CCP
The Internet and Free Speech
Alex Baiocco
No, money is not speech. But, short of standing and shouting on a street corner, speech almost always requires money. An individual Twitter user has to purchase a computer and internet access to post online. A vlogger must buy a webcam to make her viral video supporting candidate X. Free speech is not always cost free, but this should not mean that speech produced by an organized group of people is any less protected by the First Amendment.
Regulations requiring disclosure and disclaimers for unpaid internet communications would achieve little more than burdening groups with additional costs. Speech regulations almost always end up capturing more people than the authors initially intended, and smaller groups would undoubtedly be disproportionately affected by additional requirements. Tasks such as record keeping are much easier for well-staffed super PACs buying TV ads than for any citizen group that wants to post a video online. So more regulation of political speech on the internet would not only chill speech in a broad sense, but more specifically, it would block out smaller groups with less funding necessary for complying with such complex regulations.
On Bob Bauer and “Evidence”
Paul Jossey
Bob Bauer responded to my early summer post about professors Rick Hasen and Larry Lessig’s use of the infamous ‘Gilens and Page’ study. In familiar ‘pox-on-both-houses’ style, he avers it is a matter that “a particular evidentiary claim is overstated.”…
The idea that if government can produce evidence beyond illusion there is “enough” to justify abridgments of First Amendment rights, if paired with “democratic norms,” seems directly contrary to the First Amendment itself. That Amendment aimed at protecting speech from transient “democratic norms.” The constitutional majesty of freedom of speech requires more than a “sense” contemporarily common. Proof of actual harm demands more than faulty records or flawed studies, it should be central.
If First Amendment evidence be so blithely shucked, Larry Tribe was surely wrong proclaiming free speech rights “the Constitution’s most majestic guarantee.”
Independent Groups
Daily Dot: Cards Against Humanity’s diabolical plan to ‘drive Trump nuts’
Aaron Sankin
Last week, the twisted geniuses behind Cards Against Humanity launched a fundraiser tied to the 2016 presidential election. They created two packs of cards, one with a drawing of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and the other bearing the likeness of Republican nominee Donald Trump.
“At the end of this promotion,” a post on the company’s website explained, “Cards Against Humanity will tally up the sales of both packs, and depending on which pack gets more support, we will donate all the money in support of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.”
By Monday morning, the project had raised over $30,000 according to a counter on the site showing the total haul. It was ticking upward by the minute. What the company plans on doing with that money is ambitious—they’re starting their own super PAC.
Reason: Johnson/Weld SuperPAC Threatens the Commission on Presidential Debates Over their Tax Exempt Status
Brad Doherty
To conduct itself in a non-partisan manner, a debate sponsor cannot show “bias or preference for or against” particular candidates; there must be “fair and impartial treatment of candidates” without any promotion or advancement of some candidates over others…. So long as all candidates are invited, a tax-exempt charity acts properly in holding a debate or similar forum….
Put another way, bi-partisan is not the same as non-partisan. You cannot select some but not others from among all those who are legally eligible to, and capable of, competing for election.
Free Speech
Reason: Donald Trump Doesn’t Understand Freedom of the Press. Neither Does Hillary Clinton.
Anthony L. Fisher
This past February Clinton gave a speech where she declared “you’re not going to find anybody more committed to aggressive campaign finance reform than me,” but — much like Trump’s clumsy poker tell — Clinton tipped her hand by adding that Citizens United “was actually a case about a right-wing attack on me and my campaign.”
Put another way, Citizens United was a Supreme Court case about a private organization financing a documentary critical of a leading presidential candidate during an election season, kind of like Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore’s slickly-produced and Disney-financed documentary timed to coincide with the 2004 presidential election to help convince the public to vote against George W. Bush.
Last month Clinton promised to push for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United, which for 6 years has served as the Democrats’ catchall “money corrupts everything” boogeyman. But when Clinton spoke about the need to prevent films critical of her from being produced, Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern wrote (in a piece otherwise highly critical of Citizens United) that the former Secretary of State’s line about an “attack on me and my campaign” was “one of the worst Clinton has ever uttered”
FEC
Bloomberg BNA: New FEC Appointments Fail to Address Key Recommendations
Kenneth P. Doyle
The agency named Kevin Deeley as FEC associate general counsel for litigation and Adav Noti as associate general counsel for policy. Both are longtime FEC staff attorneys who headed the respective divisions in an acting capacity for more than a year.
The appointments failed, however, to address key recommendations, such as those included in a recent report commissioned by the FEC inspector general (See previous story, 07/27/16).
The IG report said the FEC commissioners should agree to appoint a permanent general counsel, filling a 3-year-old vacancy in that post. In addition, the report said the FEC should appoint a permanent chief financial officer and separate the jobs of staff director and chief information officer, which are currently held by a single manager.
Regulation
More Soft Money Hard Law: Corporate Regulation of Internet Politics
Bob Bauer
In the end, the adaptation of transparency standards to Internet political communications will depend for acceptance and durability on political debate and process. It may take a while, and there are risks, no doubt, that follow from a delayed or unsatisfactory outcome. Moreover, there are both substantive and political limits on what government regulation can and should be expected to accomplish. But for all that, the chance to shorten the waiting period by passing on responsibility to large, powerful companies, and the advantages seen in getting around the constitutional limits on state action, may be “opportunities” best passed up.
Congress
The Hill: Ending Congress’s Telemarketing Culture
Reps. David Jolly (R-Fla.) and Rick Nolan (D-Min.)
Many of your elected representatives are spending more time on the phone asking for money than a professional telemarketer.
That is why we have introduced the “Stop Act,” a four page bill that bans federal officeholders from personally asking you for money. It’s that simple. We cannot have a part-time Congress in a full-time world. Members of Congress must go to Washington and go to work on the people’s business.
Citizens would still be allowed to contribute to campaigns of their choosing. Members of Congress would still be allowed to attend fundraisers and speak to donors. But under no circumstance would they be allowed to personally ask people for campaign donations.
WPRI Providence: Sen. Whitehouse coming out with a new book
Ted Nusi
The forthcoming book will be called “Captured: The Corporate Infiltration of American Democracy,” and is scheduled to be published by The New Press in December. He co-authored it with Melanie Wachtell Stinnett, who previously worked as an aide to Elizabeth Warren before Warren became an U.S. senator.
The publisher’s description of the book tries to capitalize on the recent buzz around New Yorker writer Jane Mayer’s recent book “Dark Money,” saying Whitehouse will offer “a firsthand perspective” on what Mayer described through “an eye-opening take on what corporate influence looks like today from the Senate floor.”
Wisconsin John Doe
Wisconsin Journal Times: Wisconsin attorney general asks US Supreme Court not to hear John Doe appeal
Matthew DeFour
Attorney General Brad Schimel has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reject a review of a halted investigation into Gov. Scott Walker’s recall campaign, marking the first time his office has argued the merits of the case after his predecessor declined to lead the investigation more than three years ago.
Schimel’s filing argues the court should reject the appeal because Walker and the Republican-controlled Legislature has since changed the law making the alleged activity legal and prohibiting the use of John Doe proceedings in investigating campaign finance violations.
“The people of Wisconsin thus made as clear as they possibly could that they wish to put this unfortunate chapter behind them,” Schimel states in the filing.
The States
New York Daily News: Government reform groups slam Super PAC disclosure bill, claim it will ‘chill’ activism
Kenneth Lovett
“Common Cause supports meaningful and useful disclosures that are in the public interest,” Lerner said. “Unfortunately, that’s not what this bill provides.”
The bill would require Super PACs known as independent expenditure to disclose more about their donors and if there are any familial or work ties to candidates they are supporting. The independent PACs can spend unlimited amounts of money as long as they don‘t coordinate with the campaign they‘re supporting.
It would also require groups that spend more than $15,000 advocating for an issue or candidate to disclose any donors that give more than $2,500. Under current law, the requirement covers only groups that spend $50,000 in a year and donors who gave them more than $5,000.
“We are genuinely concerned it will chill the willingness of organizations to speak out about pending legislation and state policies that will have an impact on real people,” Lerner said. “It will also chill the collaboration of organizations amongst themselves. There’s no public interest in that.”
Miami New Times: Carlos Gimenez, County Commission Won’t Let Miami Vote on Campaign-Finance Reform
Jerry Iannelli
On August 2, a group called Accountable Miami-Dade sent the county two U-Haul trucks packed full of signed petitions demanding a public vote on new campaign-finance laws that would make it more difficult for wealthy contractors and lobbyists to donate wads of money to politicians.
Two weeks later, those 127,000 petitions are still sitting uncounted in Doral. Mayoral candidate Raquel Regalado has been quick to point the finger at County Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who has raised more than $1.6 million for his reelection campaign.
Joplin Globe: No-limits contributing cause for craziness
In statewide races for the two major parties, four primary candidate winners have never held public office before. In the race for secretary of state — the chief election authority for all elected public offices — neither major party candidate has ever held public office…
Part of this craziness results from Missouri being one of only five states with no limits on campaign contributions. The sky is the limit for campaign cash in Missouri, and a couple of contributors aimed especially high this year. Their contributions alone amounted to more than all other contributions combined.
Interestingly, one of those top megadonors almost solely bankrolled the entire multimillion-dollar campaigns of a number of statewide candidates. All but the unopposed candidate lost. This is comforting regarding elections not being for sale.
New York Daily News: Albany government reform groups called out for ethically dubious political letter
Kenneth Lovett
A group of government reform groups received a slap on the wrist after sending a political letter to the government offices of state senators.
The Legislative Ethics Commission sent a letter to the three groups instructing them it was wrong to send their “Demand Democracy Candidate Pledge” to the office of state senators.
“Please be advised that communications regarding campaign matters including questionnaires for endorsements and pledge requests should NOT be sent to government offices,” commission Executive Director Lisa Reid wrote in the letter to Citizens Action, Common Cause/New York, and Every Voice. The letter sought a pledge of support on five issues, including campaign finance and election reforms.
