CCP
Tip of the Hat: Calling the Media Exemption into Question
Luke Wachob
You are not granted special rights because you believe your speech is more important than others’ – and it has gotten worse and worse as developments in technology and culture have changed the face of media. Americans’ trust in mass media is at an all-time low, and the proliferation of blogs and citizen journalists has driven home the point that everyone needs – and is entitled to – the First Amendment’s press protections.
Hinkle makes this point by comparing The New York Times’ reporting on Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio’s personal finances and traffic tickets to the work of an opposition research firm. Are they really any different? If not, why should one get to speak more freely than the other?
First Amendment
Richmond Times-Dispatch: Why exempt the media?
A. Barton Hinkle
Like any self-respecting liberal outfit, The New York Times thinks the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United was an atrocity. The case revolved around whether the government could forbid an incorporated group, Citizens United, to broadcast a movie critical of Hillary Clinton in the days leading up to an election…
Contending that open debate requires shutting down all non-media corporate voices is an oxymoronic non sequitur. But never mind that. The Times’ recent story on Rubio’s traffic tickets exposes how very un-special media companies are.
The newspaper simply used its megaphone to parrot a talking point crafted by a liberal interest group. Its functional role was no different than the role played by American Bridge. Both of them shared information that might shape voters’ opinions about a presidential candidate. (And likely for the same reasons.)
SEC
The Hill: Obama pushed to fill SEC vacancies with corporate-giving rules in mind
Lydia Wheeler
A group of financial reform advocates sent a letter to President Obama on Friday asking him to fill upcoming vacancies at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) with candidates who support disclosure rules for corporate giving.
“One obvious issue that can and should serve as a litmus test for the selection of the nominees is the wildly popular rulemaking petition calling for the agency to promulgate a rule requiring disclosure of corporate political spending information,” said the letter signed by 21 groups including Public Citizen, Voices for Progress and Common Cause.
The letter represents the latest push from financial reform groups that have been urging the SEC to move forward with a rule that mandates reporting. Without it, advocates say shareholders are left in the dark, unable to make informed investment decisions or determine whether their money is going to groups that advocate for issues they oppose.
Independent Groups
National Constitution Center: Is jail time a good answer to campaign finance abuse?
Lyle Denniston
Even allowing fully for the fact that the Brennan Center is known as an organization that is deeply offended by the trend in the Supreme Court’s rulings on campaign financing, its conclusions about the trend lines in now-unfolding presidential politics almost certainly will be noticed by federal prosecutors who have now shown a clear interest in that trend.
Indeed, in announcing the sentencing of Tyler Harber, Justice Department officials said that those preparing to give money to candidates should make themselves aware of how their money will be spent before they actually make a donation that just might wind up spent in an illegal, perhaps criminal, way.
American Prospect: 2016 Marks a New Era for Dark Money
Laura McCauley
Dark money groups are now extending their reach beyond the hallmark negative advertising campaigns and are now backing grassroots and voter turnout efforts, the study finds.
“This means that candidates may be indebted to super PAC donors for more than just attack ads,” Ferguson notes, “they may come to rely on them for running viable campaigns.”
The report says that lack of enforcement is driving this political trend, where undisclosed donors contribute millions of dollars to essential back shadow campaigns.
New York Times: What Happens to Surplus Super PAC Money?
Anna North
Mostly, it’s up to the super PAC. “Super PACs have fairly broad discretion on what they can do with excess funds,” says Robert Kelner, chair of the Election and Political Law Practice Group at the law firm Covington & Burling. They can transfer them to a charitable organization, use them for wind-down expenses like clearing out offices or filing reports, or pay consulting fees. The main thing they can’t use leftover money for is to make contributions to a candidate for federal office.
Influence
FiveThirtyEight: Pols And Polls Say The Same Thing: Jeb Bush Is A Weak Front-Runner
Harry Enten
But what about all that money that Bush’s super PAC is gobbling up? We’ve had just a few elections — and just one presidential election — since the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and the explosion of noncampaign spending. Analyses of presidential elections are plagued by small sample sizes. That is triply true for studies of post-Citizens United elections, making it hard to judge the effects of all that outside spending. But if you were trying to explain the eventual vote won by primary candidates using endorsements and campaign fundraising since 1980, you’d give the endorsement percentage earned roughly 2.5 times the weight of money raised. In other words, money tells us something. Endorsements tell us more.
Candidates and Campaign
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Russ Feingold’s PAC funded fees, salaries for former staffers, himself
Daniel Bice
But campaign records show that Feingold’s PAC did little to help candidates directly, donating a mere $352,008 to federal candidates and political parties since 2011.
Most of the rest of its budget went to overhead.
Fundraising was the top expense, with one direct mail firm, Nexus Direct of Virginia Beach, Va., being paid $2.3 million by the Feingold PAC in the past four years, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Feingold and nine of his former campaign and U.S. Senate staffers drew salaries or consulting fees from the PAC, federal election records show. Five of them also spent time on the payroll of Progressives United Inc., the nonprofit.
WKOW: Senate candidates spar over Feingold PAC
Feingold’s campaign manager, Tom Russell, said the PAC was a new model that didn’t operate like most other similar political action committees formed “before the advent of email.” Instead of exclusively giving money to candidates, Feingold’s PAC organized like-minded voters and encouraged them to donate on their own.
Sen. Johnson’s campaign spokeswoman Betsy Ankney said Feingold was using the PAC as a slush fund to pad his pockets. And Wisconsin Republican Party executive director Joe Fadness calls the money raised “bogus slush funds” Feingold used as a “personal ATM machine.”
Feingold sent an email to supporters Monday saying Republicans were attacking the PAC’s work “because it undermines their power when people like you have a voice.”
The States
Salem Statesman Journal: Bill lets voters see last-minute campaign contributions
Tracy Loew
It would require single contributions or expenditures of $2,500 or more, received within two weeks of a primary or general election, to be reported within two days, down from the current seven.
The bill also would establish a task force to study and recommend campaign finance reforms. The task force would report back to the Legislature by Dec. 31.
L.A. Weekly: What Happens When a Random Citizen Becomes a California Legislator?
Hillel Aron
And so a bewildered Lopez headed to Sacramento this year, not knowing much about how things work, not knowing what an “unbacked bill” is, or how to sign up to present a bill to a committee so that you needn’t sit around for two hours. Or how many mailers an assembly member is allowed to send to constituents, or even how many days each week she is expected to spend in Sacramento…
Perhaps the biggest threat an amateur like Lopez poses to the Democratic Party faithful is her unpredictability. No one seems to know where she stands on the big controversies of the day — vaccinations, high-speed rail, the drought. No one knows if she’ll fall in line.
In April, Jenkins and two others filed three complaints against Lopez with the California Fair Political Practices Commission, along with more than 200 pages of documents — the kind of research often done by an “opposition researcher,” aka a paid political consultant.
