CCP
Comments to FEC Commissioner Ravel on Proposal to Rescind AO 2006-15
Allen Dickerson
For the reasons given below, the Commission should reject the Proposal and affirm its considered policy, consistently applied since 1978, that domestic subsidiaries of foreign corporations, and the U.S. citizens they employ, may participate in the American political system…
The Proposal assumes that U.S. subsidiaries, and the U.S. citizens who run them, simply cannot be trusted, “and [that] their loyalties cannot help but shift to the interests of their foreign owners.” This is a cynical and unproven assumption with vast consequences. One—that employees of foreign corporations are also suspect—has already been suggested. But the general view that funds raised by domestic economic activity (or voluntarily contributed by U.S. nationals), and managed by U.S. citizens, cannot help but be corrupted is a depressingly narrow view. In a globalized world, nearly every corner of the economy, and nearly every citizen’s personal resources, is traceable in some way to foreign economic activity. Sometimes that connection is direct: factory workers are paid from the sale of their products abroad, and lawyers are paid by firms whose clients may include foreign persons. To recast this interconnectivity as “indirect influence,” and to decide the political rights of Americans on that basis, does violence to our collective status as a self-governing people and to the autonomy of every individual American connected in some way to the wider world.
The Rhetoric of “Rigged”
Alex Baiocco
In a recent piece published in The Guardian, “experts” express their fears and concerns about Donald Trump’s rhetoric about the potential for a “rigged” election…
One reform activist quoted in the article states that the type of rigging Trump is speaking about “is virtually nonexistent and is a myth that has been used to justify” certain legal restrictions that this activist apparently views as undemocratic and unconstitutional. Sounds familiar. Using myths to drum up discontent in order to justify restrictions on constitutional rights is the name of the game for the entire reform movement. The claim that “money buys elections” is, in fact, nothing more than a myth used to instill anger and discontent that can be transformed into support for more stringent restrictions on political speech. Money cannot buy elections. Money can only buy speech in an attempt to influence electoral outcomes. Elections are won and lost according to votes, and voters do in fact hold the power.
Free Speech
Las Vegas Review-Journal: Targeting the right
Editorial Board
In a free society, the answer to unpopular speech should be more speech, not less.
Increasingly, however, those on the left show an alarming willingness to accept government restrictions on expression.
Consider that the Democratic candidate for president has fully embraced a constitutional amendment cloaked in the mantle of campaign finance reform that would allow federal bureaucrats to ban certain movies and even books.
Thus it comes as no surprise that the chairman of the Federal Election Commission now raises concerns that Democrats are pushing to use the power of the state to muzzle conservative media outlets and personalities.
Independent Groups
Politico: Reid rekindles rhetorical assault on Koch brothers
Nolan D. McCaskill
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on Monday revived his battle with the billionaire Koch brothers, blasting Charles and David Koch from the Senate floor for their influence over Republicans.
The retiring senator opened his diatribe by defining the term oligarchy — “a government in which a small group exercises control for corrupt and selfish purposes,” he said, citing Webster’s dictionary…
Reid continued, ripping into his Republican colleagues for having “done nothing to stop the Kochs’ crooked works. Campaign funding is a nasty word to Senate Republicans. The United States Senate has a history of spending up to the corrupt interests of the Kochs.”
“The Kochs and their dark money empire are flooding the airwaves with misleading and false advertisements. Ads from the Koch brothers are not always easy to identify,” he said. “The groups that sponsor them have their names that sound harmless enough. Turn on a TV, open your mailbox and you will see a quick disclaimer and tiny print that says who paid for it. They say things like sponsored by Concerned Veterans of America or sponsored by Freedom Partners or paid for by the Libre Initiative or paid for by the Americans For Prosperity.”
Sacramento Bee: Tom Steyer says he doesn’t like getting enmeshed in Democratic legislative fights
Christopher Cadelago
Tom Steyer, the billionaire climate activist and Democratic benefactor, is throwing cold water on the idea of wading into a fractious California legislative fight between an incumbent backed by business interests and her environmental challenger.
Steyer, in a recent interview between meetings in Sacramento, said he was not interested in crashing all-Democratic runoffs and instead is directing his resources toward registering and engaging voters, with a particular focus on milennials.
“We feel like that is the best thing to get the best decisions across the board in California from the top to the bottom of the ballot,” Steyer said. “Our success in doing that, regardless of its impact on any specific race, will be our measure of success for 2016. More than any of the props. More than anything else.”
Political Parties
Vox: The liberal failure of political reform
Matt Grossmann and David A. Hopkins
Bernie Sanders spent the 2016 primary campaign vowing to lead a political revolution that would fundamentally reform American politics. Like Sanders, many liberals believe that an unfair and corrupt political system controlled by privileged interests represents the chief obstacle to the realization of an otherwise popular left-wing agenda. Enacting reforms to the electoral and legislative process, they argue, would effectively remove this barrier, quickly producing a decisive leftward shift in the trajectory of national policy.
Yet history does not support this view. Liberals in the 1970s also believed that institutions were holding back the advancement of their favored policies. They sought and achieved reforms in campaign finance, party nominations, government transparency, and congressional organization that were designed to depose moderate and conservative Democratic leaders while bolstering the influence of liberal activists at the expense of “establishment” interest groups. Rather than usher in a period of ambitious liberal achievements, these reforms in fact coincided with the close of an era of left-of-center policy change.
FEC
Intercept: Foreign Spending on U.S. Elections Threatens National Security, FEC Commissioner Says
Jon Schwarz
Calling foreign influence on U.S. elections “a matter of national security,” FEC commissioner Ellen Weintraub is joining her colleague Ann Ravel in calling for the full commission to plug the flow of foreign money into American political campaigns.
In a new memo to her five fellow commissioners, Weintraub writes that the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision created “new avenues for corporate political activity would make our democracy vulnerable to foreign individuals, corporations, and governments that seek to manipulate our elections.”
Donors
Oxford University Press: Small donor democracy? Don’t count on it
Robert E. Mutch
Under small-donor programs, candidates devote time and money trying to persuade otherwise uninvolved citizens to part with money they would rather spend on something else. Under a voucher program, candidates would devote time and money advising citizens on how to allocate money they can only spend on election campaigns…
The problem with small-donor programs is that they are organized to increase the number of small donors, but not to organize the donors themselves. Millions of unorganized donors are a statistic, not a political force. They look good on disclosure reports, but without organization they cannot have the kind of policy-making influence that would justify the term “democratization.” People have been chasing the dream of a small-donor democracy off and on for more than 100 years. The chase is on again, but the goal remains as illusory as ever.
Influence
The Hill: Nate Silver gives GOP donors a closed-door presentation
Jonathan Swan
Nate Silver, the ESPN journalist behind the FiveThirtyEight website, gave a presentation on the 2016 battleground map to a group of powerful Republican donors in Manhattan last week.
Silver was paid to give the presentation by the American Opportunity Alliance, a group led by some of the biggest GOP donors in the country, including hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer and the Ricketts family, which owns the Chicago Cubs.
Silver’s closed-door session was part of a two-day confab, held Sept. 7–8 at Le Bernardin Prive, a private dining room inside a New York City restaurant run by celebrity chef Eric Ripert.
Candidates and Campaigns
Time: How the 2016 Election Is Testing the Legal Standard on Corruption
Sam Frizell
In its Citizens United decision, the majority of the court argued that “the appearance of influence or access” to a politician “will not cause the electorate to lose faith in this democracy.”
Now Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are testing that proposition in very similar ways.
In recent weeks, the two presidential nominees have argued that well-timed donations involving their opponents led to political decisions that amounted to a form of corruption, even though neither has any solid proof. When it comes to each other, Clinton and Trump do not see the Supreme Court’s bright line.
Daily Beast: Trump Family Donated To D.C. Politicians Who Helped Pave Way for Trump Hotel
Gideon Resnick
The Trump Organization opened its latest property in Washington D.C. on Monday, four years after they first secured the rights — after Donald Trump and his children all donated as much as they could to D.C.’s mayor and representative in Congress, who were instrumental in the hotel’s development…
A spokesman for Norton dismissed the donations as completely ordinary.
“It is not unusual for businesses who build in the national capital region to contribute to Members of Congress,” communications director Benjamin Fritsch said in an email to The Daily Beast. “Congresswoman Norton was at the groundbreaking because of her role as the sponsor of the Old Post Office bill.”
On August 5, 2013, the Trump Organization officially signed the lease, agreeing to pay the federal government a base rent of $250,000 for the next 60 years for the property. Initially, they requested not to pay D.C. taxes for the building, an ask that was denied by D.C. Council Finance and Revenue Chairman Jack Evans.
The States
Denver Post: Colorado Supreme Court set to hear appeal over legal services being treated like campaign contributions
Tom McGhee
The Colorado Supreme Court will decide whether legal help to those engaged in political speech must be treated as political contributions under state campaign finance laws.
In April, the Colorado Court of Appeals ruled that legal services must be treated like political contributions. The Colorado Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to that decision last month, staying the lower court action to allow time to hear the case.
“The fact that the court stayed the lower court decision is a sign that they believe it is an important issue and that perhaps the Court of Appeals got it wrong,” Sam Gedge, an attorney with the Institute for Legal Justice, said Monday.
Los Angeles Times: California’s Citizens United ballot measure: Who’s for it, who’s against it and what it could really do
Sarah D. Wire
Critics of the proposition say it clutters California’s ballot with a measure that isn’t legally binding. That was the reason Gov. Jerry Brown gave for letting the bill that put the proposition on the ballot become law without his signature.
Brown wrote in a 2014 message that he disagrees with the Citizens United court decision “but we should not make it a habit to clutter our ballots with non-binding measures as citizens rightfully assume that their votes are meant to have legal effect.”
State Sen. Jeff Stone and Assemblyman Katcho Achadjian, the two California lawmakers who oppose the measure in the Secretary of State’s voter guide, also emphasized that the measure doesn’t actually create or modify a law.
“Proposition 59 DOES NOTHING…The Legislature should focus on doing its job and stop putting meaningless measures on the ballot to ask Congress to limit free speech by overturning the Supreme Court. Corporations give money, Labor unions give money. People give money. They all do it to support candidates they like and oppose candidates they don’t,”
