IRS

Weekly Standard: The Unaccountable IRS

By The Editors

On September 8, Donald Trump’s Justice Department announced it would not be reopening an investigation into the conduct of Lois Lerner, the IRS official responsible for targeting and harassing conservative groups in the 2010 and 2012 elections. That investigation had ended in 2015, when Barack Obama’s Justice Department stated it would not be charging Lerner or anyone else at the IRS because it “found no evidence that any IRS official acted based on political, discriminatory, corrupt or other inappropriate motives that would support a criminal prosecution.”

Lerner herself admitted “absolutely inappropriate” targeting had taken place but blamed it on “front-line people.” Soon after, she pleaded the Fifth in testimony to a congressional committee and was placed on administrative leave by the IRS…

The House Ways and Means Committee asked the Justice Department earlier this year to reexamine Lerner’s case. Committee chairman Kevin Brady told the Washington Post that the department’s decision to decline “sends the message that the same legal, ethical, and constitutional standards we all live by do not apply to Washington political appointees,” who “now have the green light to target Americans for their political beliefs and mislead investigators without ever being held accountable for their lawlessness.” 

FEC

CRP: Trump’s FEC pick worries watchdogs

By Geoff West

Trainor, an election law specialist with a history of fighting the Texas Ethics Commission over campaign finance disclosures, is known for his deregulatory attitude toward money in politics…

The nomination was panned by transparency groups, including Issue One and ReThink Media, which called for Trainor to recuse himself in any future FEC probe of Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election should he receive senate approval…

ReThink called on senators to consider the implications of Trainor’s appointment. It’s unclear when the Senate Rules Committee will hold a hearing.

Issue One also urged senators “to publicly and fully vet” a nominee with such antagonism for openness and oversight in campaign finance.

“(Trainor’s) prior stances on the regulation of dark money, his clashes with the Texas Ethics Commission and support for the Texas Senate defunding the body raise serious concerns as to whether he will be fully committed to enforcing the law, or like former FEC commissioner Don McGahn, more interested in nullifying long-standing election regulations and laws,” said Meredith McGehee, Issue One’s chief of policy, programs and strategy. 

Congress

The Hill: Washington dysfunction is damaging national security

By Thomas Kean and Timothy Roemer

Cronyism and the influence of special interests in both our politics and policymaking contaminates our government. A majority of members of Congress spend too much time fundraising and not enough on their legislative responsibilities…

Access to the legislative process has a price tag that makes it accessible mostly to the richest citizens in our country. Every election cycle, special interests use legal loopholes to hide their political spending…

We adhere to the principles of increasing disclosure of campaign spending, enforcing current laws on the books, holding bad actors accountable and increasing participation in our democracy. We agree that raising money for re-election is an essential part of public office, but find it embarrassing that the Federal Election Commission, which is in charge of enforcing our laws, is permanently gridlocked.

We are united by a singular purpose to return government to the American people, not the deep-pocketed donors who have perfected a pay-to-play system.

Ethics

Politico: Government ethics office says it will stick with ban on anonymous gifts

By Darren Samuelsohn

The head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics said on Friday that the agency is sticking with its long-standing stance prohibiting anonymous donations to White House legal defense funds, despite recently putting forward language that appeared to undercut that position.

OGE has been under fire this week in the wake of a POLITICO report detailing a small but potentially critical change to the agency’s official guidance document that the OGE’s recently departed director said could give a green light to President Donald Trump’s aides to accept anonymous donations to pay their attorney bills.

But David Apol, the acting OGE director, said in an interview Friday that there’s been no change – and he’s been giving advice to outside groups that are coming forward to set up legal defense funds for Trump aides as the Russia probe intensifies that they should have their donors disclose their identities.

Free Speech

Wall Street Journal: To Deal With Antifa, Designate It a Street Gang

By David Pyrooz and James Densley

The University of California estimates it cost $600,000 to keep order last week when a conservative commentator made an appearance on its flagship Berkeley campus. In recent months, self-styled antifascists, or “Antifa,” have entered public consciousness by holding disruptive, sometimes violent protests in cities across the nation. After Antifa members disrupted a pro-Trump rally in Berkeley last month, Mayor Jesse Arreguin labeled the loose-knit group a “gang.”

As criminologists who have studied gangs, in the U.S. and abroad, for a decade, we argue Antifa does meet the defining characteristics of a gang, with one important caveat. The gang label opens up a range of possibilities for countering Antifa-and, for that matter, gangs of the extreme right such as the ones they clashed with in Charlottesville, Va…

Protesting fascism is not a bad thing. But when protest turns violent, and when there are repeated incidents of violence, it doesn’t matter if it’s the Crips and the Bloods or Antifa and neo-Nazis. They all fall under our common definition and understanding of gangs.

The Media

Fast Company: Big Tech’s Half-Hearted Response To Fake News And Election Hacking

By Cale Guthrie Weissman

While they make head nods toward trying to fix the misinformation problem, the tech giants refuse to own up to these issues-citing the privacy of their clients and their own proprietary ad systems. “Advertisers consider their ad creatives and their ad targeting strategy to be competitively sensitive and confidential,” Rob Sherman, Facebook’s deputy chief privacy officer, told Reuters. “From our perspective, it’s confidential information of these advertisers.”

Still the call for more transparency is getting louder. Members of the U.S. Federal Election Commission are calling for better reporting from Facebook following the Russian ad buy revelations. Lawmakers have called for Facebook and Twitter to testify before Congress…

The difficult truth is that there is no clear way to fight the huge problem of misinformation. Though Russia may have used “fake news” as a way to meddle in U.S. affairs, the problem existed well before Putin became interested. Political campaigns have long used micro-targeting strategies to bring over undecided voters-though these efforts have never involved misinformation at such scale, and with such precise abilities to target and spread messages.

While it may seem noble that the big tech companies are taking up the charge, their current attempts will likely produce little effect. 

The States

Michigan Public Radio: Bill allowing unlimited political spending by corporations, unions passes state Senate

By Cheyna Roth

It passed legislation that would basically codify what the court said in its controversial Citizens United opinion.

State Senate Majority Leader Arlan Meekhof says campaign donations are a way to exercise free speech.

“I don’t think it’s Democrat or Republican. All people have free speech regardless of how they’re organized. And that includes unions,” Meekhof said.

Critics of the legislation say it gives special interests too much influence over elections.

Craig Mauger is with the Michigan Campaign Finance Network. He says the bill goes beyond the Supreme Court case and allows candidates to effectively go around current limits on how much money candidates can raise.

“The state has these limits on how much individuals and PACs can give to people and this bill would allow an easy way around that. Because you could solicit unlimited contributions to an entity that you could then work pretty closely with,” Mauger said. 

New Mexico In Depth: Dark Money rearing its head in ABQ elections

By Melorie Begay

With Albuquerque’s city election less than a month away, a number of independent groups have registered with the city as political committees, ramping up to make their views known…

While some groups have filed reports of money they’ve raised, others are actively running advertising with little or no information about them available.

These sorts of groups epitomize the term “dark money” that is often applied to independent political committees…

When they do file their fundraising report next Friday, it’s possible the money will have passed through other obscurely named PACs that make tracing money difficult. NMID will update readers when that information is posted, or when more information about the group is available…

Here’s a breakdown of all 2017 measure finance committees and what we know about them as of Sept. 9. NMID welcomes tips from readers about the identities of contributors and the advertisements of these groups.

Arizona Republic: Arizona agencies feud over policing ‘dark money’ groups; voters could be the losers

By Dustin Gardiner

As next year’s statewide elections get closer, several Arizona agencies are locked in a bitter feud to determine who has the power to police so-called “dark money” groups that spend millions to influence races.

The dispute is playing out in complicated legal tit-for-tats, but the heart of the fight is simple: Should the office of Secretary of State Michele Reagan or the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, a voter-created body, play the role of enforcer? And is there room for two policemen?

It’s unclear how the dispute will get resolved. Ultimately, courts may have to decide.

On one side, Gov. Doug Ducey’s Government Regulatory Review Council, a body that tries to eliminate unneeded rules, has moved to curtail the commission’s authority to monitor the groups.

Republicans argue the commission has overstepped its bounds and waded into Reagan’s turf.

But the commission, which was created when voters passed the Citizens Clean Elections Act in 1998, contends the act gave them that power. They accuse the state of trying to spurn transparency in elections.