In the News
Washington Post: The FEC already has rules on independent campaign spending (LTE)
Eric Wang
According to Ruth Marcus’s June 14 op-ed column, “The FEC’s cry for help,” a petition filed by two commissioners at the Federal Election Commission with their own agency is a plea for their colleagues to “actually perform their duty” and “to write rules to ensure ‘dark money’ disclosure and super-PAC independence.” As if such rules did not already exist.
The FEC has explicit and robust rules addressing coordination and disclosure of “electioneering communications” and independent expenditures. Candidates, advocacy groups and super PACs are well aware of those rules and devote significant resources on legal compliance. While there has been a longstanding debate at the FEC over how the agency does its job, the commissioners’ petition is not prompted by a lack of existing rules regarding these issues.
FEC
Washington Post: Corporations are people. But are FEC commissioners people too?
Colby Itkowitz
This was all sparked by a public effort by Weintraub and Ann Ravel, the FEC’s chairwoman, to file an unprecedented formal petition with the agency to issue new rules before the 2016 election for more disclosure of donations and to strengthen the ban on coordination between super PACs and campaign.
Such petitions, the Republicans on the panel argued, are meant to give citizens a voice, not for commissioners to make a point.
“The notion that the FEC is so gridlocked that its chairman must, as a ‘private citizen,’ petition the agency to initiate a rulemaking process is weird,” Center for Public Integrity’s Dave Levinthal, a money-in-politics expert, explained to us. “It’s kind of like a head coach of a football team, as a fan, petitioning his coaching staff to run a new offensive scheme.”
Huffington Post: Federal Election Commission Members Really Don’t Like Each Other
Paul Blumenthal
Commissioner Steve Walther attempted to calm the commission down. He stated both his support for many ideas in the petition submitted by Ravel and Weintraub, as well as his discomfort with commissioners petitioning their own oversight body.
“And until we’re willing to tolerate each other’s views, our rule-making process is a farce,” Walther said. “I think we have to actually listen. Everybody here has a right in rule-making to have their views heard. When that happens, I think you’ll find that we can make some rules available to the public for consideration. And in this particular case, it’s — to me, it is a call for help.”
Public Citizen: Public Citizen Refiles Petition for FEC Commissioners Who Were Rebuffed by Their Own Agency
“The debate became rancorous and shows how the campaign finance law has been tortured in recent years,” said Lisa Gilbert, director of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division. “The dramatic activity today underscores the real need for productive action by our FEC, and the pushback on the Ravel-Weintraub complaint leaves us wondering how this government agency can get there.”
In the end, the commission decided to delay consideration of the petition. With that indecision, Public Citizen picked up the petition, dusted it off and refiled it.
FCC
Wall Street Journal: FCC Moves to Prevent Robocalls and Spam Texts
Gautham Nagesh
Under the new rule, phone carriers can block robocalls and automated text messages if requested by consumers. The move clarifies the agency’s interpretation of a 1991 consumer protection law that banned telemarketers from making cold calls to consumers. Companies have skirted that ban by using automated dialing machines, prerecorded calls and text messages. The new rule makes it clear that texts are the same as phone calls, and that phone carriers may block robocalls to consumers if asked.
The FCC’s two Republican commissioners opposed the move, arguing that it goes too far and will prevent companies that use robocalls and autodialers for legitimate purposes, like taxi companies notifying consumers their cab is on the way. “Nobody is for abusive robocalling, but I think it goes far beyond where they tried to go,” Commissioner Michael O’Rielly said.
The rule includes some exceptions: The action allows health-care providers and banks to alert consumers to possible fraud in their bank accounts, or remind them of important medication refills without their prior consent.
Supreme Court
New York Times: Supreme Court Says Texas Can Reject Confederate Flag License Plates
Adam Liptak
“As a general matter,” Justice Breyer wrote, “when the government speaks it is entitled to promote a program, to espouse a policy or to take a position.” Were this not so, he said, the government would be powerless to encourage vaccinations or promote recycling…
In dissent, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote that the majority opinion “establishes a precedent that threatens private speech that the government finds displeasing…”
He mocked the notion that, say, plates saying “Rather Be Golfing” or celebrating the University of Oklahoma conveyed a government message. The first, he said, cannot represent state policy. The second, in Texas at least, bordered on treason during college football season, he wrote.
Bloomberg: Why Clarence Thomas Joined Liberals to Shoot Down the Confederate Flag
Paul Barrett
Analysis of whether specialty license plates constitute “government speech” or private expression dominated Thursday’s dueling opinions. Breyer classified license plates as government speech: “As a general matter, when the government speaks it is entitled to promote a program, to espouse a policy, or to take a position,” he wrote.
In dissent, Alito warned that denying the Confederate descendants an opportunity to flaunt the slavery-era flag “establishes a precedent that threatens private speech that government finds displeasing.” Joining Alito were Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy. Their stance is consistent with an expansive view of the First Amendment that the conservatives have embraced in multiple contexts, including cases striking down regulation of campaign finance.
Disclosure
RegBlog: The Failed Reign of Mandated Disclosure
Omri Ben-Shahar and Carl E. Schneider
Mandated disclosure aspires to help people making complex decisions. It does so by requiring more sophisticated or knowledgable specialists to reveal information to less sophisticated or knowledgable individuals so that the latter can choose sensibly and the disclosers do not abuse their position. The theory is seductively plausible. After all, don’t people make poor decisions because they have poor information? Won’t they make good decisions with good information?…
Mandated disclosure’s failure is no stranger than its widespread popularity. It generates all the fine print that everybody derides, the interminable online sales terms everybody clicks agreement to without ever reading. Disclosures are not read because they describe complex facts in complex language. Most people little like the former and little understand the latter. The very lack of sophistication and expertise that purportedly justifies mandated disclosure means that people will not be able or willing to use the complex information disclosed.
Candidates and Campaign
New York Times: Jeb Bush’s Team Aims to ‘Weaponize’ Its Fund-Raising Total
Maggie Haberman
“We are very, very focused on the next two weeks,” Mr. Murphy told donors on the call, which one the participants allowed a reporter for The New York Times to listen in to.
Mr. Murphy described early polls as relatively meaningless, but predicted Mr. Bush would “see a lift” in the next week after a smooth campaign kickoff Monday in Miami.
“We want to weaponize our number,” Mr. Murphy said. “The press has set a very high expectation for us, much higher than we would have set for ourselves.”
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Scott Walker takes another step toward presidential campaign with new committee
Mary Spicuzza
Gov. Scott Walker has taken another step toward his all-but-certain 2016 presidential run by creating a “testing the waters” committee.
The new committee will allow the Republican governor to raise money controlled directly by him and his prospective campaign.
It will be required to follow federal campaign finance limits now that Walker is officially weighing his options.
The States
Lexington Herald-Leader: Florida group challenges Kentucky law that bans corporations from making political contributions
Jack Brammer
The group, Protect My Check, is a corporation dedicated to pushing legislation that allows people to work for unionized employers without joining a union.
It is being represented by the Goldwater Institute, a conservative, libertarian-leaning public policy and public-interest law organization based in Phoenix. The Goldwater Institute filed suit Thursday in U.S. District Court in Frankfort against the state Registry of Election Finance, which oversees campaign finance law in Kentucky.
Philadelphia Inquirer: Independent groups raised more than $11.5M in mayoral primary
Chris Brennan
The biggest spender by far was American Cities, launched by a group of Main Line investment firm owners who put up almost all of the $7.5 million raised to support State Sen. Anthony H. Williams’ candidacy.
Williams came in second, 30 percentage points behind former City Councilman Jim Kenney.
