Dogged for much of its five-decade history by political scandal, the D.C. government is forging ahead with ambitious changes to its election laws and campaign finance regulations.

But one elected official is conspicuously absent among those pushing against the status quo: Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D), whose stance toward bills designed to reduce the influence of money in politics has ranged in recent months from silence to open opposition.

The position Bowser has staked out is surprising for the leader of a progressive city – all the more so because the campaign finance rules advanced by the D.C. Council have been widely adopted elsewhere…

At issue are two new policies being debated by the council this year. One is a system for publicly financing local elections while further limiting the size of contributions participating candidates can accept. The D.C. Council approved that proposal unanimously earlier this month, though the mayor has said she would not fund the program.

The council is also expected to take up a ban or restriction on campaign contributions by businesses that seek contracts with the District government…

U.S. News & World Report: Senate Passes Plan to Fill Initiative Campaign Finance Gap

By Associated Press

South Dakota Senate lawmakers have approved a bill aimed at requiring ballot measure campaigns to disclose their donors while supporters gather support to put initiatives on the ballot.

The chamber voted 33-2 Wednesday to advance the legislation to the state House of Representatives.

It would require initiative campaigns to submit new finance reports by July 1 in odd-numbered years when supporters collect names needed to send initiatives to the voters.

Current state rules don’t require the campaigns to disclose their donors until long after they’ve submitted their signatures to the state to qualify for the ballot.

Democratic Sen. Reynold Nesiba, the bill’s main sponsor, says it would increase transparency and offer more information about who is putting issues on the ballot.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin Elections Commission to keep ousted chief on the job through April on split vote

By Patrick Marley

A day after the state Senate denied the confirmation of Wisconsin’s elections director, his bosses on a split vote approved keeping him on board at least through April.

Even before the vote by the Elections Commission, Republicans questioned the legitimacy of the move and said it would ignite litigation and political blowback. 

“You are opening up the door for chaos,” said Dean Knudson, a Republican commissioner who voted against the plan. 

“You’re picking a fight with the Legislature that you can’t win.”

The commission voted 4-2 to keep as its director Michael Haas through April 30… 

The commission vote came a day after Republicans in the Senate denied the confirmations of Haas and Brian Bell, director of the Ethics Commission. Republicans wanted them gone because they previously worked for the now-disbanded Government Accountability Board, which conducted wide-ranging probes of Republicans.

New York Times: Campaign Donor Pleaded Guilty to Trying to Bribe Mayor de Blasio

By William K. Rashbaum and William Neuman

A campaign donor to Mayor Bill de Blasio secretly pleaded guilty in federal court to bribery, admitting that he used his contributions to the mayor to try to win favorable lease terms for a restaurant he owned on city property, newly unsealed court records show.

While the court papers included no charges against Mr. de Blasio or other city officials, a federal criminal information in the case makes it clear that the donor, Harendra Singh, got something in return…

The relationship between Mr. Singh and Mr. de Blasio had been a focus of investigations by the F.B.I. and the United States attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York; after an 18-month inquiry, those prosecutors decided against charging the mayor, but harshly criticized him and his fund-raising practices.