CAMP FINANCE BAK2

TXT ONLY BOTH NODES<div>
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</div><div>campfinancebak521</div><div>
</div><div>MAIN</div><div>
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</div><div>see 2 capt 719 html Bradley Smith</div><div>
</div><div>See Citizen's United and 28th amendment</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;see mcConnell, mcCutcheon, dark $</div><div>
</div><div>see outside $</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;includes TRANSPARENCY</div><div>
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</div><div>wowsa. he was for it before he was against it</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/2019/06/newly-uncovered-video-exposes-mitch-mcconnells-corrupt-flip-flop-on-millionaires-funding-campaigns/</div><div>
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</div><div>Newly uncovered video exposes Mitch McConnell’s corrupt flip-flop on millionaires funding campaigns</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;Newly uncovered video exposes Mitch McConnell’s corrupt flip-flop on millionaires funding campaigns</div><div>
</div><div>written by Alex Henderson June 7, 2019</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;recent years, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has wholeheartedly agreed with the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and opposed a broad swath of campaign finance regulations as a violation of the 1st Amendment. Citizens United equated campaign contributions with speech, and McConnell backed that view. But an unearthed video of McConnell speaking in 1987 shows how egregiously he has flip-flopped.</div><div>
</div><div>Back in 1987, the Kentucky Republican (who is now 77) had only been in the U.S. Senate a few years: he was first elected to the Senate in 1984, defeating Democrat Walter Huddleston. In the 1987 video, McConnell was not only in favor of campaign finance regulations — he wanted a constitutional amendment setting limits on campaign contributions....“The constitutional amendment that I will be introducing is rather simple, and it deals with the millionaire problem,” McConnell explains in the video. “It simply would grant to this body and to the various state legislatures the authority to regulate what an individual could put into his own campaign — just like we have the constitutional authority to regulate what any of us can put into somebody else’s campaign.”</div><div>
</div><div>...</div><div>
</div><div>----</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/right-wing/blowing-democracy-and-charities-one-fell-swoop</div><div>
</div><div>There’s a great deal wrong with the House-passed tax overhaul bill, but its most heinous provision may be one that effectively blows up both the campaign-finance laws and the charitable sector at the same time.</div><div>
</div><div>By essentially repealing the so-called Johnson Amendment, a tax provision that bars charities from engaging in partisan politics, the House legislation frees up big donors to funnel even more unlimited, undisclosed money into campaigns, and, for the first time, to deduct that money from their taxes. The bill also threatens the credibility and viability of charitable groups, and would drastically reduce charitable giving—even as it robs education, housing, and health-care assistance from working families who invariably will turn to charities for help.</div><div>
</div><div>The Senate tax bill does not repeal the Johnson Amendment, enacted in 1954 at the urging of then–Senate Minority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson, and thousands of charitable and religious leaders are now lobbying to ensure that it stays in the final legislation. The list of those lined up against the repeal is impressive: 5,500 charities and foundations, 4,200 faith leaders, and more than 100 religious and denominational organizations.</div><div>
</div><div>So who wants it? Far-right Christian groups were the first to convince authors of the House bill to let churches alone engage in endorsements. But that measure was expanded at the last minute to include all charities, suggesting that big GOP donors, who would like nothing better than to deduct the big donations they funnel through nonprofits to influence elections, are gunning for it, too.</div><div>
</div><div>The repeal’s backers say it protects free speech and religious liberty, but these are red herrings. Churches and charities are perfectly free to endorse candidates, they just can’t do it with tax-free money. The government’s bargain with such groups is: We will exempt you from taxes and let you raise tax-deductible contributions, if you stay out of partisan politics. This protects charities from government meddling, and ensures that taxpayers aren’t forced to subsidize endorsements of candidates they oppose.</div><div>
</div><div>Campaign-finance watchdogs hate the repeal because it would create incentives for all political money to flow into unrestricted, secret channels. Right now, super PACs may raise unlimited money, but they at least must disclose its sources. Social-welfare and trade groups may raise limitless contributions, which they need not disclose, and they spend hundreds of millions on campaigns under the guise of promoting issues—but at least that money is not tax-deductible.</div><div>
</div><div>The House bill creates the very real possibility that political players will create sham “charities” and “churches” to rake in massive, undisclosed, and now tax-deductible campaign donations that will become the new normal in American elections. The campaign-finance system may seem like a world without rules today, but the freewheeling realm of super PACs and politically active social-welfare groups will look like a paragon of accountability and transparency if charities become the new vehicles of choice for political spending.</div><div>
</div><div>Even worse, say nonprofit-sector leaders, the bill would erode the public’s trust in charities, lumping them in with unpopular parties and candidates, and driving down contributions. “Charitable nonprofits don’t want to be dragged into the toxic political wasteland,” declared Tim Delaney, president and CEO of the National Council of Nonprofits, when the House unveiled its revised tax proposal earlier this month. Delaney and his allies warn that the House plan would also make churches and charities vulnerable to pressure from politicians.</div><div>
</div><div>The House tax bill purports to limit abuses by requiring charities to engage in politics only minimally and “in the ordinary course” of their normal activities. But this ill-defined standard would force the Internal Revenue Service, which has done virtually nothing to enforce political abuses by tax-exempts in any case, into the impossible role of charitable referee. If voters begin to see charities as quasi-political groups, moreover, Congress could face pressure to eliminate the deductibility of charitable contributions altogether.</div><div>
</div><div>All this comes on top of several other provisions in both the House and Senate tax bills that are expected to substantially reduce charitable giving. Both bills expand the standard tax deduction, which nonprofit sector advocates say would reduce charitable giving incentives for all but the wealthiest families. The House bill removes the estate tax, which has historically spurred charitable giving. The Senate bill retains the estate tax, but doubles the exemption amount—still threatening charitable donations, but to a lesser degree. The House bill would reduce charitable giving in 2018 by $12 billion to $20 billion, estimates the Tax Policy Center.</div><div>
</div><div>This year marks the centennial of the charitable tax deduction, which was first written into the tax code in 1917. Instead of celebrating, the nation’s charities are fighting for their lives. The GOP tax plan not only slashes services to average Americans to underwrite tax cuts for the super-rich, but also makes it harder for churches and other charities to pick up the slack. By erasing the firewall between charity and politics, the House bill doubles the damage. As Delaney, of the National Council of Nonprofits, told The American Prospect: “This is dangerous for democracy, and very harmful to the 501(c)(3) community.”</div><div>
</div><div>Eliza Newlin Carney is The American Prospect's senior editor.</div><div>
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</div><div>https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/cost.php</div><div>
</div><div>Cycle<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Total Cost of Election<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Congressional Races<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Presidential Race</div><div>2016<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$6,917,636,161<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$4,266,514,050<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,651,122,110</div><div>2014<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,845,393,700<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,845,393,700<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N/A</div><div>2012<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$6,285,557,223<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,664,141,430<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,621,415,792</div><div>2010<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,631,712,836<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,631,712,836<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N/A</div><div>2008<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$5,285,680,883<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,485,952,737<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,799,728,146</div><div>2006<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,852,658,140<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,852,658,140<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N/A</div><div>2004<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$4,147,304,003<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,237,073,141<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,910,230,862</div><div>2002<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,181,682,066<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,181,682,066<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N/A</div><div>2000<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,082,340,937<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,669,224,553<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,413,116,384</div><div>1998<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,618,936,265<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,618,936,265<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N/A</div><div>Presidential election</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>2016?</div><div>The price of winning just got higher, especially in the Senate</div><div>
</div><div>This election cycle, an average winning Senate candidate had spent $10.4 million through Oct. 19 (reflecting the latest reports filed with the Federal Election Commission). That’s a $1.8 million increase over the same period in the 2014 cycle. By the end of last cycle, the number rose to $10.6 million, and a similar uptick is expected this time once post-election and year-end reports are filed.</div><div>... read more.</div><div>---</div><div>Setting a new record and driving much of the higher cost of this year’s elections over 2012’s, outside groups that weren’t formally connected to either political party broke $1.4 billion in outlays in the 2016 cycle. That’s up from the $1 billion these groups — mostly super PACs and 501(c) organizations — spent in 2012, and way up from the $338 million spent in 2008.</div><div>... read more.</div><div>=</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>wfb's little bro:</div><div>
</div><div>v valeo</div><div>
</div><div>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckley_v.Valeo</div><div>
</div><div>A lawsuit was filed in the District Court for the D.C., on January 2, 1975, by Senator James L. Buckley, Conservative Party Senator from New York, former Senator,1968 presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy, a Democrat from Minnesota, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Conservative Union, the Peace & Freedom Party, the Libertarian Party, and numerous other plaintiffs. The named defendant in the caption was Francis R. Valeo, the Secretary of the Senate an ex officiomember of the FEC who represented the U.S. federal government. The trial court denied plaintiffs' request for declaratory and injunctive relief. Plaintiffs then appealed to the Court of Appeals and finally to the Supreme Court.</div><div>
</div><div>The plaintiffs argued that the legislation violated the 1st and 5th Amendment rights to freedom of expression and due process, respectively.</div><div>
</div><div>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_L.Buckley</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>Senator Bob Menendez</div><div>Senator Ed Markey</div><div>Senator Kay Hagan</div><div>Senator Mark Begich</div><div>Senator Michael Bennet</div><div>Senator Tom Udall</div><div>Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick</div><div>Rep. Annie Kuster</div><div>Rep. Bill Enyart&nbsp;</div><div>Rep. Bruce Braley</div><div>Rep. Carol Shea-Porter</div><div>Rep. Cheri Bustos</div><div>Rep. Dan Maffei&nbsp;</div><div>Rep. Dave Loebsack</div><div>Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz</div><div>Rep. Elizabeth Esty</div><div>Rep. Gary Peters</div><div>Rep. Jim McGovern</div><div>Rep. Joe Kennedy III</div><div>Rep. John Tierney</div><div>Rep. Julia Brownley</div><div>Rep. Linda Sanchez</div><div>Rep. Lois Capps</div><div>Rep. Louise Slaughter</div><div>Rep. Mark Takano</div><div>Rep. Nancy Pelosi</div><div>Rep. Niki Tsongas</div><div>Rep. Nita Lowey</div><div>Rep. Paul Tonko</div><div>Rep. Pete Gallego&nbsp;</div><div>Rep. Rick Nolan</div><div>Rep. Ron Barber</div><div>Rep. Scott Peters</div><div>Rep. Steve Israel</div><div>
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</div><div>Aaron Woolf, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Aimee Belgard, Candidate for Congress&nbsp;</div><div>Amanda Renteria, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Andrew Romanoff, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Ann Callis, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Bobby McKenzie, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Domenic Recchia, Candidate for Congress&nbsp;</div><div>Eric Schertzing, Candidate for Congress</div><div>George Sinner, Candidate for Congress&nbsp;</div><div>Jerry Cannon, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Jim Mowrer, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Joe Bock, Candidate for Congress</div><div>John Foust, Candidate for Congress&nbsp;</div><div>Margie Wakefield, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Martha Robertson, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Pam Byrnes, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Pete Aguilar, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Suzanne Patrick, Candidate for Congress</div><div>Dave Domina, Candidate for Nebraska Senate</div><div>Sandra Fluke, Candidate for California State Senate</div><div>Mark Schauer, Candidate for Michigan Governor</div><div>Mary Burke, Candidate for Wisconsin Governor</div><div>AMERIPAC, Steny H. Hoyer, Chairman</div><div>Daily Kos</div><div>LeftAction</div><div>DCCC</div><div>DSCC</div><div>New Jersey Democratic Party</div><div>
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</div><div>http://ecowatch.com/2014/04/30/dirty-money-dirty-fuels-politics/</div><div>
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</div><div>What if fighting dirty money in our elections was the key to fighting dirty fuels in our economy?</div><div>
</div><div>That’s the question asked in a recent report released by the Sierra Club and Oil Change International. From the perspective of the fossil fuel industry, political contributions are just another form of investment. The only difference is that, for the millions polluters spend on elections, they see billions in bonus profits.</div><div>
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</div><div>As the report says, “The return these polluters are getting on these political investments—in the form of billions in corporate tax handouts—exceed 5,000 percent, demonstrating that Congress remains the best ‘investment’ possible for the coal, oil, and gas industries.”</div><div>
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</div><div>The oil and gas industries are among the worst offenders. Between 2009 and 2010, the report estimates that they spent $347 million on lobbying and campaign contributions, and in return netted a handsome $20 billion in federal subsidies. Most of these came in the form of accounting gimmicks that help hide corporate profits and obscure tax breaks that help cover drilling and refining costs. Because of loopholes like these, the actual taxes paid by most big energy companies fall well below the top corporate rate of 35 percent.</div><div>
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</div><div>You would think that at a time when both Democrats and Republicans are preoccupied with deficits and debt, cutting subsidies for polluters should be an easy move. After all, these are some of the most profitable companies in world history; surely they need government support like Bill Gates needs food stamps. The fact that many of these giveaways are nearly a century old, dating from a time when fossil fuel extraction was a much riskier game, only adds to their irrelevance. At a time of significant fiscal strain, decades-old free money for rich polluters should be the first thing on the chopping block.</div><div>
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</div><div>Unfortunately, in the new world of campaign finance born after Citizens United and supercharged earlier this month by McCutcheon vs. FEC, money speaks much louder than fiscal and environmental sanity. The report points out that solid majorities of Americans support action on climate change, investment in renewable energy, and a repeal of fossil fuel subsidies. And yet, Congress is arguably in its most rabidly anti-environment phase in U.S. history, voting repeatedly to block action on climate change, cut support for renewable energy, and hobble enforcement of clean air and water provisions.</div><div>
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</div><div>The only way to solve this disconnect is through a new system of public financing. As such, the Sierra Club and Oil Change International are throwing their weight behind the recently sponsored Government By The People Act, which would allow federal candidates to receive money from small donors matched on a six-to-one basis. This would not end money in politics, or even strip polluters of their ability to purchase influence.</div><div>
</div><div>Winning those fights has to be part of a much longer campaign against corporate personhood and the idea of money as free speech. But in the meantime, it would give candidates who share the increasingly pro-environment sentiments of the American people a chance to be heard. Friends of the Earth supports the Government By The People Act and its vision for a more healthy and just world.</div><div>
</div><div>——–</div><div>
</div><div>YOU ALSO MIGHT LIKE</div><div>
</div><div>Supreme Court Chooses Dark Money Billionaires Over Environment</div><div>
</div><div>Activist Tom Steyer Challenges Koch Brothers to Climate Debate</div><div>
</div><div>Climate Leaders Tell Bill Moyers About The Need For Global Fossil Fuel Divestment</div><div>
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</div><div>&nbsp;SJ 19 scholar testimony: http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/06-03-14RaskinTestimony.pdf</div><div>
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</div><div>JH: Just one year after their Citizens United decision unleashed CEOs to be able to roll truckloads of their shareholders' funds into our elections (without asking those shareholders for permission or even informing them after the fact), that same five assaulted our democracy again. Their 2011 verdict in the Arizona Free Enterprise Club case increased the volume of CorporateSpeak in elections by decreasing the speech of non-rich candidates. Specifically, they rejected the will of Arizonans who had voted to provide public funds for candidates who are willing to forego all special-interest money. This system gave the political ideas of the non-wealthy a chance to be heard when up against the multimillion-dollar PR megaphones of the Koch brothers, Karl Rove, BigOil, the Walmart heirs, and other super-wealthy oligarchs. Public financing of elections was successfully widening public debate and freeing up political speech, so the five corporate supremists stepped in to kill it, absurdly declaring that such laws give an "unfair advantage" to little-guy campaigns.</div><div>
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</div><div>Next came this year's McCutcheon opinion, in which the same five blew the lid off the limits on money that an individual can pour on candidates during any given election cycle. The limit had been $123,000--high enough that only about 600 people out of our 330 million reached that maximum in 2012. The Court's narrow majority lifted the allowable total for one person's election-year spending to a stunning $5.9 million. That empowers a handful of the richest of rich donors--even fewer than 600--to overwhelm the political voices of millions of common citizens, all in the name of free speech. Adding to this absurdity, this five-man wrecking crew blithely declares in its McCutcheon ruling that even transactions that appear to be obvious conflicts of interest are permissible (e.g., a CEO can give $25,000 to the head of a congressional committee--the same person who a week later can put a bill on the floor to benefit the CEO's corporation). Such corrupt transactions apparently "do not justify" putting restrictions on campaign contributions. Instead, the wily ones ruled that the only donor-to-donee corruption that can be regulated is outright quid pro quo bribery.</div><div>
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</div><div>Note: The Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights Subcommittee of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee today approved an amended S.J. Res. 19, a constitutional amendment proposed by U.S. Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) that aims to overturn Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and other U.S. Supreme Court decisions relating to campaign finance.</div><div>
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</div><div>CA camp finance reform</div><div>
</div><div>Introduced by Senator Lieu</div><div>(Principal coauthor: Senator Jackson)</div><div>(Coauthors: Senators DeSaulnier, Hancock, Padilla, and Torres)</div><div>(Coauthors: Assembly Members Muratsuchi, V. Manuel Pérez, Skinner, Wieckowski and Williams)</div><div>
</div><div>February 21, 2014</div><div>
</div><div>SB 1272 that would put a MTA measure on the statewide ballot has passed out of the Senate and is headed to the Assembly. They may actually beat the looming deadline.</div><div>http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB1272</div><div>
</div><div>BTW, it passed on a 23-12 vote. Every one of the 12 are Republicans.</div><div>
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</div><div>CA win:&nbsp; We did it!&nbsp; On Wednesday, Governor Brown signed SB 27, the bill to force Dark Money non-profits to reveal their secret funders in California elections.</div><div>
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</div><div>Here's what I said about it in the Sacramento Bee:</div><div>
</div><div>“Governor Brown’s signature of SB 27 marks a turning point in the fight to reveal secret funders of political campaigns. It starts to shed light on dark money in California and serves as an example for the entire nation."</div><div>
</div><div>Here's the full story in the Sacramento Bee:</div><div>http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/14/6406111/gov-brown-signs-law-requiring.html</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/31/mccutcheon-supreme-court_n_3678555.html?view=print&comm_ref=false</div><div>
</div><div>Next Citizens United? McCutcheon Supreme Court Case Targets Campaign Contribution Limits</div><div>Posted: 07/31/2013 7:25 am EDT&nbsp; |&nbsp; Updated: 07/31/2013 1:10 pm EDT</div><div>
</div><div>WASHINGTON -- The next big campaign finance case to go before the Supreme Court began in February 2012 in the grand ballroom at the Marriott Wardman Park hotel during the "Ronald Reagan Banquet" at the Conservative Political Action Conference.</div><div>
</div><div>Alabama electrical engineer and budding political donor Shaun McCutcheon broached a problem in conversation with conservative election lawyer Dan Backer, who one day earlier had led a CPAC panel on rolling back campaign finance laws in which he predicted that campaign contribution limits would soon rise.</div><div>
</div><div>McCutcheon had recently learned there were overall federal campaign contribution limits on what a single donor could give during a two-year election cycle. He voiced his annoyance to Backer and wondered if he could just ignore the aggregate limits -- something that a few dozen donors wound up doing, whether deliberately or inadvertently, in the 2012 election.</div><div>
</div><div>"He could tell I didn't like 'em, so he said we could challenge and it would go all the way to the Supreme Court," McCutcheon recalled in an interview with The Huffington Post. "I didn't really believe him."</div><div>
</div><div>A little more than a year later, McCutcheon, now joined by the Republican National Committee, is bringing the biggest campaign finance case before the Supreme Court since the controversial 2010 Citizens United decision. If the justices rule in their next term to toss the overall limits, it would mark the first time the Supreme Court had found a federal contribution limit unconstitutional and would open the door for even more money to flood the political system.</div><div>
</div><div>It would also be a major victory for counter-reformers, who have racked up a string of wins rolling back campaign finance regulation ever since Justice Samuel Alito replaced the more campaign regs-friendly Sandra Day O'Connor. And it would be a major blow to the campaign finance regime crafted in the 1970s following a string of corruption scandals culminating in the abuses revealed in the Watergate investigation.</div><div>
</div><div>For the 2013-2014 election cycle, Federal Election Commission rules state that a donor can give no more than $123,200 to all political committees with two sub-limits of $48,600 to candidates and $74,600 to political parties and political action committees. Without these overall caps, a single donor supporting one political party could theoretically give more than $5 million in individually limited contributions to every House candidate, every Senate candidate, every state party committee, every national party committee and every leadership PAC.</div><div>
</div><div>The case of McCutcheon v. FEC is being managed by a team of attorneys who have made careers out of working a long game to roll back campaign finance laws, including lead counsel Jim Bopp, the first lawyer on the Citizens United case, and Backer and Stephen Hoersting. The challengers argue that the aggregate limits are an unconstitutional burden on free speech and do not serve the purpose of reducing quid pro quo corruption or the appearance thereof.</div><div>
</div><div>"This is a case about how to spend your money how you choose, and it's a very important First Amendment case about freedom of speech," McCutcheon said. "We should be able to support as many candidates as we want. There's no reason to limit the number of candidates or committees."</div><div>
</div><div>Supporters of stronger campaign finance oversight disagree strongly. They say that campaign contribution limits being up for debate is a sign of how successful the counter-reformers have already been and how unfriendly the current Supreme Court is to campaign finance regulation.</div><div>
</div><div>"The fact that they are setting their sights on even this most basic feature of campaign regulation just shows how far the conversation has shifted on campaign finance," said Brenda Wright, vice president for legal strategies at Demos and the lead author of an amicus brief opposing McCutcheon. "And it's really important for the court not to take that next step. The court really needs to put a stop to the damage that's been done to our campaign finance regulations."</div><div>
</div><div>In a string of amici briefs filed with the Supreme Court on July 25, campaign reform advocates argue that the elimination of the aggregate limits would open the door for candidates to solicit checks of over $1 million through joint fundraising committees and undermine the individual contribution limits by allowing donations to be shifted among an unlimited number of candidates and PACs.</div><div>
</div><div>"This is a not very thinly disguised first step to try to get an absolute anything-goes, no-limits regime on campaign contributions," said Charles Fried, a former solicitor general under President Ronald Reagan and the author of an amicus brief submitted by Americans for Campaign Reform.</div><div>
</div><div>McCutcheon, however, denies that he wants to change the direct contribution limits, stating, "This is not about base limits. This is about aggregate limits."</div><div>
</div><div>Yet a ruling undoing overall contribution limits could, in fact, undermine the legal standing of individual contribution limits in future court challenges. University of California-Irvine election law professor Rick Hasen explained on his Election Law Blog, "It is possible in this case, for example, that the conservative five Justices ... set out a general standard for reviewing contribution limits which makes them harder to sustain against constitutional challenge."</div><div>
</div><div>Further, in the most radical and unlikely possibility, the court could decide that the case requires a ruling on the underlying question of the constitutionality of all contribution limits -- much as it did with independent spending in the Citizens United ruling -- and then find all such limits to be unconstitutional.</div><div>
</div><div>In the past, the Supreme Court has supported the overall limits as an extension of the direct contribution limits. The court in the landmark 1976 Buckley v. Valeo decision found that the overall limits "prevent evasion of the [direct] contribution limitation by a person who might otherwise contribute massive amounts of money to a particular candidate through the use of unearmarked contributions to political committees likely to contribute to that candidate, or huge contributions to the candidate's political party."</div><div>
</div><div>The court has also found the acceptance or solicitation of "huge contributions" by lawmakers to be a legitimate concern, creating the appearance of corruption, if not leading to actual corruption, as in the Nixon White House.</div><div>
</div><div>In their brief before the court, however, McCutcheon and the RNC argue that the system of contribution caps supported in Buckley and subsequent decisions has been made irrelevant by the Citizens United ruling, which opened the door to unlimited independent spending by corporations, unions and, through a lower court ruling, individuals.</div><div>
</div><div>The unlimited spending allowed by Citizens United does raise the question of whether overall limits -- or even individual contribution limits -- matter when a donor can simply give unlimited amounts to support or oppose a candidate through a super PAC or a non-disclosing nonprofit. This reasoning has been echoed in a handful of state capitals where lawmakers have passed legislation since the 2010 decision to raise contribution limits in order to help candidates remain competitive with the rising tide of independent spending.</div><div>
</div><div>After pondering and rejecting this argument, D.C. Circuit Judge Janice Rogers Brown, writing for a three-judge panel in the lower court,predicted where the arguments made by McCutcheon and the RNC would be decided. "Plaintiffs raise the troubling possibility that Citizens United undermined the entire contribution limits scheme, but whether that case will ultimately spur a new evaluation of Buckley is a question for the Supreme Court, not us," she wrote.</div><div>
</div><div>The Supreme Court may ultimately decide to strike down or uphold the overall limits, but there is also a middle path. The court could find the overall limits to be generally constitutional, but their level to be unconstitutionally low. This would require Congress to set new caps that meet with whatever requirements the court decides are appropriate.</div><div>
</div><div>Oral arguments in McCutcheon v. FEC are scheduled for Oct. 8, with a ruling likely to arrive just in time for a potential new explosion of money in the 2014 midterms.</div><div>
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</div><div>http://www.alternet.org/print/news-amp-politics/how-one-state-senate-just-screwed-whole-nation</div><div>
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</div><div>With the final 2012 campaign finance reports, and their amendments, all in (well, mostly), the Center for Responsive Politics calculates that the elections cost at least $6.3 billion -- more than we previously estimated.</div><div>
</div><div>The final figure cements 2012's status as the most expensive election cycle ever.</div><div>
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</div><div>The 2012 Election: Our Price Tag (Finally) for the Whole Ball of Wax</div><div>By Russ Choma on March 13, 2013 4:04 PM</div><div>With the final 2012 campaign finance reports, and their amendments, all in (well, mostly), the Center for Responsive Politics calculates that the elections cost at least $6.3 billion -- more than we previously estimated.</div><div>
</div><div>The final figure cements 2012's status as the most expensive election cycle ever.</div><div>
</div><div>In late October, we estimated that the election would cost about $6 billion. Even that figure was a revision of a $5.8 billion calculus made earlier in the year. Skyrocketing outside spending continually exceeded estimates, causing us to revise up.</div><div>
</div><div>The cost of the presidential election alone remains at roughly the figure we calculated in late October, about $2.6 billion. Spending on congressional races by candidates and other committees and groups topped $3.6 billion in 2012.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>On the presidential level, President Barack Obama's re-election campaign outspent the campaigns of all his Republican rivals put together. Obama's campaign spent about $737.9 million, compared to the combined Republican total of $624.8 million. Spending by other committees in the presidential race, however, heavily favored Republicans and helped make up the deficit.</div><div>
</div><div>The Republican National Committee, for instance, laid out $333.9 million for the presidential contest, far more than the Democratic National Committee's $197.8 million. Outside spending by super PACs and politically active nonprofits on the presidential race also came out heavily in favor of Republicans. Conservative outside groups spent $454.5 million to get a Republican elected president, while liberal outside groups spent a relatively paltry $124.5 million.</div><div>
</div><div>election_totals2.png</div><div>(click to expand)</div><div>
</div><div>Spending by all House and Senate candidates topped $1.7 billion, with House candidates alone responsible for almost exactly $1 billion of the total. House Republican candidates held the edge in spending, accounting for about $532 million, while Democrats accounted for $447 million. In the Senate, Democratic candidates were also outspent -- $331.4 million to $408.5 million by the GOP Senate candidates.</div><div>
</div><div>Outside spending on congressional races also heavily favored Republicans over Democrats. Conservative outside spending groups spent $103.5 million on House races, compared to $81.6 million by liberal groups. Similarly, conservative outside groups spent $171.3 million on Senate races, while liberal outside groups spent $98.5 million.</div><div>
</div><div>One calculation by which Democrats led Republicans was in non-presidential party spending. Both parties together spent a total of $1 billion this election, of which $583 million was spent by the Democratic party committees and Republican party committees spent $444.7 million.</div><div>
</div><div>An important note: We have modified the methodology by which we calculate total cost, and thus a precise comparison between the costs of the 2012 election and the 2008 election is not possible. Previously, we calculated party spending by relying on press releases provided by the FEC. Now, we are able to use more detailed and newly provided summary data to calculate these totals. Furthermore, we used to be unable to include a calculation for spending by PACs on overhead expenses such as salary and office rent, but the new data allows us to include these totals. We have recalculated the final cost of the 2010 election, but can't do so for earlier cycles because the more detailed data is not available from the Federal Election Commission.</div><div>
</div><div>A full breakout of our analysis is below:</div><div>Category <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>PresMoney <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>TotalSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>DemsSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>RepubsSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>ThirdParty <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>DemPct <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>RepubPct&nbsp;</div><div>Candidates - President<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Y<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,368,206,593<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$737,922,197<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$624,852,550<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$5,431,846<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>54%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>46%</div><div>Candidates - Delegates<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$4,044,581<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,806,319<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$215,250<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$23,013<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>94%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>5%</div><div>Candidates - House<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$990,520,291<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$447,445,724<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$532,904,194<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$10,241,744<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>45%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>54%</div><div>Candidates - Senate<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$754,674,391<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$331,407,202<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$408,596,395<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$14,669,794<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>44%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>54%</div><div>Party Cmtes - DNC & RNC<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Y<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$531,728,184<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$197,806,594<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$333,921,590<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$0<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>37%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>63%</div><div>Party Cmtes - Other<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,033,655,168<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$583,687,734<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$444,801,054<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$5,166,379<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>56%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>43%</div><div>527 federal Cmtes<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$153,737,286<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$90,058,019<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$48,728,875<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$12,275,571<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>59%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>32%</div><div>Outside Money House<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$205,309,245<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$81,645,668<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$103,564,965<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$20,098,612<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>40%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>50%</div><div>Outside Money Senate<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$275,311,581<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$98,536,705<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$171,366,087<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$5,408,789<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>36%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>62%</div><div>Outside Money Pres<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Y<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$579,701,415<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$124,556,324<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$454,475,843<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$669,248<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>21%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>78%</div><div>PAC Overhead<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>N<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$246,888,887<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$17,993,144<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$52,330,994<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$249,586<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>7%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>21%</div><div>FEC funding of conventions<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Y<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$35,379,600<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$17,689,800<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$17,689,800<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$0<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>50%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>50%</div><div>Host Committee Fund Raising<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>Y<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$106,400,000<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$54,000,000<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$52,400,000<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$0<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>51%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>49%</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span></div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>&nbsp;</div><div>Grand Total<span style="white-space:pre"> </span></div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$6,285,557,223<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,786,555,430<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,245,847,596<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$74,234,582<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>44%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>52%</div><div>Grand Total Pres Only<span style="white-space:pre"> </span></div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$2,621,415,792<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,131,974,915<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,483,339,783<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$6,101,094<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>43%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>57%</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span></div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span> <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>&nbsp;</div><div>Congress (by default)<span style="white-space:pre"> </span></div><div>&nbsp;<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$3,664,141,430<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,654,580,515<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$1,762,507,814<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>$68,133,488<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>45%<span style="white-space:pre"> </span>48%</div><div>Category <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>PresMoney <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>TotalSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>DemsSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>RepubsSpent <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>ThirdParty <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>DemPct <span style="white-space:pre"> </span>RepubPct&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Researcher Doug Weber contributed to this article.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>Categories:</div><div>Congress,</div><div>Congressional Elections,</div><div>Election Overview,</div><div>Politicians & Elections,</div><div>Presidential Election</div><div>Tags:</div><div>$6.3 billion,</div><div>2012,</div><div>barack obama,</div><div>Democratic National Committee,</div><div>DNC,</div><div>GOP,</div><div>presidential race,</div><div>Republican National Committee,</div><div>RNC,</div><div>russ choma,</div><div>total cost of election</div><div>http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2013/03/the-2012-election-our-price-tag-fin.html</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Last week, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a new case — McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission.</div><div>
</div><div>The McCutcheon case attempts to undermine the total combined contributions limit for individuals (already set at tens of thousands of dollars), which will open a whole new floodgate of cash into our electoral system reserved only for the wealthy.</div><div>
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</div><div>http://www.publicintegrity.org/2012/06/20/9145/us-chamber-gop-block-election-ad-transparency-bill</div><div>
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</div><div>DISCLOSE ACT beat by US CoC/gop:</div><div>
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</div><div>In 2010, legislation introduced by Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., would require nonprofits that buy political ads to disclose their donors. The bill — fought by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's most powerful business lobby — failed. A stripped-down version introduced this year has been blocked by Republicans in both the House and Senate.</div><div>
</div><div>The Chamber claims disclosure would “silence free speech.” Critics say its opposition is more about shielding the business association’s corporate donors from a potential public backlash.</div><div>
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</div><div>While a handful of moderate Republicans, most notably campaign finance reform champion Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., have considered taking up the bill this year, it’s still considered a longshot.</div><div>
</div><div>Republican House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio also opposes the bill. His office did not did not respond to requests for comment for this story, but Boehner said the 2010 version was a "backroom deal to shred our Constitution for raw, ugly, partisan gain."</div><div>
</div><div>But in 2007, Boehner said on “Meet the Press” that there should be “full disclosure of all of the money that we raise and how it is spent.” And seven years before that, McConnell said on the same show that “Republicans are in favor of disclosure.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Despite numerous requests, Van Hollen, the bill’s author, did not grant an interview and instead released a statement through his representative.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear from the DISCLOSE Act 2012.”</div><div>
</div><div>Disclosure has become a partisan issue — only two out of 114 cosponsors of the 2010 bill in the House were Republicans — then-Rep. Mike Castle, R-Del., and Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C. This year, not one of the House bill’s 160 co-sponsors or the Senate bill’s 44 co-sponsors is Republican.</div><div>
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</div><div>Adam Skaggs, counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice, which advocates for campaign finance reform, said that since the 2012 bill is more closely tailored to disclosure and not cluttered with other issues support or opposition among members of Congress should be telling.</div><div>
</div><div>“By eliminating some of the provisions that prompted opposition in the first version of the act, the current bill presents members with Congress with a stark choice,” he said. “Do you support transparency in elections or do you not?”</div><div>
</div><div>For up-to-date news on outside money in the election, follow our Source2012 Tumblr and the hashtag #Source2012 on Twitter.</div><div>
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</div><div>full:ish</div><div>
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</div><div>In 2010, legislation introduced by Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., would require nonprofits that buy political ads to disclose their donors. The bill — fought by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's most powerful business lobby — failed. A stripped-down version introduced this year has been blocked by Republicans in both the House and Senate.</div><div>
</div><div>The Chamber claims disclosure would “silence free speech.” Critics say its opposition is more about shielding the business association’s corporate donors from a potential public backlash.</div><div>
</div><div>Transparency means ‘informed decisions’</div><div>“Disclosure permits citizens and shareholders to react to the speech of corporate entities in a proper way,” wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy in his majority opinion in the Citizens United case. “This transparency enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages.”</div><div>
</div><div>But the reality is there is often no transparency in the current system.</div><div>
</div><div>Crossroads GPS spent $16 million on “express advocacy” in 2010, more than $15 million on ads bashing Democrats. That’s far more than any other non-disclosing group, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan, nonprofit group that tracks money in politics.</div><div>
</div><div>The outside spending addressed by the high court is in two categories: Independent expenditures and electioneering communications.</div><div>
</div><div>An independent expenditure group buys ads that urge voters to support or reject a candidate. Electioneering communications allow the mention of a candidate but stop short of urging a yes or no vote. In either case, coordinating the ads with a candidate is prohibited.</div><div>
</div><div>What DISCLOSE discloses</div><div>The 2010 DISCLOSE Act introduced by Van Hollen contained a number of provisions that were not strictly related to disclosure. For example, it barred campaign contributions from government contractors, foreign-owned businesses and companies that received government bailouts.</div><div>
</div><div>Nonprofits were required to report their donors when spending reached a certain level. And it required the group’s leaders to appear in a disclaimer approving the message conveyed in the ad.</div><div>
</div><div>The Chamber spends the bulk of its money on electioneering advertising. A key provision of the bill would expand the definition of electioneering. Currently, only electioneering advertising made within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election must be reported.</div><div>
</div><div>Consequently, there is a disclosure gap.</div><div>
</div><div>And even when an ad buy is made within the disclosure period, the Chamber and other groups in the past have not revealed their donors. In Van Hollen v. Federal Election Commission a judge recently decided that all donors who give more than $1,000 to electioneering groups must now be disclosed. An appeal of the decision is pending.</div><div>
</div><div>In response, the Chamber — which is a nonprofit corporation — announced on May 21 that it would no longer make electioneering ads and switch to independent expenditures so it can continue to keep its donors secret.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2010 the Chamber was especially outspoken against regulations on government contractors and argued the bill unfairly targeted businesses’ speech while insulating unions.</div><div>
</div><div>Unions also opposed parts of the bill. They were concerned that reporting requirements would pose an unnecessary burden by requiring fund transfers among chapters be reported within 24 hours.</div><div>
</div><div>Broadcasters voiced their opposition in 2010, particularly when it came to the provisions expanding the requirement that they offer political airtime at the lowest rate.</div><div>
</div><div>Clean bill</div><div>The 2012 DISCLOSE Act eliminates almost all those points of contention.</div><div>
</div><div>Restrictions on government contractors are gone and unions are subject to the same reporting requirements as the other groups.</div><div>
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</div><div>Like the first version, DISCLOSE 2.0 requires that once an outside spending group has spent a certain amount, it must report the identity of each contributor who gave $10,000 or more. Groups must “stand by” their ads, the same way candidates do. And corporations, unions and other organizations that file annual financial reports must include their campaign-related spending.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2010, the Chamber was one of 113 organizations to lobby the bill and by far the largest. In 2010, it spent $100.2 million on lobbying. The 2012 bill hasn’t attracted nearly as much attention, due no doubt to its almost certain failure thanks to Republican opposition. The Chamber is again leading the fight. It sent a letter, signed by 124 organizations, to the Senate in May voicing its opposition.</div><div>
</div><div>Among the signers were the Associated Builders and Contractors and several of its local chapters, Edison Electric Institute and the Wichita Independent Business Association, whose board of directors includes Koch Industries’ vice president of government and public affairs, Mark Nichols.</div><div>
</div><div>The bill “is designed to chill the political speech of corporations, business interests, and others, while giving labor unions special protections,” the letter says. “The bill does not propose genuine reform — its disclosure requirements are transparently political and ultimately unconstitutional.”</div><div>
</div><div>Chamber spokeswoman Blair Latoff called the bill “politically motivated” and designed “to single out and stifle the speech of …the business community.”</div><div>
</div><div>The bill does not ban businesses from election advertising — it only requires them to go public. When asked how DISCLOSE would “stifle” speech, the Chamber did not respond. Advocates for disclosure say the speech issue is a smoke screen.</div><div>
</div><div>“By keeping its donors secret, the Chamber prevents the brand names of its members from being associated with policies and politicians that half of the public — their customers — reject,” said Bill Allison of the pro-open-government group the Sunlight Foundation. “The Chamber serves the interests of its members, and in politics, that means anonymity.”</div><div>
</div><div>Speech or secrecy?</div><div>As a tax-exempt trade organization, the Chamber does not report who its donors are, though filings with the IRS do include contribution totals. In 2010, the Chamber collected $188 million from contributions alone.</div><div>
</div><div>Its 138-member board of directors includes top executives from a cross-section of the largest corporations in America. Their interests include oil and gas, pharmaceuticals, transportation, telecommunications, insurance and finance.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Unions have been much quieter this time around. Bill Samuel, director of government affairs at the AFL-CIO, said they strongly support additional corporate disclosure.</div><div>
</div><div>“We’re pretty much an open book,” Samuel said, referencing the detailed reports on membership, dues, revenue and expenditures that unions file with the Department of Labor. “There’s no comparable disclosure for companies.”</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The nation’s best-known defender of individual rights, the American Civil Liberties Union, opposes the bill.</div><div>
</div><div>“Anonymity in speech is really critically important,” said Michael Macleod-Ball, the ACLU’s legislative chief of staff. He said the bill harms groups that are purely involved in policy issues, not electing politicians.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The ACLU runs ads that fall into the electioneering communications category but does not take sides. If the issue at hand is controversial — Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, for example — revealing donors could increase the chance of retaliation, MacCleod-Ball said.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But Richard Hasen, a campaign finance lawyer, testified before a Senate committee that the bill’s high dollar-amount thresholds and the option for nonprofits to create a separate account to preserve the anonymity of donors who do not make election-related contributions provide ample constitutional protections.</div><div>
</div><div>“Disclosure laws can prevent corruption and the appearance of corruption … provide valuable information to voters … [and] help enforce other campaign finance laws,” he said.</div><div>
</div><div>Social welfare?</div><div>Groups like Crossroads GPS are organized as 501(c)(4)s and known as “social welfare” organizations. They may not make politics their “primary” activity, according to IRS rules.</div><div>
</div><div>These 501(c)(4) groups make up an increasing percentage of outside spending.</div><div>
</div><div>In the 2010 election, they outspent super PACs by a 3-to-2 margin, according to a Center for Public Integrity study.</div><div>
</div><div>Crossroads GPS, co-founded by Republican operative Karl Rove, is one of the most active nonprofits. In 2010 and 2011, it raised $76.8 million, the Center for Public Integrity has reported, far more than the $46.4 million raised by its sister super PAC American Crossroads during the same period.</div><div>
</div><div>Top Democratic 501(c)(4)s include Priorities USA, affiliated with pro-Obama super PAC Priorities USA Action; American Bridge, affiliated with pro-Democrat super PAC American Bridge 21st Century; and America Votes, which gained prominence from a $1 million contribution in early May from hedge fund billionaire George Soros.</div><div>
</div><div>GOP opposes DISCLOSE</div><div>DISCLOSE 2012 has gone nowhere.</div><div>
</div><div>Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., led the filibuster that doomed the bill in the Senate in 2010. A representative for McConnell would not comment on the 2012 bill despite repeated requests.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>While a handful of moderate Republicans, most notably campaign finance reform champion Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., have considered taking up the bill this year, it’s still considered a longshot.</div><div>
</div><div>Republican House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio also opposes the bill. His office did not did not respond to requests for comment for this story, but Boehner said the 2010 version was a "backroom deal to shred our Constitution for raw, ugly, partisan gain."</div><div>
</div><div>But in 2007, Boehner said on “Meet the Press” that there should be “full disclosure of all of the money that we raise and how it is spent.” And seven years before that, McConnell said on the same show that “Republicans are in favor of disclosure.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Despite numerous requests, Van Hollen, the bill’s author, did not grant an interview and instead released a statement through his representative.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear from the DISCLOSE Act 2012.”</div><div>
</div><div>Disclosure has become a partisan issue — only two out of 114 cosponsors of the 2010 bill in the House were Republicans — then-Rep. Mike Castle, R-Del., and Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C. This year, not one of the House bill’s 160 co-sponsors or the Senate bill’s 44 co-sponsors is Republican.</div><div>
</div><div>Adam Skaggs, counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice, which advocates for campaign finance reform, said that since the 2012 bill is more closely tailored to disclosure and not cluttered with other issues support or opposition among members of Congress should be telling.</div><div>
</div><div>“By eliminating some of the provisions that prompted opposition in the first version of the act, the current bill presents members with Congress with a stark choice,” he said. “Do you support transparency in elections or do you not?”</div><div>
</div><div>For up-to-date news on outside money in the election, follow our Source2012 Tumblr and the hashtag #Source2012 on Twitter.</div><div>
</div><div> George Soros is the chairman and founder of the Open Society Foundations, which is a financial supporter of the Center for Public Integrity. To learn more about the Center’s funders, please go here.</div><div>
</div><div>Correction (June 26, 3:02pm): The Center originally reported that Crossroads GPS raised $76.8 million in 2011 and that American Crossroads raised $46.4 million in 2011. The story has been updated to indicate these totals are for 2010 and 2011.</div><div>
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</div><div>History, incl pacS:&nbsp; GANGS OF AMERICA</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Only one problem stood in the way of corporations putting together</div><div>a system for deploying political money at the federal level: a</div><div>174</div><div>Progressive Era law known as the Tillman Act. The Tillman Act originated</div><div>in an 1898 scandal in the Republican Party involving Ohio mining</div><div>magnate Marcus Hanna, a major player in the party and a fundraiser for</div><div>William McKinley. It was Hanna who made the memorable observation,</div><div>“There are two things that are important in politics. The first is</div><div>money and I don’t remember what the second one is.”</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Under Hanna’s direction, the Republican Party systematically extracted</div><div>contributions from banks and corporations, each according to its</div><div>“stake in the general prosperity.” The scandal led to calls for campaign</div><div>finance reform, which went unheeded until 1904, when Alton B. Parker,</div><div>the Democratic presidential nominee, charged that corporations were</div><div>providing gifts to President Theodore Roosevelt in return for access and</div><div>influence. Roosevelt denied the charges, and in his annual messages in</div><div>1905 and 1906 he called for campaign finance reform. Under the sponsorship</div><div>of Senator Benjamin “Pitchfork” Tillman, Congress began considering</div><div>such legislation, which finally passed and became law in 1907.</div><div>The Tillman Act banned contributions by corporations to federal campaigns.</div><div>In 1947, the Taft-Hartley Act added labor unions to the ban.</div><div>On the surface, the 1970s did not look like an auspicious time to</div><div>try to undo the ban on the use of corporate political donations. In fact,</div><div>corporate donations had a particularly bad image at the time after revelations</div><div>during the Watergate scandal that numerous businesses had</div><div>doled out money to President Nixon from secret political slush funds. In</div><div>one notorious incident, the chairman of Archer Daniels Midland had</div><div>walked into the White House and handed the President’s personal secretary</div><div>an envelope stuffed with a thousand $100 bills. Eventually, twelve</div><div>corporations were shown to have donated $750,000 in cash to Nixon.</div><div>Given public outrage over such activities, it was unlikely that the</div><div>Tillman Act ban on corporate contributions to candidates would be revoked.</div><div>A more sophisticated avenue would have to be developed.</div><div>That avenue arrived from an improbable source: the labor movement.</div><div>After the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 had banned labor unions from</div><div>contributing to federal candidates, labor unions had invented the political</div><div>action committee. PACs had allowed unions to get around the ban</div><div>
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</div><div>THE REVOLT OF THE BOSSES 175</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>on union political contributions by encouraging their members to donate</div><div>on an individual basis to a union-sponsored PAC, which in turn made</div><div>contributions to candidates. But even after PACs were legalized for</div><div>corporations by the Federal Election Campaign Act in 1971 and 1974,</div><div>corporations found them of little use because the law allowed them to</div><div>solicit stockholders but not employees.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>In 1975 the legal status of PACs was finally addressed by the Federal</div><div>Election Commission in a little-known 1975 decision known as the</div><div>SUN-PAC ruling. Not only did SUN-PAC give the green light to corporate</div><div>PACs, it also gave corporations permission to solicit contributions</div><div>from their employees and to use their own treasury funds to manage</div><div>their PACs.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Prior to the SUN-PAC ruling, the use of PACs had depended on</div><div>the rare stockholder who happened to have a high degree of interest in</div><div>the political agenda of the company. After the ruling, corporations were</div><div>freed to “work” their own employees for contributions. In the mid-</div><div>1980s, researchers at the University of Massachusetts and the University</div><div>of Maryland began a series of anonymous interviews inside corporations</div><div>about how PAC money is raised. The results were revealing. At</div><div>some companies, the researchers found no attempt to pressure employees</div><div>to contribute to the company PAC. At other companies, the official</div><div>stance was “no pressure” but the methods used involved meetings where</div><div>employees were repeatedly solicited by their bosses. A typical pattern</div><div>was for the head of government relations, one of the firm’s lobbyists,</div><div>and the supervisor of a work unit to jointly lead a meeting of that unit’s</div><div>employees:</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>“We talk about the PAC and what it means to the company and</div><div>what it means to them as individuals, and we solicit their membership;</div><div>if they are members we solicit an increase in their gift.”</div><div>Then the employees boss is asked “to get up and say why they</div><div>are members and why they think it’s important for an employee</div><div>to be a member.”</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>176 GANGS OF AMERICA</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>The chair of the PAC insisted that any pressure to contribute came</div><div>from the employees themselves, not from their superiors:</div><div>“And yet regardless of how many times you say that, there’s always</div><div>going to be some employees who feel that you got them</div><div>into that meeting to put pressure on. But if they feel pressure it’s</div><div>self-imposed from the standpoint of the solicitation. Because</div><div>there will be several of us, including myself, who will get up and</div><div>say, we want you to be a member and here’s why.”</div><div>The researchers concluded that, given the nature of employeremployee</div><div>relations, the pressure to contribute to PACs is real, if somewhat</div><div>veiled: “If your boss comes to you and asks for a contribution saying</div><div>he or she hopes that all team players will be generous, it’s not easy</div><div>for you, an ambitious young manager, to say no.”</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Not surprisingly, the research found that positions taken by corporate</div><div>PACs on legislative issues were not derived by a democratic process</div><div>among the employees making the contributions. In every company</div><div>surveyed, all such decisions were made by senior management. In effect,</div><div>the PAC served as a means for a corporation to make direct political</div><div>contributions?the exact opposite of the intent of the Tillman Act.</div><div>After the SUN-PAC ruling, the use of PACs by corporations exploded.</div><div>In 1974, labor PACs outnumbered corporate PACs by 201 to</div><div>89. Ten years later, the numbers were reversed, with corporate PACs far</div><div>outnumbering labor PACs, 1,682 to 394.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>For lobbyists, PACs became a resource to be systematically managed,</div><div>with overhead expenses paid for out of company coffers. Making</div><div>this resource even more effective was the arrival of organizations devoted</div><div>specifically to coordinating PAC activity among corporations.</div><div>These included the Business-Industry Political Action Committee</div><div>(BIPAC), the National Association of Business Political Action Committees,</div><div>and the National Chamber Alliance for Politics. Such coordination</div><div>allowed PAC money to be deployed with maximum effectiveness.</div><div>PAC money was only part of the picture. Another major source of</div><div>corporate money in federal politics was “soft money,” a category of</div><div>
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</div><div>THE REVOLT OF THE BOSSES 177</div><div>
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</div><div>contribution made possible by an administrative decision by the Federal</div><div>Election Commission in 1978 that allowed corporations, unions, and</div><div>wealthy individuals to contribute money to the parties for “party building”</div><div>purposes unrelated to influencing federal elections. This money</div><div>had to be kept in separate party accounts known as “nonfederal accounts.”</div><div>In practice, this money flowed from national parties to state</div><div>parties, where it was spent in ways that supported candidates. Although</div><div>some of the largest donors of soft money were labor unions, corporations</div><div>overall outpaced labor unions in soft money contributions by a</div><div>margin of 10 to 1. In 1999, labor unions contributed $33 million in soft</div><div>money. Business interests contributed $368 million.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>In 2002, spurred by public rage over the Enron scandal, the U.S.</div><div>Senate passed the McCain-Feingold bill banning soft money contributions,</div><div>and the House passed the similar Shays-Meehan bill. The two</div><div>bills were then reconciled as the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act</div><div>(BCRA). The new law offered the hope that the flow of soft money</div><div>would be cut off, thereby reducing corporate influence over federal legislation.</div><div>But opponents immediately sued in federal court to have it</div><div>blocked on the grounds that the BCRA violated the “free speech” rights</div><div>of corporations. It was expected that eventually those suits would end</div><div>up in the Supreme Court, where the bill faced an uncertain fate due to</div><div>the strong possibility that the Court would find it a violation of corporate</div><div>First Amendment rights.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>But even if the BCRA were to withstand such a challenge, a more</div><div>practical problem was the likelihood that corporate political money</div><div>would merely be rerouted through political action committees. PACs are</div><div>certainly a less convenient way of raising money, since they require a</div><div>large amount of logistical attention in order to assemble contributions in</div><div>$1,000 blocks. Nevertheless, as had been shown by the entire nature of</div><div>the corporate political mobilization since 1971, that sort of logistical</div><div>expertise was where corporations, with their in-house organizational</div><div>resources, had their biggest advantage in the political process.</div><div>So what about a simple, direct approach? Why not simply ban corporations</div><div>from the political arena?period? Far from being a pie-in-the</div><div>
</div><div>178</div><div>GANGS OF AMERICA</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>sky proposition, such laws once existed in some states. Consider Wisconsin,</div><div>for example. Until 1970, that state had the following statute on</div><div>the books:</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>No corporation doing business in this state shall pay or contribute,</div><div>or offer consent or agree to pay or contribute, directly or indirectly,</div><div>any money, property, free service of its officers or</div><div>employees or thing of value to any political party, organization,</div><div>committee or individual for any political purpose whatsoever, or</div><div>for the purpose of influencing legislation of any kind, or to promote</div><div>or defeat the candidacy of any person for nomination, appointment</div><div>or election to any political office. [Wis. Laws, Section</div><div>4479a (Sec. I, ch 492, 1905)]</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Clearly, the enactment of such a statute at the federal level would</div><div>accomplish far more than merely removing corporate campaign contributions</div><div>from the political process. If written broadly, it could also stop</div><div>corporate political lobbying, corporate media blitzes on referendums,</div><div>and corporate influence machines like the American Legislative Exchange</div><div>Council. With such legislation in place, corporations could still</div><div>send their representatives to testify before legislative committees?on</div><div>invitation only. The 60,000 corporate lobbyists who work the hallways</div><div>of the Capitol?a hundred for every Congressman and Senator?would</div><div>have to go home, and the democratic institutions of American society,</div><div>including courts, legislatures, and regulatory bodies, would all hang out</div><div>a prominent sign: for human beings only. gangs of am</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>http://cnsnews.com/news/article/efforts-amend-constitution-limit-speech-will-fail-citizens-united-president-says</div><div>
</div><div>-----</div><div>
</div><div>GOP platform:</div><div>
</div><div>http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/gop-plank-in-2012-platform-wants-to-leave-campaign-spending-alone/2012/08/29/c1cc2dee-f202-11e1-892d-bc92fee603a7_story.html</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>By Bill Turque, Published: August 29</div><div>The Republican Party’s 2008 platform contained not a mention of campaign finance reform in its 68 pages. The omission was in deference to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the GOP presidential nominee and co-author of McCain-Feingold. The groundbreaking 2002 measure banned unlimited donations to parties, placed new strictures on political advertising and tried to roll back the ability of wealthy individuals to self-fund their candidacies.</div><div>
</div><div>Rather than tarnish their standard bearer by challenging his signature legislative achievement, the platform’s authors skirted the issue entirely.</div><div>
</div><div>What a difference a presidential election cycle makes. A series of court decisions striking down parts of McCain-Feingold — and a new nominee — have led to a new plank in the 2012 platform on regulation of campaign spending.</div><div>
</div><div>It says there should be next to none.</div><div>
</div><div>“We oppose any restrictions or conditions that would discourage Americans from exercising their constitutional right to enter the political fray or limit their commitment to their ideals,” it declares on page 12. The platform calls for repeal of what remains of McCain-Feingold — mainly the ban on “soft” money contributions to parties — and either raising or abolishing donation limits. It also opposes passage of any law that would weaken the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, which did away with prohibitions against corporate or union spending on elections. The platform specifically mentioned the Democrat-supported DISCLOSE Act, which would require independent groups to list the names of those donating more than $10,000. The bill died in the Senate this year. The plank also calls for no regulation of political speech on the Internet.</div><div>
</div><div>The enduring truism about party platforms is that every four years they are drafted, debated, voted on and forgotten. But Republican National Committee member James Bopp Jr., who drafted the campaign finance section, said it matters because it speaks to long-standing sentiment inside the party.</div><div>
</div><div>“I’m just glad we can reflect what the grass-roots of the party believe,” said Bopp, an Indiana lawyer who has worked for years to deregulate campaign funding. “They support the First Amendment and they support no campaign finance restrictions, by and large, ” he said.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;...</div><div>
</div><div>In 1992, the GOP called for elimination of corporate and union political action committees. Four years later, it endorsed “full and immediate disclosure of all contributions” and a crackdown on soft money.</div><div>
</div><div>By 2004, the conservative trend emerged. The party firmly established campaign funding as a First Amendment issue with no government restrictions on individual political expression. But it also called for “full and timely disclosure on the Internet of all campaign contributions.”</div><div>
</div><div>Bopp and other supporters of minimal regulation said there has been no retreat from the idea of transparency.</div><div>
</div><div>“We’re not opposing any disclosure rules that we’ve supported in the past,” said Bradley Smith, a former Federal Election Commission chairman and now chairman of the Center for Competitive Politics, a group that advocates for lighter regulation of campaign finance.</div><div>
</div><div>They said the DISCLOSE Act was a partisan measure that would have gone beyond anything the party previously supported — targeting for exposure individual donors to multi-purpose advocacy groups who may not be involved in campaign activity. One provision called for an organization’s top five contributors to be listed in ads. But supporters said donors could remain anonymous by stipulating that their money not be used for campaign purposes.</div><div>
</div><div>Democrats have yet to unveil the 2012 platform that delegates will vote on in Charlotte next week. DNC spokesman Brad Woodhouse did not return a phone call Wednesday afternoon.</div><div>
</div><div>They might take a cue from President Obama, who sided with liberal activist groups when he suggested Wednesday that a constitutional amendment might be needed to blunt Citizens United and the rise of the super PACS that can spend unlimited sums.</div><div>
</div><div>In a chat with the Web community Reddit, Obama wrote: “Even if the amendment process falls short, it can shine a spotlight of the super-PAC phenomenon and help apply pressure for change.”</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
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</div><div>&nbsp;=</div><div>
</div><div>After a bruising months-long fight between media corporations and the Federal Communications Commission, a government website came online today that will feature political ad data from television stations around the country.</div><div>
</div><div>This means that detailed files about political advertising — which show who is buying political ads, how much they are paying, and when the ads are running, among other information — will finally be available online. In the past, those interested in the files, which are by law public, had to travel to stations to get physical copies.</div><div>
</div><div>Insisting on Transparency—Even from the Media</div><div>
</div><div>Though the new system is far from perfect, it will likely give the public and journalists a new window into how an expected few billion dollars are spent on political ads on local television this election cycle.</div><div>
</div><div>For now, only the affiliates of the top four broadcast networks in the top 50 markets will have to upload their political files to the FCC site. (The Sunlight Foundation has a map of the missing markets here.) All broadcasters will have to start complying in July 2014.&nbsp; And the rule is not retroactive for political ad data — so the site will only have information on political ad buys going forward.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>DISCLOSE act: 7.12 The vote was 53 for and 45 against, along party lines. For a bill to proceed, 60 votes in favor are needed to overcome the filibuster threat.</div><div>
</div><div>Not one Republican senator crossed the aisle to join Senate Democrats in supporting this modest reform bill, which merely would require public disclosure when a corporation, labor union, billionaire or anyone else spends $10,000 or more on political advertising.</div><div>
</div><div>Not one Republican senator stood up to prevent unaccountable interest groups from anonymously funding the smears, half-truths and outright lies that will inundate our televisions, radios and computer screens.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Rooting out the corruption of our political system by corporations and wealthy special interests should not be a partisan issue.</div><div>
</div><div>Believe it or not, lots of Republican senators have said they think voters should know whose money is behind the attack ads that smear candidates during election seasons.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>180</div><div>Among the Republican senators who once supported such reforms are Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Scott Brown (R-Ma.), Dick Lugar (R-Ind.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and, of course, John McCain (R-Ariz.).</div><div>
</div><div>On Tuesday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) even stood up and gave a speech about how she believes the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission is “corrosive” to our democracy.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>Republicans Vote to Block Transparency on Political Ads</div><div>The opponents of a new rule to post political ad information online have opened up another front in a long-running fight, inserting language into an appropriations bill that would bar the Federal Communications Commission from implementing the transparency measure.</div><div>
</div><div>The FCC voted in April to require television stations to put detailed data on political ad purchases online. The information, which includes who buys ads, for how much, and when they run, is currently open to the public but is available only on paper at individual stations. Media companies have lobbied hard against the rule, and the National Association of Broadcasters recently sued in federal court to stop it. The rule is currently under review by the government and will not go into effect until July at the earliest.</div><div>
</div><div>Impact</div><div>Insisting on Transparency—Even from the Media</div><div>Related Coverage</div><div>Campaign 2012</div><div>
</div><div>Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, R-Mo., chair of the financial services and general government subcommittee of the House appropriations committee, added language to an appropriations bill ordering that no funds to be used to implement the disclosure rule. The bill, which passed the subcommittee Wednesday, funds the FCC and other agencies for fiscal year 2013.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>ucs recs 5/12</div><div>
</div><div>Specific Recommendations</div><div>for the Legislative Branch</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>No branch of government has a more important</div><div>role to play than Congress in creating federal</div><div>climate policy that is strongly based on climate</div><div>science. Congress should use its authority to</div><div>ensure that legislators and the public are being</div><div>responsibly served and informed.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>• Congress should approve the Democracy Is</div><div>Strengthened by Casting Light On Spending in</div><div>Elections (DISCLOSE) Act, or similar legislation,</div><div>to enhance disclosure of indirect political</div><div>contributions.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>• The Lobbying Disclosure Act should be</div><div>strengthened and enforced. Although companies</div><div>are currently required to report their lobbying</div><div>expenditures, the content of these reports is</div><div>often vague and incomplete. A more robust</div><div>policy, including mechanisms for monitoring</div><div>and enforcement, is needed to inform the</div><div>public on corporate lobbying activities.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>• Congress should investigate discrepancies</div><div>between climate positions presented by</div><div>Congress should use its authority to require greater transparency in the political activity of corporations and the</div><div>organizations that represent them.</div><div>companies in congressional oversight hearings</div><div>and those they have presented elsewhere.</div><div>Congress should hold companies accountable</div><div>
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</div><div>research:&nbsp; http://www.cgs.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=49&Itemid=54&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>It Takes Dark Money to Make Dark Money</div><div>Karl Rove's dark-money group doles out $2.75 million to an outfit fighting to keep dark money in the dark.</div><div>By Andy Kroll | Fri Apr. 20, 2012 3:00 AM PDT</div><div>
</div><div>When Crossroads GPS [1], the conservative nonprofit started [2] by GOP political gurus Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie, isn't dropping millions of dollars on anti-Obama ads, it's doling out tens of millions more to like-minded groups. "The ATM of the Right," Politico recently called [3] Crossroads. Between May 2010 and December 2011, new tax records show, Crossroads gave [4] $4 million to Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform and $500,000 to former Sen. Norm Coleman's American Action Network, among others.</div><div>
</div><div>But there was another recipient of Crossroads cash that stood out: the Center for Individual Freedom [5], which snagged $2.75 million. Among political money experts, CFIF is known for its aggressive legal strategy aimed at toppling disclosure laws at the state level. In other words, Crossroads GPS, which doesn't name its donors, gave millions to another dark-money group whose goals include fighting to keep dark money in the dark.</div><div>
</div><div>Spokesman Jonathan Collegio wrote in an email that Crossroads GPS' donations to "effective center right organizations" such as CFIF are intended to "help build an enduring infrastructure on the right—just as labor unions have funded organizations on the Left for decades."</div><div>
</div><div>Founded in 1998, the Center for Individual Freedom says its mission is to "protect and defend individual freedoms and individual rights guaranteed by the US Constitution." CFIF preaches [6] free-market reforms, opposes government regulations, and slams [7] labor unions [8]. The group blasts President Obama's Affordable Care Act as an assault on freedom [9], wants lower corporate tax rates [10], and demands less government in the lives of Americans. (CFIF did not respond to four requests for comment.)</div><div>
</div><div>Little is known about who funds CFIF. Archival records at the University of California-San Francisco show that CFIF once received financial support (PDF [11]) from the National Smokers Alliance, a tobacco industry front group. But that's about all. In its legal filings, CFIF's says its willingness to tackle "controversial" issues means that many of its funders ask to remain anonymous. To that end, CFIF "staunchly and zealously" guards donors' privacy, the group says. Forcing CFIF to reveal those donors would hurt its revenue and "its ability to speak would be impaired." Disclosure requirements cause "irreparable injury," as the group argued in one case, and violate constitutionally protected speech.</div><div>
</div><div>Since 2004, CFIF has launched a broad legal campaign to roll back disclosure rules. It has filed lawsuits in Illinois, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, arguing that those states' disclosure and reporting laws "chill" the free-speech rights of groups like CFIF. In Center for Individual Freedom v. Carmouche, a federal case filed in Louisiana in 2004, CFIF argued that it "wants to address citizens of Louisiana on matters of public importance, and many in Louisiana want to hear what the Center has to say." Yet Louisiana's laws requiring that groups behind political spending disclose their donors and disbursements "make it impossible for the Center to speak."</div><div>
</div><div>More recently, CFIF weighed in on the high-profile Van Hollen v. FEC lawsuit [12] winding its way through the court system. At issue in Van Hollen is a Federal Election Commission loophole that lets donors bankroll so-called "issue" ads without having to disclose their names—a break from years prior. Last month, a federal judge struck down that loophole. The result could mean that the US Chamber of Commerce and Crossroads GPS have to reveal [13] more of their contributors. CFIF, which supports the FEC's loophole, joined the Van Hollen case as an "intervenor," which gives it the option of appealing the judge's decision.</div><div>
</div><div>Though little known, CFIF is a formidable player, say supporters and critics. It retained Jan Baran [14], a powerful DC election law attorney, to argue its disclosure cases in Louisiana and West Virginia, both of which it won. Known as the "dean of campaign finance," Baran has argued numerous campaign finance cases before the Supreme Court, including McConnell v. FEC in 2003 and Citizens United v. FEC in 2010.</div><div>
</div><div>Paul Ryan, an attorney with the Campaign Legal Center, which supports more campaign finance regulation, calls CFIF's anti-disclosure cases "meritless" but says the group shouldn’t be underestimated. "They don't come across as wingnuts who don't know what they're talking about," Ryan says. "They come across as skilled lawyers who need to be taken seriously."</div><div>
</div><div>CFIF's anti-disclosure efforts, Ryan adds, illustrate the latest salvo by conservatives and libertarians in their decades-long attack on campaign finance laws. Joining CFIF in this fight is Republican super-attorney James Bopp Jr., who has multiple disclosure cases in the works nationwide, and the libertarian Center for Competitive Politics. "Challenging disclosure laws," Ryan says, "is the new wave of campaign finance deregulation litigation."</div><div>
</div><div>Supporters of disclosure, like Ryan, hold out hope that such laws will survive these legal challenges, even if they make it all the way to Supreme Court. Although the Roberts court has repeatedly struck down political spending limits as unconstitutional, it has written in support of disclosure on multiple occasions. In the Citizens United decision, for instance, eight of the nine justices upheld the disclosure rules [15] under challenge; in his written opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy stressed [16] the importance of transparency, which "permits citizens and shareholders to react to the speech of corporate entities in a proper way."</div><div>
</div><div>Yet the conservative fight against disclosure laws isn't going away soon, says Fred Wertheimer, a leading advocate of campaign finance regulation with the group Democracy 21. "This is part of an effort that's based on the idea that they have a favorable Supreme Court majority," he says, "and they might as well try to take this as far as they possibly can."</div><div>
</div><div>Source URL: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/04/karl-rove-crossroads-gps-center-individual-freedom</div><div>Links:</div><div>[1] http://www.crossroadsgps.org/</div><div>[2] http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-19/secret-donors-multiply-in-u-s-with-finances-dwarfing-watergate</div><div>[3] http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=D1E422E9-801D-4A80-9FD6-870A6719B97B</div><div>[4] http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-secret-donors-pour-millions-of-dollars-into-crossroads-gps-20120417,0,6124833.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+latimes%2Fmostviewed+%28L.A.+Times+-+Most+Viewed+Stories%29</div><div>[5] http://cfif.org/v/</div><div>[6] http://cfif.org/v/index.php/the-issues/56-health-care/1291-direct-pay-medicine-a-free-market-approach-to-healthcare-reform-</div><div>[7] http://cfif.org/v/freedom_line_blog/13455/spectrum-stall-fcc-and-big-labor-impeding-innovation-and-economic-opportunity/</div><div>[8] http://cfif.org/v/freedom_line_blog/13562/louisiana-teacher-unions-happy-to-sell-out-kids-for-political-gain/</div><div>[9] http://cfif.org/v/index.php/commentary/56-health-care/1321-whats-really-at-stake-with-obamacare-legal-battle</div><div>[10] http://cfif.org/v/index.php/press-room/1290-conservative-leaders-call-on-president-congress-to-pass-corporate-tax-reform</div><div>[11] http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/qws17a00/pdf?search=%22center%20for%20individual%20freedom%22</div><div>[12] http://www.fec.gov/law/litigation/van_hollen.shtml</div><div>[13] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/30/koch-brothers-rove-fec-campaign-donations_n_1392838.html</div><div>[14] http://www.wileyrein.com/professionals.cfm?sp=bio&id=33#rep</div><div>[15] http://www.demos.org/publication/testimony-support-disclose-act-united-states-senate-committee-rules-and-administration</div><div>[16] http://eshoo.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1151:the-prescription-to-citizens-united&catid=5&Itemid=100014</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT</div><div>
</div><div>FOR THE DISTRICT OF HAWAII</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>IN THE MATTER OF MARY LOU WOO TRUSTEE, PLAINTIFF</div><div>
</div><div>vs</div><div>
</div><div>BOBBY N. HARMON, DEFENDANT</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>CIVIL NO. 05-00030- DAE-KSG</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>(JUDGES DAVID A. EZRA AND KEVIN S. CHANG)</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>DEFENDANT’S WITNESS</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>MITCH McCONNELL</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Republican Senator from Kentucky; majority whip in the Senate; major opponent of the McCain-Feingold Bill for Campaign Finance Reform and major proponent of unlimited campaign contributions based upon the First Amendment ; husband of U.S. Secretary of Labor, Elaine Chao.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>On December 10, 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld most provisions of the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002 in a 5 to 4 decision seen as a victory for campaign finance reform advocates. After a six and a half year effort, the Senate passed BCRA in a 60 to 40 vote on March 20, 2002. President Bush quietly signed the measure into law (Public Law No. 107-155) on March 27, 2002; it took effect on November 6, 2002. The law next faced the Federal Election Commission's rulemaking process and legal challenges.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>On March 21, 2002, the day after the Senate passed the bill, Sen. Mitch McConnell, who termed the measure "unconstitutional" and an "assault" on freedom of speech, announced the heavyweight legal team he has put together to challenge the legislation--Floyd Abrams, Judge Kenneth Starr, James Bopp, Bobby R. Burchfield, Jan Baran, and Dean Kathleen M. Sullivan. The very day Bush signed the bill, McConnell filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Suits by various other groups were consolidated into McConnell v. FEC.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Senator Mitchell McConnell</div><div>
</div><div>361-A Russell Senate Office Building</div><div>
</div><div>Washington, DC 20510</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>Fax: (202) 224-2499</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>This witness is expected to testify regarding his political, business, professional and personal relationships with Jack Abramoff, Karl Rove, “Scooter” Libby, Hal Rogers, Ernie Fletcher, Gale Norton, Bureau of Indian Affairs, The Nature Conservancy, Henry Paulson, Peter Savio, Frank Carlucci, Carlyle Group, Ashland Oil, Aloha Petroleum, Wackenhut, John Peyton, Corrections Corp. of America, John Snow, CSX, Inc., Ralph Reed, Jr., Grover Norquist, Michael Scanlon, Dan Inouye, Daniel Akaka, Neil Abercrombie, Ed Case, Linda Lingle, Maurice Greenberg, American International Group (AIG), Lippo Group, Robert Rubin, Citigroup, James T. Riady, John Huang, Sukamto Sia, Al Gore, William B. Blount, Protective Life Corp., CRC Protective Life Insurance, Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Bill Frist, Columbia/HCA, Hawaiian Tropics, Randy “Duke” Cunningham, Titan Corp., Kathleen Sullivan, and other entities to be named upon discovery.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Internet References:</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_McConnell&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a6553426d0f.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2002/03/22/usat-campaign.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=393&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/030519/19mcconnell.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Mitch_McConnell&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://oakland.drinkingliberally.org/&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.cwa9430.org/ramblings.html&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10723902/from/RL.5/&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.opensecrets.org/1996os/detail/S2KY00012.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://mcconnell.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=224452&start=1&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.enquirer.com/editions/2003/07/18/loc_kydiscipline18.html&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/Titan-Corp.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=5394&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://hawaiiankingdom.info/C608676235/E20050723045558/&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.kpua.net/news.php?id=5812&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/Title-VIII-Appropriations-10-28-0.pdf&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/Prisons-Mitch-McConnell.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/Octopus.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/PrivatePrisons.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/BrokenTrust.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/NuclearNests.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/Paradise3.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/IndonesianConnection.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>www.the-catbird-seat.net/DCBats.htm&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>TO GO TO THE WOO VS. HARMON WITNESS INDEX&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>---</div><div>
</div><div>apparently no correlation to real democracy?</div><div>
</div><div>Clean Elections</div><div>From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</div><div>"Clean Elections" (variously called, "Clean Money," "Voter-Owned Elections," or "Fair Elections") is a term used to describe a particular system of government financing of political campaigns, in which the government provides a grant to candidates who agree to limit their and private fundraising efforts and limit their campaign-spending.</div><div>Contents</div><div>&nbsp;[hide]&nbsp;</div><div>1 In the United States</div><div>2 Differences from traditional reforms</div><div>3 Effectiveness</div><div>4 Supporters</div><div>5 See also</div><div>6 References</div><div>7 External links</div><div>7.1 Legislation</div><div>7.2 Studies</div><div>7.3 Related organizations</div><div>7.4 Press coverage</div><div>[edit] In the United States</div><div>Clean Election initiatives are used in a small number of states and local political jurisdictions in the United States. Some form of Clean Elections legislation has been adopted by ballot initiative in Maine, Arizona, North Carolina, New Mexico, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Massachusetts. It was also adopted by legislative action in Connecticut and at the municipal level in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Portland, OR. However, the systems in Massachusetts and Portland were later repealed, while Vermont's was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court on First Amendment grounds.</div><div>
</div><div>These laws have increasingly run into constitutional problems in the Courts. Substantial portions of the Vermont system were found unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Randall v. Sorrell. Connecticut's statute was held unconstitutional in August, 2009, on grounds that it unfairly discriminated against third party and independent candidates.[1] In July 2010 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld portions of the District court's order but allowed the core program to continue.[2]</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>On June 27, 2011, ruling in the consolidated cases Arizona Free Enterprise Club’s Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett and McComish v. Bennett, the Supreme Court deemed unconstitutional the matching-funds provision of the Arizona law.[3] The decision throws similar provisions in Maine, Wisconsin, and elsewhere into doubt. As a result, the Wisconsin legislature eliminated funding for its judicial elections in 2011.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Additionally, voters have defeated clean elections in several recent referendums. In Massachusetts the system was repealed after a 2002 advisory initiative in which voters voted nearly 2 to 1 against using government funds to pay for political campaigns. Portland, Oregon's program was narrowly repealed by voters in a 2010 referendum.[4] In 2008, a Clean Elections bill, the California Fair Elections Act (AB583) passed the California Assembly and Senate and was signed by Governor Schwarzenegger. To take effect, however, the law had to be approved by voters in an initiative in June 2010. On June 8, 2010, California voters defeated the measure by 57% to 43%.[5] An earlier Clean Elections ballot initiative, Proposition 89 was also defeated in California in 2006, by 74% against to 26% in favor. A Clean Elections ballot initiative in Alaska failed by a 64% to 35% margin in August 2008,.[6]</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>....</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Effectiveness</div><div>A 2003 study by the federal government's nonpartisan General Accounting Office (GAO), requested by Congress as part of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law passed in 2002, found that the Clean Elections system had failed to produce measurable benefits in the two election cycles run under the system in both Maine and Arizona. The average number of candidates per district, percentage of contested races, incumbency rates, incumbency victory margins, perceptions of interest group influence among candidates and citizens, and voter participation did not change notably. Campaign spending decreased in Maine but increased in Arizona and independent expenditures increased in both states. 60% of Maine and 37% of Arizona voters were unaware of the public financing program. The study concluded that "with ... only one election from which to observe most statewide races, it is too early to draw causal linkages".[10]</div><div>
</div><div>A 2006 study of the 2004 and 2002 campaigns by political scientists Mayer, Werner, and Williams of the University of Wisconsin—Madison argued that the GAO "understate[d] the reforms' impact, in part by making some unusual methodological choices and jettisoning valuable data." They found that the candidate pool and competitiveness increased significantly, while the incumbency rate dropped significantly.[11] A 2007 update, however, found that in the 2006 campaign competitiveness continued to increase slightly but reelection rates "returned to pre-reform levels". The number of at least nominally contested races also continued to increase, reaching 100% in Maine. Mayer, Werner and Williams also found that women were much more likely than men to accept public funding but this had no effect on the gender composition of the legislature.[12] A study by the non-partisan, privately funded Clean Elections Institute[13] found that the number and geographic, economic, and ethnic diversity of campaign contributors increased significantly, with contributors almost quadrupling, contributions from people with incomes below $40,000 increasing by 40% and contributions from Latinos increasing significantly.[14] A 2008 study by the non-profit, non-partisan Center for Competitive Politics concluded that the process of gathering small contributions needed to qualify for public funding still relied heavily on interest groups.[15] Another 2008 study by the Center for Competitive Politics of Clean Elections programs in Maine and Arizona found that neither state had seen a decline in legislators with “traditional” [law and business] backgrounds in the eight years since the campaign laws were first implemented.[16]</div><div>
</div><div>Other studies conducted by the nonpartisan Center for Competitive Politics, found that the programs in Maine, Arizona, and New Jersey had failed to accomplish other stated goals, including electing more women ([1]), reducing government spending (in fact in both states government spending grew more rapidly after the enactment of clean elections) ([2]), or meeting most other stated objectives, including increasing competition or voter participation. ([3])</div><div>
</div><div>A 2006 study by the non-partisan, libertarian-leaning Goldwater Institute found that "incumbency rates have remained near 100% [while] the number of candidates fell substantially ... from 247 to 195. Moreover, the law has not increased minor or third-party participation in politics, and Arizona campaigns remain every bit as hard-edged." However, according to the Clean Elections Institute, the number of legislative candidates increased from 135 in 1998 ([4]), the last year before Clean Elections, to 188 in 2004, as reported in the Goldwater study—a 40% increase. In 2006 there were 204 legislative candidates ([5]), a 51% increase over the pre-Clean Elections numbers.[17]</div><div>
</div><div>In 2008, a study released by the non-partisan, non-profit organization Public Campaign, examined the demographic profile of $5 qualifying contribution donors in Clean Elections gubernatorial campaigns in Arizona over the course of the 2002 and 2006 elections, comparing and contrasting them with contributions raised by candidates running with funding from private sources — more than 67,000 contributions in all. The data were analyzed by zip code alongside U.S. Census data to determine the racial, ethnic, geographic, and economic characteristics of donors. The study, titled All Over The Map, found that Arizona’s qualifying contribution donors are more diverse racially, ethnically, economically, and geographically than donors giving to candidates who choose to rely on private fundraising. In nearly every category, Clean Elections $5 donors were more representative of the state's population than were donors to privately funded campaigns. However, the study has been criticized because it compares donors to Clean Elections only to donors of $200 or more to federal campaigns - in other words, it compared $5 donors under clean elections to $200 donors in federal races, rather than comparing the common universe of all donors, or donors at the same levels of contributions. Federal candidates are not required to report names and addresses of contributors of less than $200 to federal candidates thus the information is not made public.</div><div>
</div><div>[edit] Supporters</div><div>SB 752, the Fair Elections Now Act, calling for Clean Elections in U.S. senate campaigns, was sponsored in the 111th Congress (2009–10) by Senators: Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Arlen Specter (D-PA).[18] A companion bill, H.R. 1826, was introduced in the House, sponsored by John Larson (D-CT), Chellie Pingree (D-ME), and Walter Jones (R-NC). Unlike the Clean Elections laws in Maine and Arizona, H.R. 1826 dids not include the "rescue funds" provision, perhaps due to concern about constitutionality in the wake of the Davis decision. Neither bill moved out of Committee.</div><div>
</div><div>Others who have endorsed clean elections include:</div><div>
</div><div>Barack Obama as an Illinois senator was the first co-sponsor of the 2007 version of the Durbin-Specter bill.[19]</div><div>John Bonifaz, founder of the National Voting Rights Institute</div><div>Bill Bradley (D-NJ), former U.S. Senator[citation needed]</div><div>John Edwards (D-NC), former U.S. Presidential Candidate and Senator [20]</div><div>Adonal Foyle, NBA player, and founder of Democracy Matters</div><div>Cecil Heftel (D-HI), former U.S. Representative</div><div>Ned Lamont (D-CT), former U.S. Senate candidate[citation needed]</div><div>John McCain (R-AZ), U.S. Presidential Candidate and Senator [21][22] (McCain has also expressed opposition to a national version of the system and has not endorsed or co-sponsored the bills introduced in the U.S. Senate.[23])</div><div>Ralph Nader of Connecticut, U.S. Presidential Candidate[citation needed]</div><div>Janet Napolitano (D-AZ), former Governor, current Secretary of Homeland Security[citation needed]</div><div>Bill Richardson (D-NM), U.S. Presidential Candidate and Governor[citation needed]</div><div>Eliot Spitzer (D-NY), former Governor [24]</div><div>John Eder Green Party leader who utilized Maine's public financing to win office to the Maine State Legislature</div><div>[edit] See also</div><div>Iron triangle</div><div>Money trail</div><div>Political finance, section on Regulation</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>----</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>hightower 8/11</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>2006. Roberts, Alito, Kennedy, Scalia, and Thomas vote to overturn limits that the people of Vermont placed on campaign contributions.</div><div>
</div><div>2007. The same five throw out Wisconsin's effort to keep corporations from swamping their elections with last-minute ad blitzes.</div><div>
</div><div>2008. The same five strike down the "millionaire's amendment," a part of the McCain-Feingold election finance reform passed by Congress in 2002; this provision had allowed candidates who were confronted by self-financed millionaire opponents to raise more money than otherwise allowed in order to level the playing field.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>June 27, 2011. The same five kill the "matching funds" provision of Arizona's Citizens Clean Elections Act--a provision that was key to making the state's extremely popular and successful public financing system work.</div><div>
</div><div>The Arizona ruling was a stinging slap in the face to the conscientious citizens of that state. Arizonans have labored diligently to free their politics from the corruption of big money, while also opening the possibility of holding office to those who don't have piles of money or don't want to be beholden to those who do. Nauseated in the 1990s by an epidemic of gubernatorial and legislative scandals, the people themselves launched a grassroots initiative to get the democracy-destroying corrosion of special-interest political contributions out of their elections. In 1998, Arizona voters emphatically said, "yes."</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Their Clean Elections Act established a voluntary public financing system that gave office-seekers of all parties and all economic classes an alternative, no-strings-attached way to finance their campaigns. By agreeing not to take any special interest contributions, these candidates received a fixed sum of public money--enough for them to be competitive under normal campaign conditions and have their voices heard. However, abnormal happens. So, if clean-running contenders found their voices being drowned out by a flood of special interest cash flowing to a rival, the "matching funds" provision allowed them to get a limited level of extra money from the public fund to help counter the free-spending opponent's unfair advantage.</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>It is this matching mechanism that the mammon-worshipping Supremes went after. Why? Because it works. Former Governor Janet Napolitano, for example, says she could not have even considered running for Arizona's top office without the availability of this funding alternative, but with it she won two terms. A majority of all parties' candidates use the Clean law, and it is enormously popular with the public.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But the corporate powers hate, hate, hate it, for it diminishes their political control. Having failed again and again to repeal it at the state level, they turned to the vipers nest of Koch-funded, right-wing policy fronts to find a way for the federal courts to inter- vene and do their dirty work. With support from the American Legislative Exchange Council (see Feb. 2011 Lowdown) and the Institute for Justice, this clique developed a perversely-novel theory of law, framed it into a lawsuit, and had the Republican leader of the state house, John McComish, sign on as plaintiff.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The Roberts quintet happily swallowed the perverse legal theory fed to them in the case, known as Arizona Free Enterprise Club v. Bennett. Turning both common sense and the Constitution topsy-turvy, the Court found--get this--that Arizona's matching provision gives cash-poor candidates an unfair advantage over those flush with money. Huh?</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Well, explained the five, money speaks in politics, and the speech of the rich is inhibited if they know that their money-raising can result in "counterspeech" from opponents. Corporatespeak, good; counterspeak, bad. In a twisted and overwrought opinion for the majority, Alito wrote that public matching funds impose an "unprecedented penalty on any candidate who robustly exercises [the First Amendment right to buy an election]." Okay, I edited-in that last bit, but that's precisely what the Court's majority (and the Koch brothers) are actually saying. Not only are they freeing big money to shout as loud as it wants in our elections, but the Court has now allowed the money interests to quash the political speech of others. The good news is that Roberts & Company only nixed the matching provision, not the Clean Election Act itself. At least not yet. As Roberts wrote: "We do not today call into question the wisdom of public financing."</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>------</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Tracking $:</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/10/cool-tools-tracking-campaign-cash</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>mojo</div><div>
</div><div>http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/01/republican-public-financing-cantor-corporation</div><div>
</div><div>Mon Jan. 24, 2011 4:00 AM PST</div><div>On Wednesday, House Republicans plan to rush to the floor a bill that would eliminate the federal government's presidential financing systemâ??in the process, violating recent pledges by the GOP's leadership of increased transparency and debate in Congress. Not one hearing has been held on the legislation, nor has a single commitee debated its merits. If it passes, it will roll back more than 30 years of law born out of the Watergate scandal, eviscerating one of the few remaining protections stopping corporations from heavily influencing, if not outright buying, American elections, reform experts say.</div><div>
</div><div>Democratic lawmakers and campaign finance reformers blasted the bill, not only for seeking to kill public financing but for breaking the GOP's campaign promises on transparency and accountability. "This is a sneak attack on the system," says Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). "It's a total break from their public pledge for transparency and openness." Fred Wertheimer, a longtime campaign finance reform advocate at Democracy 21, called the bill "a gross abuse of the legislative process."</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>House Republicans' much-touted "Pledge to America" bashed Democrats for "limiting openness and debate" during the legislative process and vowed to "ensure that bills are debated and discussed in the public square." The Pledge says the GOP "will fight to ensure transparency and accountability in Congress and throughout government." And in House Speaker John Boehner's first remarks after taking control of Congress' lower chamber, he spoke of a greater emphasis on "real transparency" and "greater accountability." He went on, "Above all else, we will welcome the battle of ideas, encourage it, and engage in itâ??openly, honestly, and respectfully."</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Last week, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the majority whip, announced with little fanfare the GOP's plan to introduce and vote on the bill. The legislation to repeal public financing was first floated in by Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) in June 2009. But it wasn't until House Republicans added the elimination of the Presidential Election Fund, as it's officially called, to their "YouCut" initiative, an online list of federal programs that citizens can vote in favor of cutting, that the bill gained momentum. Cantor's "YouCut" site claims that cutting the program, which also funds party conventions, would save $520 million over the next ten years.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>context: hightower&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>March 2011, Volume 13, Number 3</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 1986, Richard Kimball, a Democratic state legislator in Arizona, was running for a US Senate seat. In a televised debate, he did something that absolutely astonished his opponent and completely confounded his campaign consultants: He looked directly into the camera and spoke the truth about the money corruption of big-time American politics.</div><div>
</div><div>"Understand what we do to you," Kimball said to viewers. "We spend all of our time raising money, often from strangers we do not even know. Then we spend it in three specific ways: First we measure you, what it is you want to purchase in the political marketplace--just like Campbell's soup or Kellogg's cereal. Next, we hire some consultants who know how to tailor our image to fit what we sell. Lastly, we bombard you with the meaningless, issueless, emotional nonsense that is always the result. And whichever one of us does that best will win."</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Unfortunately for Kimball he was not the best bamboozler on the ballot--he lost big to John McCain, who's presently in his 25th year as an Arizona senator. Ironically, McCain himself became a champion of campaign finance reform for a while. But he totally abandoned that pose about three years ago and has now wedged himself tightly into his senate seat with the very same kind of special interest campaign cash and vacuous politicking that Kimball had so rightly condemned.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>based on www.opensecrets.org and www.sunlightfoundation.com.</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/node/2603</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>mojo: 1/11</div><div>
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</div><div>The GOP's Campaign Finance "Sneak Attack"</div><div>Boehner and Co. fast-track a bill to kill the presidential public finance system and privatize election fundraising.</div><div>
</div><div>Mon Jan. 24, 2011 3:00 AM PST</div><div>On Wednesday, House Republicans plan to rush to the floor a bill that would eliminate the federal government's presidential financing systemâ??in the process, violating recent pledges by the GOP's leadership of increased transparency and debate in Congress. Not one hearing has been held on the legislation, nor has a single commitee debated its merits. If it passes, it will roll back more than 30 years of law born out of the Watergate scandal, eviscerating one of the few remaining protections stopping corporations from heavily influencing, if not outright buying, American elections, reform experts say.</div><div>
</div><div>Democratic lawmakers and campaign finance reformers blasted the bill, not only for seeking to kill public financing but for breaking the GOP's campaign promises on transparency and accountability. "This is a sneak attack on the system," says Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). "It's a total break from their public pledge for transparency and openness." Fred Wertheimer, a longtime campaign finance reform advocate at Democracy 21, called the bill "a gross abuse of the legislative process."</div><div>
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</div><div>House Republicans' much-touted "Pledge to America" bashed Democrats for "limiting openness and debate" during the legislative process and vowed to "ensure that bills are debated and discussed in the public square." The Pledge says the GOP "will fight to ensure transparency and accountability in Congress and throughout government." And in House Speaker John Boehner's first remarks after taking control of Congress' lower chamber, he spoke of a greater emphasis on "real transparency" and "greater accountability." He went on, "Above all else, we will welcome the battle of ideas, encourage it, and engage in itâ??openly, honestly, and respectfully."</div><div>
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</div><div>Last week, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the majority whip, announced with little fanfare the GOP's plan to introduce and vote on the bill. The legislation to repeal public financing was first floated in by Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) in June 2009. But it wasn't until House Republicans added the elimination of the Presidential Election Fund, as it's officially called, to their "YouCut" initiative, an online list of federal programs that citizens can vote in favor of cutting, that the bill gained momentum. Cantor's "YouCut" site claims that cutting the program, which also funds party conventions, would save $520 million over the next ten years.</div><div>
</div><div>A spokeswoman for Cantor declined to comment beyond Cantor's announcement of the public financing bill. A spokeswoman for Cole confirmed that the bill has not been the subject of any congressional hearings.</div><div>
</div><div>Public financing of presidential campaigns provides matching tax dollars to the small donations received by candidates who agree to publicly finance their campaigns, instead of relying on private donations. The intent is to encourage small donations, and the burden on taxpayers isn't much: Americans can voluntarily contribute $3 to the fund on their federal tax filings. The public finance system was created in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal in the mid-1970s. After President Richard Nixon's re-election campaign was found to have illegally accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from big corporations, Congress created a public financing system so that candidates wouldn't have to rely on corporations and deep-pocketed donors to finance their campaigns.</div><div>
</div><div>Since 1976, every Democratic and Republican presidential candidate has used the public financing system except Barack Obama's 2008 campaign. Obama opted out of the program and instead raised $745 million from small and large private donors and corporations, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The way reformers see it, the presidential public financing system needs repair, not repeal. Meredith McGehee, policy director at the Campaign Legal Center, says the amount of public funds currently available to candidates is too small to be competitive in modern presidential races. She says lawmakers need to update the system to better emphasize small donations to candidates and raise the total amount of public funding available. "Imagine if you didn't make any changes to the tax code since 1976. Of course public financing is outdated. The issue, then, is not to get rid of, but how to fix."</div><div>
</div><div>Legislation to make presidential public financing more competitive has won support from both parties in the past. In 2003, Sens. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) of and John McCain (R-Ariz.) introduced a bill that would reform the public financing system; Reps. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.) and Marty Meehan (D-Mass.) filed a companion bill in the House. "The public financing system for presidential elections, which aims to allow candidates to run competitive campaigns without becoming overly dependent on private donors, is a system worth improving and preserving," the lawmakers said in a joint statement.</div><div>
</div><div>More recently, Rep. David Price (D-NC) introduced the Presidential Fund Act, which would notably increase the funds available to candidates who opt in to public financing. In 2007, when Price introduced his bill, cosponsors included three Republicansâ??Reps. Mike Castle of Delaware, Todd Platts of Pennsylvania, and Shays. (Castle and Shays no longer hold office.) Price offered the bill again in 2010, and says he intends to offer it yet again in the 112th Congress. As for the Republicans' plan to gut public financing, Price remarks that it "looks like the Republican Party moving to toss red meat to the tea party."&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Already good government groups and campaign finance reformers are drumming up opposition to the GOP's plan. Craig Holman, a lobbyist for the public interest group Public Citizen, says his organization and others like it will urge lawmakers to oppose the GOP's bill because it violates the GOP's transparency promises, both on the 2010 campaign trail and now as the House majority. "This just came out of the blue, has had no deliberation and no discussion within the Republican and Democratic conferences," Holman says. "They have just been seated and they're already breaking the ground rules on how they'll do business."</div><div>
</div><div>Andy Kroll is a reporter at Mother Jones.</div><div>
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</div><div>These include flag-waving conservative organizations responsible for television ads such as one in which a U.S. marine recently returned from Iraq assails unnamed members of â??Congress [who] talk about surrendering.â? They include the cheeky liberals who wanted to change the name of General Petraeus to General Betray Us. They include the single-minded activists who obsessed on the alleged misdeeds of Senator Hillary Clinton. Yet while they were quick to delve into any real or imagined political scandal that might change the course of the campaign in their favored direction, there was one thing that most of these groups refused to make public: the names of their funders.</div><div>
</div><div>Behind the patriotic gloss and high-quality production values of their advertising, these organizations were operating as renegades along the untested margins of the law that purports to control spending in presidential elections. With their identities hidden under stunningly misleading names and legal technicalities, many offered questionable facts and unproven charges intended to confuse voters or appeal to their worst prejudices.</div><div>
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</div><div>The result, veteran Democratic pollster Peter Hart told the Center for Public Integrity, was â??democracy run amok.â?</div><div>
</div><div>The irony is that all this negative advertising was unleashed by the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002, which was intended to limit political contributions and improve the electoral process. The goal was to control â??soft money,â? which in the patois of political insiders means money given with political intent but not specifically in support of a candidate; this contrasts with â??hard money,â? the tightly controlled and limited direct contributions to candidatesâ?? campaigns and to parties.</div><div>
</div><div>Senators Russ Feingold and John McCain, lead backers of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (Office of Senator Russ Feingold)</div><div>
</div><div>The 2002 law prohibited parties from taking soft money, but political money is insistent in finding a productive channel. Very quickly it was flowing into the coffers of independent groups that have become such a force that they are changing the political landscape. In the 2004 presidential campaign, they found their voice, and major groups in support of both parties found themselves defending charges of corrupt collusion â?? and paying fines to the Federal Election Commission.</div><div>
</div><div>Critics of the reform were obviously wrong when they predicted that it would stifle free speech. But Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the leading GOP opponent of the legislation, did foresee one of the lawâ??s biggest drawbacks. â??McCain-Feingold does not take the money out of politics,â? he said. â??It takes the parties out of politics.â? Even though the Democratic and Republican parties were raising record amounts of hard money, they found that the upstarts were even better funded and the partiesâ?? voices struggled to compete with the independent groupsâ?? aggressive advertising.</div><div>
</div><div>In the 2004 election, it was a pro-Republican group, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, that had the biggest impact by producing an ad that smeared the military record of Democratic nominee John Kerry, a Vietnam veteran. By 2008, the technique of â??swift-boating,â? as it came to be called, had become so widespread that it was considered an integral part of the presidential selection process. These groups were technically independent of the candidates and parties, but there was seldom â?? if ever â?? any mystery about the politicians who would benefit from their negative advertising.</div><div>
</div><div>Hart said the proliferation of independent advertising groups with hidden motivations made it difficult for voters to assess the information they received from broadcast advertising. â??In the end,â? he said in an interview, â??all it means is voters are getting bombarded with a message they donâ??t know where itâ??s coming from, and thereâ??s no accountability.â? He said the real beneficiaries of this â??boondoggleâ? were the media consulting firms that made millions of dollars creating and placing the ads on broadcast outlets, as well as the broadcasters themselves. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, independent groups reported spending more than $200 million on the 2006 elections and more than $440 million on the last presidential election, in 2004. And those numbers only include one type of independent organizations: 527 committees.</div><div>
</div><div>Some of these groups publicly identify only a few, if any, of their big funders. The most generous donors include billionaire investor George Soros, a contributor to liberal Democratic organizations; Bob Perry, a conservative Republican who has made millions building housing developments in Texas; and Las Vegas casino owner Sheldon Adelson, also a contributor to Jewish and Israeli causes, who is focused on the threat posed by Iran. In the past, wealthy donors such as these were the source of soft money contributions that went directly to organizations controlled by the Democratic and Republican parties.</div><div>
</div><div>Joe Sandler, a lawyer whose clients include the Democratic National Committee as well as some independent groups, said he worries that these groups will eventually sap the vitality from the party organization. â??Long term, itâ??s not in the institutional interest of the party to have [independent groups] be big players in the presidential campaign,â? Sandler said. â??It diverts some resources and control from the party.â?</div><div>
</div><div>But suspicions abound that behind all the secrecy the independent groups may not be so independent. During the 2004 presidential election, a Washington Post reporter witnessed what seemed to be evidence of collusion between a nonprofit independent group, Americans for Tax Reform, and the Bush-Cheney campaign. As reported in the newspaper, she saw ATRâ??s founder, Grover Norquist, give Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlman a confidential list of conservative activists in 37 states. When a watchdog group filed charges against ATR based on the Post story, the Federal Election Commission found â??reason to believeâ? that the transfer constituted an illegal contribution from a corporation (ATR) but declined to take further action. ATR and the Bush-Cheney campaign maintained that the list had no monetary value because the information in it was publicly available, a premise the FEC did not accept.</div><div>
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</div><div>The moral of this story: It is almost impossible to prove cooperation between candidates and independent groups, even though everyone assumes that it happens on a daily basis. And even violations that could be proven would likely not be punished.</div><div>
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</div><div>Also in the 2004 campaign, a number of consultants worked both for a presidential campaign as well as an allied independent group. Washington attorney Ben Ginsburg was forced to resign when it was learned that he was serving as counsel to both the Bush campaign and the Swift Boat Veterans organization. Ginsberg also was counsel for Progress for America during 2004. Tony Feather, a former political director of Bush-Cheney 2000 and a good friend of White House adviser Karl Rove, was the founder of PFA. Originally, the groupâ??s purpose was to support Bushâ??s agenda. When the group began running independent issue ads supporting Bushâ??s reelection, Feather left PFA. But his firm, Feather Larson Synhorst-DCI, went on to do campaign work for Bush-Cheney 2004 and the Republican National Committee. When then-Federal Election Commissioner Bradley Smith was asked on MSNBC whether Ginsberg had violated the law, he replied: â??Clearly, a lawyer can advise two clients. What he canâ??t do is transfer inside information from one to another.â?</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>TWO BAK</div><div>
</div><div>12/17 age of trump capt 719</div><div>see also cult of corruption</div><div>see dark $</div><div>see voter suppression</div><div>html plaintiff-appellants</div><div>
</div><div>see citizens united 2010 case</div><div>see</div><div>public fund election / small donor</div><div>
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</div><div>really good report 918</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.issueone.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Dark-Money-Illuminated-Report.pdf</div><div>
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</div><div>https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/05/heritage-foundation-dark-money-voter-suppression-laws/</div><div>
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</div><div>Leaked Video: Dark Money Group Brags About Writing GOP Voter Suppression Bills Across the Country</div><div>
</div><div>“We did it quickly and we did it quietly,” said the executive director of Heritage Action.</div><div>
</div><div>ARI BERMAN</div><div>
</div><div>NICK SURGEY</div><div>
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</div><div>In a private meeting last month with big-money donors, the head of a top conservative group boasted that her outfit had crafted the new voter suppression law in Georgia and was doing the same with similar bills for Republican state legislators across the country. “In some cases, we actually draft them for them,” she said, “or we have a sentinel on our behalf give them the model legislation so it has that grassroots, from-the-bottom-up type of vibe.”</div><div>
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</div><div>The Georgia law had “eight key provisions that Heritage recommended,” Jessica Anderson, the executive director of Heritage Action for America, a sister organization of the Heritage Foundation, told the foundation’s donors at an April 22 gathering in Tucson, in a recording obtained by the watchdog group Documented and shared with Mother Jones. Those included policies severely restricting mail ballot drop boxes, preventing election officials from sending absentee ballot request forms to voters, making it easier for partisan workers to monitor the polls, preventing the collection of mail ballots, and restricting the ability of counties to accept donations from nonprofit groups seeking to aid in election administration.</div><div>
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</div><div>All of these recommendations came straight from Heritage’s list of “best practices” drafted in February. With Heritage’s help, Anderson said, Georgia became “the example for the rest of the country.”</div><div>
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</div><div>The leaked video reveals the extent to which Heritage is leading a massive campaign to draft and pass model legislation restricting voting access, which has been swiftly adopted this year in the battleground states of Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and Iowa. It’s no coincidence that so many GOP-controlled states are rushing to pass similar pieces of legislation in such a short period of time.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Republican legislators claim they’re tightening up election procedures to address (unfounded) concerns about fraud in the 2020 election. But what’s really behind this effort is a group of conservative Washington insiders who have been pushing these same kinds of voting restrictions for decades, with the explicit aim of helping Republicans win elections. The difference now is that Trump’s baseless claims about 2020 have given them the ammunition to get the bills passed, and the conservative movement, led by Heritage, is making an unprecedented investment to get them over the finish line.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“We’re working with these state legislators to make sure they have all of the information they need to draft the bills,” Anderson told the Heritage Foundation donors. In addition to drafting the bills in some cases, “we’ve also hired state lobbyists to make sure that in these targeted states we’re meeting with the right people.”</div><div>
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</div><div>“In some cases, we actually draft [the bills] for them, or we have a sentinel on our behalf give them the model legislation so it has that grassroots, from-the-bottom-up type of vibe.”</div><div>
</div><div>To “create this echo chamber,” as Anderson put it, Heritage is spending $24 million over two years in eight battleground states—Arizona, Michigan, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Texas, and Wisconsin—to pass and defend restrictive voting legislation. Every Tuesday, the group leads a call with right-wing advocacy groups like the Susan B. Anthony List, Tea Party Patriots, and FreedomWorks to coordinate these efforts at the highest levels of the conservative movement. “We literally give marching orders for the week ahead,” Anderson said. “All so we’re singing from the same song sheet of the goals for that week and where the state bills are across the country.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Days before the Georgia legislature would pass its sweeping bill rolling back access to the ballot, Anderson said she met with Gov. Brian Kemp and urged him to quickly sign the bill when it reached his desk. “I had one message for him,” said Anderson, a former Trump administration official in the Office of Management and Budget. “Do not wait to sign that bill. If you wait even an hour, you will look weak. This bill needs to be signed immediately.” Kemp followed Anderson’s advice, signing the bill right after its passage. Heritage called it a “historic voting security bill.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Anderson said she delivered “the same message” to Republican governors in Texas, Arizona, and Florida. Texas is the next big fight for Heritage. Anderson said Heritage Action wrote “19 provisions” in a Texas House bill that would make it a criminal offense for election officials to give a mail ballot request form to a voter who hadn’t explicitly asked for one and would subject poll workers to criminal penalties for removing partisan poll challengers who are accused of voter intimidation. It’s expected to pass in the coming days.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“Gov. Abbott will sign it quickly,” Anderson said. She warned of corporate opposition to the bill, following actions by Georgia-based companies to distance themselves from the restrictive voting bill there. “American Airlines, Dell, they’re coming after us,” she said. “We need to be ready for the next fight in Texas.”&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>In response to a request for comment, Anderson said in a statement, “We are proud of our work at the national level and in states across this country to promote commonsense reforms that make it easier to vote and harder to cheat. We’ve been transparent about our plans and public with our policy recommendations, and we won’t be intimidated by the left’s smear campaign and cancel culture.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Heritage Foundation fellow Hans von Spakovsky, a former George W. Bush administration official who for two decades has been the driving force behind policies that restrict access to the ballot, spoke alongside Anderson at the donor summit.</div><div>
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</div><div>“Hans is briefing governors, secretaries of state, state attorney generals, state elected officials,” Anderson said. “Just what three weeks ago, we had a huge call with secretaries of state, right?”</div><div>
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</div><div>“We’ve now for several years been having a private briefing of the best conservative secretaries of state in the country that has so annoyed the left that they have been doing everything they can to try to find out what happens at that meeting,” von Spakovsky replied.</div><div>
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</div><div>“So far unsuccessfully,” Anderson said. “No leaks.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Though the bills shaped by Heritage have been sold as advancing “election integrity,” they appear aimed more at helping GOP candidates take back power. “We are going to take the fierce fire that is in every single one of our bellies,” Anderson told the donors in April, “to right the wrongs of November.”</div><div>
</div><div>The Heritage Foundation was co-founded in 1973 by Paul Weyrich, a well-connected conservative activist on a mission to create more aggressive conservative infrastructure to rival more liberal think tanks like the Brookings Institution. Weyrich, who was also Heritage’s first president, went on to co-found the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which pairs corporations with conservative state legislators to draft model legislation, and the Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell, which mobilized evangelical voters behind GOP causes and candidates. Heritage received major funding from leading right-wing donors such as Charles and David Koch, Richard Mellon Scaife, and Joseph Coors.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Speaking in 1980 at a meeting of evangelical leaders in Dallas, Weyrich bluntly articulated his radical views on voting rights. “I don’t want everybody to vote,” he said. “Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.”</div><div>
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</div><div>In the years since, the Heritage Foundation became the driving force behind much of the Republican Party agenda, writing many of the policy recommendations that were enacted under the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Heritage is spending $24 million over two years in eight battleground states—Arizona, Michigan, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Texas, and Wisconsin—to pass and defend restrictive voting legislation.</div><div>
</div><div>It remains one of the best-funded organizations in GOP circles. It raised more than $76 million in 2020, according to its most recent annual report. More than $1.6 million of that was raised from corporations, most of which chose to remain anonymous. But according to the annual report from 2019, Google, the pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, and the multi-level marketing company Amway all gave at least $100,000, and Citigroup and Hitachi each gave $25,000.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>In 2010, as opposition on the right to the Obama administration reached a fever pitch, Heritage launched Heritage Action, a dark money group that does not have to disclose its donors but has received at least $500,000 from the Koch brothers. The goal was to connect the Heritage Foundation to the growing Tea Party movement and to enable the group to undertake more aggressive political activities, such as leading opposition to the Affordable Care Act and promoting a government shutdown in 2013. This right-wing advocacy alienated Republicans on Capitol Hill, with former Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn accusing the group of “destroying the Republican Party.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Former Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint described the relationship between Heritage Foundation and Heritage Action as “the one-two punch.” The foundation writes the policy, and Heritage Action makes it happen. Heritage Action raised more than $11 million in 2019.</div><div>
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</div><div>The mastermind behind the nationwide voting restrictions operation is von Spakovsky, who’s done more than just about anyone in GOP circles to spread the myth of widespread voter fraud over the past two decades.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>During the Bush administration, von Spakovsky was a special counsel at the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, where he played a key role in the department’s approval of a 2005 voter ID law from Georgia—among the first of its kind—over objections from career department lawyers, who said it was discriminatory. While advocating internally for the law, von Spakovsky published a law review article under the pseudonym “Publius” praising voter ID laws, in a move that experts said violated Justice Department ethics guidelines. (Von Spakovsky said in a statement that he received approval from a Justice Department ethics adviser and his supervisor for the article. He added, “Contrary to the maliciously false claims in the Mother Jones story, I have worked hard for many years to ensure that every eligible citizen is able to vote.”)</div><div>
</div><div>“It’s like he goes to bed dreaming about this, and gets up in the morning wondering, ‘What can I do today to make it more difficult for people to vote?’” the late civil rights icon John Lewis once said of von Spakovsky.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“I don’t want everybody to vote,” said Heritage co-founder Paul Weyrich.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2017, von Spakovsky joined Donald Trump’s ill-fated Commission on Election Integrity, which was formed after Trump falsely claimed 3 million people voted illegally in California in the 2016 election, with the aim of unearthing evidence of voter fraud in order to justify new ballot restrictions. Von Spakovsky argued the commission should exclude Democrats and “mainstream Republican officials and/or academics” and helped Vice Chair Kris Kobach, then the Kansas secretary of state, draft a letter requesting sensitive voter data from all 50 states. The request was met with massive pushback, and the commission, facing a flurry of lawsuits, abruptly disbanded in January 2018 without finding any evidence of fraud.</div><div>
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</div><div>Though Anderson called von Spakovsky “the premier election law expert across this country,” his work has not fared well in court. During a trial challenging Kansas’ proof-of-citizenship law for voter registration, Kobach hired von Spakovsky to support his claim that illegal votes by noncitizens had swung US elections. But under questioning, von Spakovsky admitted he couldn’t name a single election where votes by noncitizens had decided the outcome. A federal judge wrote that the court gave “little weight to Mr. von Spakovsky’s opinion,” citing “several misleading and unsupported examples of noncitizen voter registration.”&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Nonetheless, von Spakovsky’s sensationalist claims about stolen elections and advocacy for policies that restrict voting have found an increasingly receptive audience among Republicans following Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.</div><div>
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</div><div>“The one good thing that came out of last year’s elections,” von Spakovsky said at the Heritage Action event in April, “is I think finally a lot of members of the public, and particularly state legislators, realized that these vulnerabilities exist, have existed for a long time, and have figured out in many states we really need to do something to fix it.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Indeed, Heritage has been at the forefront of weaponizing Trump’s Big Lie of widespread voter fraud in order to build support for policies that restrict access to the ballot. “A lot of bad things happened in 2020,” Heritage Foundation senior adviser Genevieve Wood said in April to the donors, who ranked “election integrity” as their top issue in a survey this year. “But you should know a lot of good things are beginning to happen now in 2021. You’re seeing it in Georgia. You’re seeing in the state of Arizona. You’re beginning to see it in Texas and so many more.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Heritage began its lobbying campaign early in Georgia. In February, a representative from the group delivered a letter signed by 2,000 conservative activists to Republicans in the state legislature, urging them to rewrite the state’s voting laws after GOP defeats in the November presidential election and the January Senate runoffs (where Heritage Action contacted 1.5 million voters on behalf of the losing Republican candidates). The activists wrote that they had “lost faith in the process and the outcome of their elections.” Soon after, bills restricting voting access started moving through the legislature.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“Then we provided testimony, expert witnesses, analysis, and actually how to draft these bills so that they were legally tight,” Anderson said. “So, [Democratic voting rights lawyer] Marc Elias, if you know that name from the progressive left, he’s like their legal pit bull. He goes after all of this with lawsuits, so that Marc Elias can’t find any holes.”&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Elias has filed a suit challenging the Georgia law. “The Georgia law violates both the Voting Rights Act and the US Constitution,” Elias told Mother Jones. “Heritage Action claiming that this is legally tight is like hearing from the Titanic shipbuilders about how much confidence they have in its maiden voyage. This law is based on a Big Lie, denies Black, Brown, and young voters of their rights, and will be struck down in court.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Republican state Rep. Barry Fleming, the author of the bill in the Georgia House, was a guest at Heritage’s donor summit. “I can tell you, back in February, I felt like some days we were alone in Georgia,” Fleming said. “And then the Heritage Foundation stepped in, and that began to bring us a boost to help turn around, get the truth out about what we were really trying to do. And I’m here in part to say thank you and God bless you.”</div><div>
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</div><div>A number of majority-Black counties that Fleming represents as a lawyer in private practice when he’s not at the legislature fired him in protest after the bill passed. But he credited Heritage for helping Republican legislators resist what Anderson called “economic terrorism.” (The group has launched a $1 million ad campaign to defend the law on CNBC and local Georgia stations, which Anderson said is aimed at “woke CEOs [who] didn’t read the bill.”)</div><div>
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</div><div>“But for the Heritage Foundation and you stepping up to help us, what are other part-time legislators across this nation going to think when they try to do the right thing and secure our elections if they’re allowed to fire us from our jobs, threaten our livelihoods just because we stood up to try to make it easy to vote and hard to cheat?” Fleming asked.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>Other measures Anderson said Heritage drafted included “three provisions” in legislation adopted by Iowa Republicans a few weeks before Georgia’s law, including one placing voters on inactive status if they sit out one election cycle and removing them from the rolls if they fail to take action, a system that could lead hundreds of thousands of voters to be purged.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“Iowa is the first state that we got to work in, and we did it quickly and we did it quietly,” Anderson said. “We worked quietly with the Iowa state legislature. We got the best practices to them. We helped draft the bills. We made sure activists were calling the state legislators, getting support, showing up at their public hearings, giving testimony…Little fanfare. Honestly, nobody even noticed. [chris h trms ~] My team looked at each other and we’re like, ‘It can’t be that easy.’” (Elias has also filed suit against the Iowa law.)</div><div>
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</div><div>Heritage has been at the forefront of weaponizing Trump’s Big Lie of widespread voter fraud in order to build support for policies that restrict access to the ballot.</div><div>
</div><div>Anderson also took credit for a Arizona law enacted in early April that prohibits election officials from accepting private funding, which was used in 2020 in both red and blue counties for things like opening more polling locations and drop box sites, saying, “We’re kicking Mark Zuckerberg out of all of our state and federal elections.” And she claimed that another bill signed by Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey on Tuesday, which could purge more than 100,000 people from the state’s list of voters who automatically receive a mail ballot, was “straight from the Heritage recommendations.”&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>A Heritage lobbyist met early on with Florida Republicans to draft a bill largely mimicking the Georgia law, which passed the legislature over the unanimous opposition of Florida’s county elections supervisors. While the bill worked its way through the legislature, Anderson urged DeSantis to champion it. “I’ve got a call this afternoon with Gov. DeSantis’ team getting an update,” she said on April 22 to her donors. “Why is that? He needs to do more. He needs to say, get this bill on my desk.” DeSantis signed the bill on May 6 behind closed doors, with only Fox & Friends cameras allowed in for an “exclusive.”</div><div>
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</div><div>“The scandal is the national pressure coming down on states with an intent to keep people from voting,” says Lisa Gilbert, executive vice president of the corporate watchdog group Public Citizen. After record turnout in 2020, “writing these bills, pushing these bills, is a mechanism to attempt to return to those new voters being unable to vote.”</div><div>
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</div><div>In addition to pushing state-based voting restrictions, Heritage Action is leading the effort to block the passage of HR 1, Democrats’ sweeping democracy reform bill that would preempt many of these voter suppression laws by enacting policies like automatic and Election Day registration, two weeks of early voting, and expanded mail-in voting on a nationwide basis. “HR 1 is basically the dream bill of every left-wing advocacy group we’ve been fighting against for years on election issues,” von Spakovsky said at the donor event.</div><div>
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</div><div>Von Spakovsky said at the beginning of the year that Heritage put out “a short summary of the worst provisions of a 900-page bill. Now, you all know congressional staffers don’t like reading 900-page bills. That fact sheet we put out is being used by congressional staffers, members of Congress, to go up and fight HR 1.” The group dubbed the bill the “Corrupt Politicians Act,” a label that was soon being used by leading Republicans like Ted Cruz.</div><div>
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</div><div>“We’ve made sure that every single member of Congress knows just how bad the bill is,” Anderson added. “Then we’ve made sure there’s an echo chamber of support around these senators driven by your Heritage Action activists and sentinels across the country where we’ve driven hundreds of thousands of calls, emails, place letters to the editor, hosted events, and run television and digital ads.”</div><div>
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</div><div>In March, the group organized a rally in West Virginia to urge centrist Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin to oppose the bill and “stand up for WV values,” according to an invitation obtained by Documented, even as it bused in conservative activists from states hundreds of miles away. Heritage Action announced on Wednesday it would run ads this summer pressuring Democratic senators in West Virginia, Arizona, Montana, and New Hampshire to preserve the filibuster in order to block HR 1.&nbsp;</div><div>
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</div><div>“It’s an all-hands-on-deck moment,” Anderson said in April. “If we don’t win this, we lose our republic, period.”</div><div>
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</div><div>To Elias, the video from the Heritage summit is proof that Republican state lawmakers are pursuing voting restrictions not in response to real local problems, but at the behest of well-funded Washington insiders. “It’s not being run by a coalition of state legislators,” he says. “It’s not being run by election administrators. It’s being run out of an office in Washington, DC, by people whose sole agenda is to make it harder for Black, Brown, and young voters to participate in the electoral process. Republicans who adopt these model laws should be ashamed of themselves.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Watch the full video here. This story has been updated to include comment from Hans von Spakovsky.</div><div>
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</div><div>Nick Surgey is an investigative reporter and the executive director of Documented.</div><div>
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</div><div>&nbsp;torres-sp</div><div>
</div><div>Business interests have also worked to undo campaign finance reforms that voters wanted. In November 2016, North Dakota voters voted for an initiative to provide public financing in elections. But the state legislature repealed the measure and the governor signed the repeal into law by February 2017.&nbsp; The opponents of this change included American for Prosperity, a group linked to Charles Koch of the Koch Brothers and Koch industries.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/2020/12/georgia-senate-race/</div><div>
</div><div>kennis, really about camp fin ref need</div><div>
</div><div>On the eve of the general election, Russ Silva and his family, like many fellow Georgians, watched as the results started slowly pouring across his television set. It was becoming more and more apparent that Georgia was destined to become a focal point for the entire country, not just because it was a contested battleground state between Donald Trump and Joseph Biden, but also because it was setting the stage for an unprecedented situation.</div><div>
</div><div>As election night came to an end with many results still uncertain, Silva let out a sigh as he bemoaned to AlterNet what he suspected was inevitable: "Now I pretty much know I'm going to be barraged by endless ads."</div><div>
</div><div>By the time incumbent Senator David Perdue's slim advantage over challenger Jon Ossoff dipped to 49.9997 percent of the vote on November 5, it became all but official: a double-header runoff for two Senate seats and ultimately control of the chamber was going to happen in early January.</div><div>
</div><div>John Nichols, a veteran journalist, explained to AlterNet that, "We've never had a circumstance like this before with two seats up-in-the air while two seats are also needed for control of the Senate in two runoff elections before an inauguration with these kinds of stakes at play."</div><div>
</div><div>Unsurprisingly then, Georgia's unique double-header runoff has rapidly become ground zero for a legion of political consultants, pollsters and a blizzard of television advertising.</div><div>
</div><div>"There's a whole industry that does this from Washington and everyone is able to go to their donors and say, 'hey, I need 20 million dollars,' and then that money will then be found," says Nichols.</div><div>
</div><div>This unprecedented spending frenzy led Christian-right activist Ralph Reed to dub Georgia "crazytown" to the New York Times. It became that after Democrats suffered rough defeats in North Carolina (a race they lost by a mere 1.8 points), Iowa (where various polls showed the Democratic challenger leading through election night), Kentucky (where tons of money was spent in an unsuccessful effort to unseat Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican Majority Leader) and most devastatingly, in Maine (where the New York Times profiled the Republican incumbent, Susan Collins, as being a dinosaur out of touch with more polarized times and quite vulnerable to defeat).</div><div>
</div><div>Because of this string of defeats, Georgia's old southern-styled campaign system, which was originally fashioned to advantage white Democratic candidates in the Jim Crow era, wound up having greater relevance than ever before. No more than a mere percentage point separated the total Democratic and Republican Party votes in both Senate races, with all sides acknowledging that the Democrats are still facing steep odds of sweeping. By January, the double-header will decide not only party control of the Senate but also the future path to a potential economic recovery for both the U.S. and to a significant extent, the rest of the world.</div><div>
</div><div>While the anticipated record-breaking spending in Georgia's twin runoffs has gotten a lot of media coverage, the ramifications of so much hinging on contests that will likely be decided by a relative handful of voters is an under-explored aspect of the story. Leading researchers on politics, campaign finance and the media told AlterNet that the Georgia campaigns exemplify a system that is anti-democratic to its core.</div><div>
</div><div>Consulting and Pollster Industry Descends Upon Georgia</div><div>
</div><div>The numbers so far have been dizzying, and the campaign has only just gotten underway. According to AdImpact, by Thanksgiving week, $220 million had already been spent between all four campaigns (Ossoff has spent $41.6 million; Loeffler, $40.8; Warnock, $34.2 and Perdue, $30.1) while another $214 million in future buys had been reserved.</div><div>
</div><div>With this rate of spending, the campaigns are collectively on pace to reach a half a billion dollars in spending by Election Day or perhaps even more, according to Professor Thomas Ferguson, author of The Golden Rule.</div><div>
</div><div>"One private equity investor put a couple of million into the Maine senate race which clearly came during a late influx of money," Ferguson said. As a result, when it comes to Georgia, "you very well may not see what the real total spending will amount to until the end December."</div><div>
</div><div>You may be wondering what all of this money is even being spent on.</div><div>
</div><div>As Nichols explained to AlterNet, "party campaign committees, leadership PACs [political action committees], special interest PACs, political television advertising and hired gun political consultants and pollsters," form the bedrock of what he dubbed, "the media and election industrial complex, which Bob McChesney and I have written about because the truth of the matter is that there really is a huge industry that is solely dedicated to this."</div><div>
</div><div>The Atlanta metro area's television market, where three-fourths of Georgia's voters reside, is already approaching near total ad saturation well over a month before Election Day. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who has embraced Trump even more than her fellow Republican incumbent, has already spent 23 million of her own personal funds on television advertising and has already reserved an additional 40 million.</div><div>
</div><div>Georgian voters have already registered their fatigue with the advertising onslaught. Echoing the thoughts of many Georgia users in the Twittersphere, one posted, "Here in Georgia, I can't watch anything without being POUNDED with political ads. I get it, but I'm sooooooo tired."</div><div>
</div><div>Rich Campaigns, Poor Democracy?</div><div>
</div><div>The Supreme Court has consistently ruled that campaign spending is the equivalent of protected political speech. As a result, each election year records for campaign spending set in previous cycles routinely fall, according to Gerald Sullivan, the author of Global Electioneering.</div><div>
</div><div>"Overall, more than $14 billion will have been spent on all Federal-level campaigns this year, doubling what was spent in 2016. The amount of money is abhorrent and disgusting," Sullivan told AlterNet, while adding that "the more professionalization of campaigns intervenes into the electoral process, the less democratic it will be."</div><div>
</div><div>To a whole generation of young people, it has become a fact of life that elections are synonymous with big spending. But to Sullivan, this is not consistent with a healthy democracy. "In the 1950s, things were done on a retail basis as politicians would have district and ward captains and everything was done locally." In modern times, however, "political consulting firms have centralized the whole process. Now it's just left up to the experts and professionals." Sullivan added that spending doesn't dominate the process in most democracies, which have relatively short campaign seasons. He pointed to the United Kingdom's six-week long election campaigns as a better model.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>the big bopper gets beat?</div><div>
</div><div>Anita Milanovich was a delegate to the 2016 Republican National Convention from Montana. All 27 delegates from Montana were bound by state party rules to support Donald Trump at the convention.[2] As of July 13, 2016, Trump had approximately 1,542 delegates. The winner of the Republican nomination needed the support of 1,237 delegates. Trump formally won the nomination on July 19, 2016.</div><div>
</div><div>Career</div><div>Anita Milanovich is an attorney with the legal offices of The Bopp Law Firm, which is led by James Bopp Jr. Milanovich operates out of the firm's Montana satellite office. She specializes in first amendment law, campaign finance law, election law, constitutional law, civil litigation, and appellate practice.[3][1] She began working with the firm in 2004 when she graduated law school.[1]</div><div>
</div><div>2016 Republican National Convention</div><div>See also: Republican National Convention, 2016</div><div>
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</div><div>i'm confused: but note these are STATE races</div><div>
</div><div>https://mtstandard.com/opinion/editorial/montana-view-campaign-spending-limits-survive/</div><div>
</div><div>no lnx</div><div>
</div><div>Montana view: Campaign spending limits survive</div><div>Jan 17, 2019&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Eight years of litigation to abolish Montana’s campaign contribution limits ended Monday with two words from the U.S. Supreme Court: certiorari denied.</div><div>
</div><div>Lair v. Mangan was among dozens of cases that the nation’s highest court declined to review in an order issued Monday.</div><div>
</div><div>The high court order allows the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling to stand. The court upheld Montanans’ authority to limit how much money a contributor may donate to a candidate for public office.</div><div>
</div><div>Doug Lair was one of three individuals, who along with American Tradition Partnership, Montana Right to Life Association PAC, Sweet Grass Council for Community Integrity, Lake County Republican Central Committee, Beaverhead Republican Central Committee, Jake Oil LLC, JL Oil LLC and Champion Painting Inc., filed a lawsuit in September 2011 in U.S. District Court in Billings.</div><div>
</div><div>The lawsuit was one of a series involving American Tradition Partnership (originally named Western Tradition Partnership) that sought to overturn Montana campaign laws, including the state’s century-old voter-approved ban on corporate campaign contributions and newer statutes requiring truth in political advertising among other things.</div><div>
</div><div>ATP and its associates succeeded in getting most of the campaign laws thrown out. A week before voting started in the 2012 Montana General Election, U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell ruled in favor of ATP and Lair, nullifying Montana contribution limits, too.</div><div>
</div><div>The Republican Governors Association quickly donated $500,000 to the campaign of Rick Hill, the GOP nominee for governor. Lovell’s decision was appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which reinstated the Montana campaign limits pending appeal, so the limits were off for just six days.</div><div>
</div><div>The Hill campaign asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene and allow unlimited donations pending appeal, which the high court declined to do. Eventually, the circuit court upheld the donation limits’ constitutionality and the law's foes appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.</div><div>
</div><div>What this long legal battle means is that Montana must not take our campaign finance laws for granted. Commissioner of Political Practices Jeff Mangan, who has the duty of enforcing those laws, needs adequate staffing and resources to fulfill his vital watchdog role.</div><div>
</div><div>The flurry of court action in the 2012 General Election erased any doubt that even greater sums of cash would flood into our elections if we had no limits.</div><div>
</div><div>“Montana’s limits leave candidates with the ability to conduct an effective campaign for office,” Commissioner of Political Practice’s Chief Legal Counsel Jaime MacNaughton said in a news release Monday. “Our limits allow individuals to associate with the candidate of their choice through their own speech, volunteering, discussing their merits with their neighbors, and through making their voice heard at the ballot box. Montana secured a victory today for transparency and accountability in our government and elected officials.”</div><div>
</div><div>The Montana Attorney General’s Office successfully defended the state contribution law, starting when Democrat Steve Bullock was attorney general and concluding under the leadership of Republican Tim Fox.</div><div>
</div><div>"I've never heard any Montanan say we need more money in politics and I'm glad to see the Supreme Court for once agrees," Bullock said Monday. Montanans troubled by recent growth in campaign spending across the political spectrum will agree with the governor.</div><div>
</div><div>MONTANA VIEW ICON</div><div>The Billings Gazette</div><div>=</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>lee f</div><div>
</div><div>https://theintercept.com/2020/02/15/dark-money-irs-reporting-501c</div><div>
</div><div>DARK MONEY GROUPS backed by foreign corporate donors are supporting the Trump administration’s decision to roll back one of the last remaining ways for authorities to monitor the flow of unlawful campaign cash in American elections.</div><div>
</div><div>In recent years, 501(c) nonprofits have become the entities of choice for secret campaign spending. These nonprofit groups, which do not have to report any donor information to the public, can receive unlimited contributions from any source and, thanks to the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, spend unlimited amounts on elections.</div><div>
</div><div>Foreign spending, whether by a foreign national or a foreign-owned corporation, is still illegal under federal law. But the law has been poorly enforced, and the few instances in which penalties have been applied in recent years have come in reaction to publicly reported foreign corporate spending to Super PACs, such as The Intercept’s reporting on Chinese corporate donations in 2016 and the recent federal indictment over a shell company owned by a Russian national that gave to President Donald Trump’s Super PAC in 2018.</div><div>
</div><div>The one check on foreign contributions to dark-money groups has been the Schedule B form, which reports 501(c) donor information confidentially to the Internal Revenue Service. Under a new rule proposed last September by the Treasury Department and the IRS, nonprofits will no longer be required to report donor information, even to the government, allowing an unprecedented level of secrecy.</div><div>
</div><div>Lobbyists for foreign-funded groups have pushed the administration to move forward with the rule, which is close to being finalized.&nbsp; The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the largest business lobby organization in the world, spent over $10 million to influence the last 2018 midterm election cycle using its general fund. The group, which has foreign corporate donors, has lobbied in support of the IRS rule to repeal the Schedule B requirement, claiming in a letter to officials that the accidental leak of donors could reduce corporate free speech rights.</div><div>
</div><div>“Identifying, harassing, and intimidating the organization’s supporters is a chief means of silencing that organization’s speech,” wrote Caroline L. Harris, the Chambers’ chief tax policy counsel, and Ryan P. Meyers, the deputy general counsel of the group, in a regulatory letter to officials overseeing the rule change. “The Chamber applauds the work of Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in eliminating onerous reporting requirements.”</div><div>
</div><div>The National Association of Manufacturers, which counts several corporations based in foreign countries as members, in a letter to IRS officials, similarly called the Schedule B requirement an “unnecessary administrative filings that raise the potential for misuse in a way that chills protected speech.”</div><div>
</div><div>Both NAM and the Chamber of Commerce, which spends more than $160 million a year, are organized as 501(c)(6) trade associations and under no obligation to disclose donor money to the public — only to the government through the annual Schedule B form to its 990 annual filing. After the Citizens United decision, the two groups led an effort to defeat the DISCLOSE Act, legislation that would have forced groups engaged high-dollar election advocacy to reveal donor information. The Chamber also lobbied successfully to stop President Barack Obama from issuing an executive order to force government contractors to disclose grants to 501(c) groups.</div><div>
</div><div>Foreign-based firms such as Brazilian petrochemical firm Braskem, Al Zayani Investments in Bahrain, and Turkish conglomerate Tekfen are listed on the Chamber’s website as dues-paying members. Faced with criticism in the past that its foreign funding might bleed into the Chamber’s vast domestic lobbying and campaign spending budget, the group has claimed that any foreign donations are walled off from domestic funds, and that foreign donors make up a small percentage of its overall budget.</div><div>
</div><div>But the removal of the Schedule B requirement could make those claims impossible to verify. A large foreign national firm could provide multimillion-dollar donations for use in U.S. elections to the Chamber under the new rule and such giving would never be reported to government officials.</div><div>
</div><div>That’s precisely the danger of removing Schedule B forms, campaign finance experts warn. The Campaign Legal Center, a campaign finance watchdog that has filed the ethics complaints that led to enforcement action on foreign money in the past, cautioned the IRS that the rule would simply open the door to more foreign spending.</div><div>
</div><div>“Congress has failed to pass new transparency legislation, and the FEC has failed to enforce the transparency laws that are on the books,” said Brendan Fischer, director of Campaign Legal Center’s federal reform program. “As a result, the only donor disclosure reports that dark-money groups file with any federal agency are the confidential Schedule B reports filed with the IRS. These confidential donor reports are one of the few ways that federal agencies could detect and deter foreign money in U.S. elections.”</div><div>
</div><div>It’s not hard to comprehend the many ways in which completely secret legal entities could incentivize illegal election behavior. In 2016, reporters from the Telegraph conducted a sting operation on a Republican campaign operative working in support of Trump. The operative was offered a $2 million check from a Chinese businessman by the reporters. He responded by offering a plan for how to conceal the money, suggesting that it be routed through his consulting firm to a pair of 501(c)4 groups and then to a pro-Trump Ssuper PAC.</div><div>
</div><div>The FBI is also investigating the National Rifle Association over allegations that the group, which is organized as a 501(c)4, may have received financial support from Russian sources. McClatchy reported that counterintelligence officials believe that Russian interests may have contributed to the NRA’s $30 million election advertising campaign in 2016.</div><div>
</div><div>Foreign firms increasingly finance major American business associations. As The Intercept has previously reported, a major Chinese chemical company joined the American Chemistry Council, a 501(c)6 that routinely lobbies lawmakers and spends money in elections.</div><div>
</div><div>The Trump administration had originally tried to remove the Schedule B form last summer in a surprise decision. A federal judge in Montana, however, ruled that the IRS had failed to follow proper regulatory procedure and ordered the agency to conduct a formal rule-making to allow the public and stakeholders to weigh in on the change.</div><div>
</div><div>“The rise of ‘dark money’ in U.S. elections has made it easy for foreign entities to contravene these laws by funneling money into U.S. elections through groups that that [sic] do not publicly disclose their donors, such as 501(c)(4) social welfare organizations and 501(c)(6) trade associations,” wrote the Campaign Legal Center in a letter to the IRS. “This change would further enable foreign entities to donate millions of dollars to such organizations for the purpose of influencing U.S. elections without any risk of scrutiny by federal regulators.”</div><div>
</div><div>Republican-aligned think tanks have joined the business-backed push to eliminate the Schedule B. Several nonprofits backed by billionaire Charles Koch, including his marquee group Americans for Prosperity, testified on February 7 in support of the rule change. FreedomWorks, a conservative grassroots group backed by business interests, has also mobilized hundreds of letters to the agency.</div><div>
</div><div>Hans von Spakovsky, a former Federal Election Commission member now with the Heritage Foundation, appeared at the hearing alongside other conservative activists in support of the rule change.</div><div>
</div><div>Von Spakosvsky, an avowed critic of campaign finance regulations and voting rights laws, testified that “their claim that this will somehow allow foreign money to suddenly flood into American elections is absurd,” according to a transcript of his remarks. Von Spakovsky said the FEC had plenty of authority and expertise in combating foreign money during his tenure, despite the fact that the agency has historically only intervened to investigate foreign money through disclosed political action committees on a few occasions in its 45-year history. He did not cite any examples of the FEC investigating 501(c) groups.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>=</div><div>koch v ca</div><div>https://www.exposedbycmd.org/</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2020/01/10/koch-funds-groups-supporting-lawsuit-against-donor-transparency/</div><div>
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</div><div>Legal scholar argues the Supreme Court is ‘killing’ the bedrock of campaign finance law — and may soon crush it completely</div><div>
</div><div>An Alaska law that caps campaign contributions from individuals to…</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/legal-scholar-argues-the-supreme-court-is-killing-the-bedrock-of-campaign-finance-law-and-may-soon-crush-it-completely/</div><div>
</div><div>no lnx</div><div>
</div><div>Legal scholar argues the Supreme Court is ‘killing’ the bedrock of campaign finance law — and may soon crush it completely</div><div>
</div><div>Written by Cody Fenwick December 31, 2019</div><div>
</div><div>An Alaska law that caps campaign contributions from individuals to candidates at $500 is facing a legal challenge that has made its way to the Supreme Court. While the Ninth Circuit upheld the law, the justices have told the lower court to review the decision again while applying a previous precedent from the case Randall v. Sorrell — a ruling that struck down low limits on campaign contributions.</div><div>
</div><div>In a recent post on the Harvard Law Review blog, law professor Ciara Torres-Spelliscy argued that the Supreme Court appears primed to use the case to severely weaken campaign finance law — and perhaps kill contribution limits altogether.</div><div>
</div><div>Reacting to the court’s decision to send the Alaska law back to the Ninth Circuit for review, she wrote: “This likely portends the Ninth Circuit reversing itself, or, if it sticks to its guns, then Thompson v. Hebdon may make a round trip to the Court where the Roberts Court would likely reprise the wrongly decided Randall and strike Alaska’s contribution limits, possibly taking with it all states’ contribution limits.”</div><div>
</div><div>This falls in a pattern of the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts pushing to deregulate corruption, as Torres-Spelliscy has argued.</div><div>
</div><div>And even the standard that existed before the 2006 Randall ruling was unreasonably strict. Previously, the Supreme Court had ruled in the 1976 Buckley v. Valeo that while it was constitutional to limit how much individuals could contribute to campaigns, it was not permissible to limit campaigns’ expenditures. Campaign finance reform advocates had been hoping to overturn that precedent, but their hopes were dashed.</div><div>
</div><div>Now things could get much worse. And according to Torres-Spelliscy, the Court’s apparent justification for seeking to cut down campaign finance laws is at odds with the empirical evidence.</div><div>
</div><div>She explained:</div><div>
</div><div>The decision in Randall was based in part on the Supreme Court’s assumption that lower contribution limits would hamper electoral competition and especially hurt challengers. But the Supreme Court made this assumption without the benefit of data that tested this empirical point. Post-Randall, I help co-author a study that looked at precisely this issue. The study examined elections in forty-two states over twenty-six years for lower house legislative races. The study showed that lower contribution limits actually boost electoral competition and assist challengers—likely because incumbents were unable to amass as big war chests to either scare off or out-maneuver would-be challengers. Analysis by the National Institute on Money in Politics in 2018 looking at data from Vermont from 2000 to 2016 confirmed that higher contribution limits hurt electoral competitiveness—the opposite of what the Supreme Court assumed in Randall. But in the area of campaign finance, facts have been relegated to an unexamined dusty shelf.</div><div>
</div><div>If the Supreme Court takes the route she’s expecting, she believes other campaign finance laws will quickly face a wave of new lawsuits from opponents hopeful that the justices will favor their cause.</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/the-citizens-united-ruling-broke-american-democracy-at-the-start-of-the-decade-it-may-never-recover/</div><div>
</div><div>many lnx</div><div>
</div><div>The Citizens United ruling broke American democracy at the start of the decade. It may never recover</div><div>
</div><div>Written by Igor Derysh / Salon December 29, 2019</div><div>
</div><div>The election of President Donald Trump will likely define this decade, but the breakdown in our political system which sowed deeper partisan divisions and ultimately paved the way for his White House victory can be traced back to a single January day almost exactly ten years ago.</div><div>
</div><div>On Jan. 21, 2010, then-Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy cast the deciding vote in the Citizens United case, which was brought by a group chaired by David Bossie, who would later serve as Trump’s deputy campaign manager.</div><div>
</div><div>Kennedy wrote in the majority decision that limits on independent expenditures violated the First Amendment rights of corporations and other groups, effectively overturning spending restrictions dating back more than a century.</div><div>
</div><div>The decision allowed corporations to spend unlimited money on campaign ads as long as they did not formally coordinate with candidates or political parties. According to Kennedy, there could not be corruption, because “an independent expenditure is political speech presented to the electorate that is not coordinated with a candidate.”</div><div>
</div><div>Some have argued that the ruling was the “logical next step” after the court’s 1976 Buckley v. Valeo decision, which said election spending limits may violate the First Amendment. But the Supreme Court ruled in favor of corporate limits in 1990 and then upheld limits on corporate and union spending in 2003.</div><div>
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</div><div>The Citizens United ruling was later compounded by Republican efforts to block transparency rules, Federal Election Commission rulings and further court decisions like McCutcheon v. FEC, paving the way for the creation of super PACs, or committees which can spend unlimited sums of money to promote or oppose candidates while hiding the identities of their donors.</div><div>
</div><div>The impact of the Citizens United ruling and subsequent campaign finance changes are undeniable. In 2010, the biggest Republican donor of the election cycle spent $7.6 million to support conservative candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics (CPR). Just eight years later, casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam, donated $122 million to support GOP candidates, or more than 15 times as much.</div><div>
</div><div>Democrats pumped big money into elections, too. Presidential contender Mike Bloomberg spent $95 million during the last election cycle, while fellow billionaire candidate Tom Steyer spent more than $73 million, according to CPR data. [FOR GUNS AND CliMATE]</div><div>
</div><div>There was certainly loads of money pumped into elections prior to Citizens United. The 2008 presidential election, which was the last national contest before the Supreme Court decision, saw about $338 million in outside spending. But the amount of outside cash injected into the presidential race skyrocketed to more than $1 billion in 2012 and $1.4 billion in 2016.</div><div>
</div><div>Such massive expenditures are not limited to presidential races. The 2018 midterm election cycle was the first in history to see more than $1 billion in outside spending — up from $69 million just four cycles earlier and $567 million in 2014, according to the CPR.</div><div>
</div><div>Super PACs quickly became the biggest outside spenders. In 2018, the House Republican-linked Congressional Leadership Fund spent $136 million, the Senate Democratic-aligned Senate Majority PAC spent $112 million and the Mitch McConnell-connected Senate Leadership Fund spent $94 million, according to the CPR.</div><div>
</div><div>Though both parties have raised and spent hundreds of millions in outside money — and the Citizens United ruling has been criticized by both former President Barack Obama and Trump — researchers at the University of Chicago, Columbia University and the London School of Economics and Political Science found that the rise of dark money has resulted in a huge advantage for Republicans in state legislature races, particularly in “states with weak unions.”</div><div>
</div><div>“We find that Citizens United increased the GOP’s average seat share in the state legislature by five percentage points. That is a large effect — large enough that, were it applied to the past twelve Congresses, partisan control of the House would have switched eight times,” the researchers wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. “In line with a previous study, we also find that the vote share of Republican candidates increased three to four points on average.” PLUS GERRY VOTE SUPPRESS?!]</div><div>
</div><div>The result has been a shift much further to the right in numerous state legislatures and an increase in “ideological extremism,” which was more prevalent among Democrats, according to the study.</div><div>
</div><div>In the 2010 election, the first to see a massive upswing in outside money, Republicans captured two dozen state legislative chambers ahead of a game-changing nationwide gerrymandering effort, which made it harder than ever for Democrats to win back the seats they lost.</div><div>
</div><div>“Without Citizens United every frontline Congressional race of the last two cycles are TOTALLY different,” Fordham Law Professor Zephyr Teachout tweeted. “A billion in outside spending in 2018. And that is just a tiny fraction of the impact.”</div><div>
</div><div>Despite Kennedy’s insistence that there could be no corruption because candidates cannot coordinate with super PACs, the ruling has also led to corruption as candidates flout rules preventing them from coordinating with the PACs. [EITAN_]</div><div>
</div><div>“The supposed barrier between candidates and unrestricted super PACs is flimsier than ever,” Roll Call reported just four years after the ruling. “As midterm elections approach, complaints are rolling into the FEC from both parties about super PACs that share vendors, fund-raisers and video footage with the politicians they support.”</div><div>
</div><div>GOP leaders like Paul Ryan devised ways to solicit money directly from billionaires like Adelson by using go-betweens. The New York Times reported in 2015 that Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina had “aggressively” exploited loopholes to allow a super PAC to effectively run her campaign.</div><div>
</div><div>And the corruption is not merely limited to exploiting loopholes in the law. Obama warned in a State of the Union speech that the Citizens United ruling could lead toforeign interference in U.S. elections. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito could be seen mouthing the words, “Not true.”</div><div>
</div><div>But Obama’s foreshadowing turned out to be remarkably true. Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, the two associates of Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, were recently indicted on charges that they illegally funneled foreign money to Republican politicians, including a $325,000 contribution to a pro-Trump super PAC.</div><div>
</div><div>George Nader, an adviser to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates who was linked to efforts to aid Trump’s campaign during the election, was also indicted for allegedly funneling $3.5 million into elections, including a $1 million contribution to a Democratic super PAC.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2012, a foreign-owned company made a $1 million contribution to a pro-Mitt Romney super PAC.</div><div>
</div><div>Democratic presidential candidates, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., have premised their campaigns on driving big money out of politics. Sanders has long called for a constitutional amendment to repeal Citizens United, which was echoed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and others at the party’s December primary debate.</div><div>
</div><div>But it may be nearly impossible to meet the high threshold to ratify a constitutional amendment. There has only been one amendment ratified since 1971. While House Democrats voted to approve H.R. 1, which called for the ruling to be repealed, there appears to be little to no support for the legislation from Republicans in the upper chamber.</div><div>
</div><div>Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union have decried these efforts as attempts to “ban political speech.”</div><div>
</div><div>“In our view, the answer to that problem is to expand — not limit — the resources available for political advocacy. Thus, the ACLU supports a comprehensive and meaningful system of public financing that would help create a level playing field for every qualified candidate,” the organization said. “We support carefully drawn disclosure rules, we support reasonable limits on campaign contributions and we support stricter enforcement of existing bans on coordination between candidates and super PACs.”</div><div>
</div><div>Some local governments have tried to counter the rise of dark money with public financing. Seattle’s “democracy vouchers” give voters $100, which they can donate to any campaign in a local election. Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang has proposed a similar “Democracy Dollars” program, which would expand this initiative across the country.</div><div>
</div><div>But while cities, states and federal lawmakers grapple with the rise of dark money in politics, one thing that is clear is that Citizens United irrevocably changed politics over the course of the last decade — and beyond.</div><div>
</div><div>Kennedy himself admitted in 2015 that the disclosure requirement he believed would fix any potential issues of corruption was “not working the way it should.”FEC Commissioner Ann Ravel quit in 2017 over the state of campaign finance, writing in her resignation letter that “our political campaigns have been awash in unlimited, dark money” since the Citizens United decision.</div><div>
</div><div>“Most of the funding comes from a tiny, highly unrepresentative segment of the population,” she wrote. “Disclosure laws need to be strengthened, the broken jurisprudence of Citizens United re-examined, public financing of candidates ought to be expanded to reduce reliance on the wealthy and commissioners who will carry out the mandates of the law should be appointed.”</div><div>
</div><div>A Brennan Center report pointed out that a small wealthy group of Americans now wields “more power than at any time since Watergate, while many of the rest seem to be disengaging from politics.”</div><div>
</div><div>“This is perhaps the most troubling result of Citizens United: in a time of historic wealth inequality,” report author Daniel Weiner wrote, “the decision has helped reinforce the growing sense that our democracy primarily serves the interests of the wealthy few and that democratic participation for the vast majority of citizens is of relatively little value.”</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div></div><div>Dark Money tracks the influence of corporate money in contemporary American politics. Using the state of Montana as a primary case study, the film engages with the complex history that Montana state politics has with corporate influence in politics. Starting with the story of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, Dark Money shows how the influence of mining corporations caused state legislators to relax mining regulations, which resulted in an environmental catastrophe in Butte, Montana, with problems that persist today. As a result, Montana banned corporate campaign financing of state politics in 1912.[4] However, since the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court decision, corporate interests and big money have made their way back on the scene in Montana and have become a growing national concern. The film traces the steps taken by Montana Attorney General (and now Governor) Steve Bullock to seek relief from campaign finance abuses at a time when the Federal Election Commission (FEC) was ground to a halt by the appointment of three new Republican members, headed by Don McGahn, who systemically blocked all enforcement of FEC regulations.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 2015, Montana reasserted its campaign finance sovereignty with passage of the Montana Disclose Act, which, by requiring full disclosure of contributors' names, removed the "dark" aspect of the Big Money influence on their campaigns.[5] John S. Adams of the Montana Free Press plays a central role in the film as an investigative journalist who has been tracking state politics and "following the money" for several years. Adams has reported on everything from the role of the American Tradition Partnership (formerly known as Western Tradition Partnership) funds in the shaping of state election laws[6] to the illegal political activities of a "right to work" PAC in Montana as well.[7] The film follows Adams's work as a reporter, but it also includes interviews from other prominent figures in Montana state politics and those involved in the movement to examine and limit the influence of dark money in politics.</div><div>
</div><div>Director Kimberly Reed explains that she was motivated to make the film because the way to understand any public issue is to understand what guides it. “The first thing you have to look at is the money that’s fueling that issue,” she explains. “Just by following that money, you can tell a lot about the powers-that-be behind it.”[8]</div><div>
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</div><div>https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/07/montana-pols-launch-fight-against-nonprofit</div><div>
</div><div>Two Montana politicians on Tuesday launched separate fights against the Trump administration’s decision to relax disclosure requirements on certain politically active nonprofit groups.</div><div>
</div><div>Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) introduced legislation that would overturn the decision and increase nonprofit transparency requirements. Gov. Steve Bullock (D-Mont.) filed a lawsuit in a Montana Federal District Court that would prevent the administration from implementing the new rules.</div><div>
</div><div>The Treasury Department announced last week that it would no longer require certain nonprofit organizations, such as 501(c)(4) groups, to disclose identifying information about their donors to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The move, which the department said will save resources and prevent the accidental release of confidential information, could allow groups like the National Rifle Association and Planned Parenthood to pour “dark money” into nationwide elections with less government oversight than before.</div><div>
</div><div>Tester’s legislation, dubbed the Spotlight Act, would effectively reverse the department’s new rules. The Spotlight Act would also require 501(c)(4), 501(c)(5) and 501(c)(6) groups to disclose to the IRS and the public the names of donors who contribute more than $5,000. Those groups do not have to release the names of any donors under current laws, which is why many politically active nonprofits are called “dark money” groups.</div><div>
</div><div>Bullock’s lawsuit, first reported by The New York Times, claims the IRS and Treasury Department unlawfully interfered with Montana’s ability to gather the data it needs to manage its tax laws. The suit also claims the Trump administration did not follow the Administrative Procedure Act, which requires agencies such as the Treasury Department to provide opportunities for public comment before changing policies.</div><div>
</div><div>Bullock’s litigation is seeking to nullify the new IRS rules, according to court documents.</div><div>
</div><div>Tester and Bullock have both been champions of campaign finance reform that increases election transparency. Tester has introduced multiple campaign finance reform plans, including a proposed constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people and a bill that would require senators to file campaign finance disclosures electronically.</div><div>
</div><div>Bullock helped push legislation in Montana that requires independent groups to disclose their donors if they spend money in state elections, regardless of the group’s tax status. He also signed an executive order requiring recipients of government contracts to disclose dark money spending in Montana elections.</div><div>
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</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/2019/07/ted-cruzs-lawyer-actually-compared-him-to-rosa-parks-in-the-fight-against-campaign-finance-law/</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;Ted Cruz is currently involved in a campaign finance battle, and attorneys for the far-right Texas senator are being lambasted for comparing their lawsuit to the actions of civil rights icon Rosa Parks.[same week hunter 5 affairs as legit biz expense]</div><div>
</div><div>At issue in Cruz’ lawsuit is a $260,000 contribution for his 2018 campaign. The day before he narrowly defeated Democrat Beto O’Rourke in Texas’ U.S. Senate race, Cruz contributed $260,000 of his own money to his campaign — which was a violation of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. Under that law, candidates can only reimburse themselves for up to $250,000 with funds raised after an election.</div><div>
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</div><div></div><div>619</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2019/06/bipartisan-push-to-crack-down-on-money-laundering-and-dark-money-shell-companies</div><div>
</div><div>A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to require obscure corporations and limited-liability companies to disclose their true owners to law enforcement to snuff out laundered cash and political “dark money” flowing into the U.S. from foreign-influenced shell companies.</div><div>Members of Congress have introduced a number of bills mandating disclosure of companies’ beneficial owners — the person or persons who enjoy the benefits of ownership and control the company — to federal investigators. Lawmakers are mostly attempting to crack down on money laundering and the financing of other illegal activities. But the proposed legislation could also impact foreign interference in U.S. politics.</div><div>
</div><div>Foreign nationals and governments are prohibited from directly or indirectly engaging in activity to influence U.S. elections. But opaque LLCs, which are not required to disclose their beneficial owners to the public or law enforcement, frequently contribute to politically-active outside groups. This untraceable process has prompted concerns that they are anonymously injecting foreign money into the U.S. political process.</div><div>
</div><div>More than 4,000 LLCs contributed to groups in 2016, nearly quadruple the number in 2012. In the 2016 election cycle alone, nearly $46 million came from LLCs at the federal level, nearly double the $24 million from LLCs in the 2012 presidential election cycle.</div><div>
</div><div>Overall, direct spending in U.S. federal elections by groups that do not disclose their donors has exceeded $1 billion since OpenSecrets began tracking dark money in 2006.</div><div>
</div><div>Opaque foreign money has also found its way to political committees. Jho Low, a fugitive Malaysian financier accused of stealing billions, allegedly used a shell company to funnel more than $1 million to a pro-Barack Obama super PAC ahead of the 2012 presidential election. Low has not only been charged in relation to his alleged illegal foreign contributions in support of Obama, but has also been tied to suspicious money transfers funneling money into President Donald Trump’s joint fundraising committee.</div><div>
</div><div>These anonymous shell companies also show up in Foreign Agents Registration Act filings, masking the source of money behind influence campaigns and undermining the intent of the law to provide transparency on foreign influence activities.</div><div>
</div><div>Lax corporate disclosure laws have turned the U.S. into a top destination for shell companies. Last year, the U.S. surpassed the Cayman Islands to become the second largest haven for secretive offshore accounts and shell companies, according to a report from London-based Tax Justice Network.</div><div>
</div><div>“We’re becoming second only to Switzerland in the place people pick to put their money,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said during Wednesday’s hearing on shell companies. “Being second in a lot of things is good … not here.”</div><div>
</div><div>Lawmakers have introduced a number of bills to address the flow of untraceable money. Senate Judiciary Committee members Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) introduced legislation Tuesday that would require corporations to turn over beneficial ownership information to law enforcement in the event of a subpoena or summons.</div><div>
</div><div>A bipartisan group of senators in early June proposed their own bill to combat abuse of shell companies, requiring that corporations and LLCs disclose their beneficial owners to the Treasury Department. Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), Peter King (R-N.Y.) and Tom Malinowski (D-N.J.) introduced similar legislation in May.</div><div>Whitehouse and Grassley, along with Graham and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) have also introduced legislation to specifically address political contributions from shell companies. The bill, first introduced last year, would make it a felony for individuals to use or help set up a shell company to conceal illegal political activity such as foreign political contributions.</div><div>
</div><div>The Treasury Department’s financial crimes enforcement unit finalized a rule last year that requires financial institutions to collect beneficial ownership information for customers opening accounts. But experts say the rule won’t stop the flow of money from foreign shell companies, making Congressional action necessary.</div><div>
</div><div>“This was a step in the right direction. But the primary responsibility for identifying the owners of a company cannot lie with banks. It should lie with the companies themselves, at the time of incorporation or when their ownership changes,” former Acting Treasury Secretary Adam Szubin toldthe Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday. “And FinCEN’s rule does nothing to illuminate the ownership of shell companies incorporated in the U.S. that exclusively open bank accounts abroad, a route that many dirty companies have followed.”</div><div>
</div><div>The House passed the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Rewards Act, which would reward whistleblowers who notify the U.S. of assets linked to corrupt foreign individuals, in May. The legislation is currently being considered by the Senate Banking Committee, which will hold a hearing Thursday on the topic of beneficial ownership collection. Among the organizations testifying are the Bank Policy Instituteand Financial Accountability and Corporate Transparency Coalition, both groups pushing for disclosure of beneficial ownership to law enforcement.</div><div>
</div><div>These kinds of measures find support from a number of powerful trade associations, public interest groups and think tanks, ranging from the American Banking Association to Public Citizen to the American Enterprise Institute.</div><div>
</div><div>Center for Responsive Politics Executive Director Sheila Krumholz testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, detailing how shell companies inject money into U.S. politics and advocating for greater transparency of beneficial ownership.</div><div>
</div><div>A few organizations have come out against the proposed measures. The National Federation of Independent Business has voiced opposition to some of the disclosure measures, expressing concern over the regulatory burden it would place on small businesses. The American Bar Association also expressed concerns about privacy.</div><div>
</div><div>None of the beneficial ownership proposals would propose creating a public registry of beneficial ownership information for businesses. Although some foreign countries keep their own running registries of these owners, U.S. lawmakers have not shown interest in expanding disclosure to that level, citing privacy concerns.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div></div><div>fein freee sp 4 ppl</div><div>
</div><div>we filed our opening brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Lieu v. FEC.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>This was an important step on the path to getting the court to review the notorious SpeechNow v. FEC decision for the first time since 2010 -- and potentially overturn it.</div><div>
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</div><div>Here’s the back story: SpeechNow.org v. FEC was the case that originally unleashed super PACs on our democracy. For nearly a decade, the SpeechNow ruling has allowed big money donors to evade federal campaign contribution limits and further corrupt our political process.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Many scholars and constitutional law experts said that the ruling was legally erroneous at the time, and U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts has even given signals that suggest he would be willing to sustain limits on contributions to super PACs.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Lieu v. FEC is our opportunity. Filed in federal district court on behalf of a bipartisan coalition of Members of Congress and 2016 congressional candidates, the case seeks the reversal of the SpeechNow.org v. FEC ruling. And yesterday’s opening brief pushes it along on its journey!&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div></div><div></div><div>On Fifth Anniversary of Citizens United, Eshoo Co-Introduces Constitutional Amendment to Rid Politics of Dark MoneyThe Supreme Court decisions in Citizens United and McCutcheon have cast a dark shadow over our democracy by bringing us dangerously closer to an electoral system where the voices of average Americans are easily drowned out by special interests, shadowy front groups, and a handful of billionaires," said Eshoo. "At a time when Americans of every political persuasion want big money out of our elections, the Democracy for All Amendment will restore their authority to pass laws protecting the integrity of our electoral process. By reversing Citizens United and related cases, this amendment will advance the basic principle of "one voice-one vote' that is integral to our democracy</div><div>
</div><div>Statement</div><div>By: Anna Eshoo&nbsp;</div><div>Date: Jan. 22, 2015&nbsp;</div><div>Location: Washington, DC&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Keyword Search : Corporation</div><div>Yesterday, on the five-year anniversary of the Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, Congresswoman Anna G. Eshoo (D-Calif.) co-introduced the Democracy for All Amendment. This proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution would reverse highly controversial Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United v. FEC and McCutcheon v. FEC, which have given corporations and America's wealthiest donors a right to buy unlimited influence in our nation's elections. Eshoo joined original co-sponsors of the bill Reps. Ted Deutch (D-Fla.), Donna F. Edwards (D-Md.), and Jim McGovern (D-Mass.).</div><div>
</div><div>"The Supreme Court decisions in Citizens United and McCutcheon have cast a dark shadow over our democracy by bringing us dangerously closer to an electoral system where the voices of average Americans are easily drowned out by special interests, shadowy front groups, and a handful of billionaires," said Eshoo. "At a time when Americans of every political persuasion want big money out of our elections, the Democracy for All Amendment will restore their authority to pass laws protecting the integrity of our electoral process. By reversing Citizens United and related cases, this amendment will advance the basic principle of "one voice-one vote' that is integral to our democracy."</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div>The most important thing we must do to save our democracy is get big money out of politics. It’s a prerequisite to accomplishing everything else.</div><div>
</div><div>Today, big money continues to corrupt American politics – creating a vicious cycle that funnels more wealth and power to those at the top and eroding our democracy.</div><div>
</div><div>In the 2018 midterm elections, wealthy donors and Super-PACs poured millions into the campaigns of the same lawmakers who voted to pass the 2017 tax cuts, which gave them huge windfalls.</div><div>
</div><div>Consider conservative donors Sheldon and Miriam Adelson, whose casino business received an estimated $700 million windfall, thanks to Trump and Republicans’ tax cuts. The couple then used some of this extra cash to plow more than $113 million dollars into the 2018 election, breaking the record for political contributions by a single household.[vid]</div><div>
</div><div>That’s not a bad return on investment – for them.&nbsp; All told, almost 40 percent of total contributions in the 2018 midterms came from people who donated $10,000 or more. Yet these mega-donors comprise a tiny 0.01 percent of the U.S. population.</div><div>
</div><div>It’s a worsening vicious cycle: Lawmakers cut taxes and slash regulations for their wealthy campaign donors. Mega-donors and corporations funnel some of that money back into our political system to keep their lackeys in power. Politicians then propose another round of tax cuts, subsidies or bailouts to secure even more donations.</div><div>
</div><div>If this isn’t corruption, I don’t know what is. It also breeds cynicism in our democracy. The game seems rigged because it is.&nbsp; A 2015 poll found that the majority of Americans say lawmakers are corrupt, out of touch with their constituents, and beholden to special interests.</div><div>
</div><div>In the 2018 midterms, Americans demanded an end to the corruption. And there are signs lawmakers are finally getting message. House Democrats’ first piece of legislation aims to end the big-money takeover.</div><div>
</div><div>We must end this vicious cycle in order to reclaim our democracy. We must get big money out of politics. Now.</div><div>
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</div><div></div><div>yay but why do the right thing?</div><div>
</div><div>https://www.alternet.org/stunning-supreme-court-decision-dark-money-were-about-know-lot-more-about-who-funding-our-elections</div><div>
</div><div>In&nbsp; a win for increased transparency and those demanding an end to the so-called "dark money" eating away at U.S. democracy, the Supreme Court on Tuesday lifted a previous stay on a lower court ruling by rejecting the argument by right-wing advocacy groups who said they should not have to reveal the identity of big-dollar donors who fund their issue-based campaign ads.</div><div>
</div><div>Crucially, the ruling means that groups that in the past have been able to hide the source of their funding before, during, and after campaigns will have now have to make that information available before voters go to the polls—in this case, that means before the upcoming mid-term elections. Effective immediately, any group or individual making more than $250 in express advocacy ads — ads that tell viewers who to vote for or against — must now disclose the identities of all contributors who gave more than $200 in a year.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>As the Huffington Post reports:</div><div>
</div><div>The decision came about after Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal watchdog group, fought for the past six years to get the Federal Election Commission to enforce campaign finance laws against Crossroads GPS, a conservative nonprofit group founded by Karl Rove, a senior adviser to George W. Bush when he was president. CREW finally won its battle on Tuesday.</div><div>
</div><div>As of Sept. 18, any group that runs an independent expenditure ? election ads that expressly call for the election or defeat of a candidate ? in excess of $250 will have to disclose all political donors above $200.</div><div>
</div><div>Norm Eisen, the chairperson of CREW, celebrated the decision on Twitter: "We are about to drive a lot of dark money donors into the light—it's gonna look like the climax of a Harry Potter movie where the creatures shrivel in the sun."</div><div>
</div><div>Writing for the Center for Public Integrity, Dave Levinthal and Sarah Kleiner report that "secret money in politics will soon be a lot less secret."</div><div>
</div><div>And while Levinthal and Kleiner quoted Federal Election Commission Vice Chairwoman Ellen Weintraub, who said it won't be surprising to see some groups "come up with clever ways of getting around the rules," champions of disclosure said the ruling is a major crack in the armor of the forces of those using shadowing groups and their vast fortunes to undermine democracy.</div><div>
</div><div>"This is a great day for transparency and democracy," said Noah Bookbinder, CREW's executive director. "Three courts, including the Supreme Court, have now rejected Crossroads' arguments for a stay, meaning we're about to know a lot more about who is funding our elections."</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div>=</div><div>$1 contributions scam to hide the big ones wolff 8/3/18, claim avg #, grassroots support?</div><div>=</div><div>https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/07/11/democrats-reintroduce-disclose-act-combat-dark-money-poison/</div><div>
</div><div>On June 27, Democrats in both chambers of Congress reintroduced the DISCLOSE Act to provide what the lead Senate sponsor, Sheldon Whitehouse (RI-D), calls “a commonsense solution to restore transparency and accountability in our political system.”</div><div>
</div><div>The DISCLOSE Act of 2018 is the most recent iteration of a bill that Democrats have pushed since the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, which eliminated a century-old federal ban on political spending by corporations.</div><div>
</div><div>The “Democracy Is Strengthened by Casting Light On Spending in Elections Act” (DISCLOSE) was first introduced in 2010 by Representative Chris Van Hollen and Senator Chuck Schumer. DISCLOSE passed in the House that year but a Republican filibuster threat doomed it in the Senate, despite support from 59 senators.</div><div>
</div><div>DISCLOSE ACT WOULD SHINE A LIGHT ON DARK MONEY</div><div>The 2018 Senate bill comes out of the gate with all Senate Democrats and both Independents supporting it. The companion legislation in the House, introduced by Congressman David Cicilline (D-RI), already has 159 cosponsors.</div><div>
</div><div>As things stand today, corporations and wealthy donors can make unlimited expenditures to support or oppose political candidates through super PACs, independent expenditures, and dark money groups, with much of it hidden from the public. The result is a system where billionaires and large corporations dominate the political landscape with little or no accountability. As two Princeton political scientists put it in a recent study of influence in American politics, “economic elites and organized interest groups play a substantial part in affecting public policy, but the general public has little or no independent influence.”</div><div>
</div><div>The Brennan Center for Justice released a report in 2016 that found that “dark money sources often hold direct economic interests in the election outcome.” In the absence of effective disclosure laws, special interests are able to launch campaigns on policy issues and influence how people vote while hiding their stake in the outcome. “When viewers learn more about an ad’s sponsor — for instance, that it’s an out-of-state group or a group that does not report its donors — they may become not only more skeptical about the ad’s message but also more critical of the ad’s intended beneficiary,” the report concluded.</div><div>
</div><div>In a recent interview, Rep. Cicilline and Sen. Whitehouse spoke about the importance of the DISCLOSE Act in restoring the integrity of our democracy. “Eight out of ten” Americans do not have faith in our democratic institutions due to the influence of money-in-politics, Whitehouse said. He emphasized that Americans want to have a government that “works for the benefit of the many.”</div><div>
</div><div>According to Sen. Whitehouse, dark money “has been poisonous to the American democracy we cherish.” Whitehouse believes that increased transparency would encourage congressional debate about the “merits of clearing dark money out of our political system.”</div><div>
</div><div>“The cockroaches are everywhere. I say let’s turn on the lights,” Whitehouse said.</div><div>
</div><div>Common Cause, a leading nonpartisan group fighting for campaign reform, praised the proposed law as “grounded in the principle expressed by the late Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis that ‘sunshine is the best disinfectant.'”</div><div>
</div><div>The DISCLOSE Act of 2018 would mandate that organizations spending money in elections — including super PACs and tax-exempt 501(c)(4) groups — must promptly disclose their donors who have given $10,000 or more during an election cycle, and report expenditures of $10,000 or more on election ads within 24 hours. In addition, the bill includes provisions to prevent complex money webs from shielding the identities of donors.</div><div>
</div><div>Like the 2017 version of the bill, the 2018 DISCLOSE Act would also “ban campaign contributions and expenditures by corporations that are controlled, influenced, or owned by foreign nationals.”</div><div>
</div><div>In a new provision, the bill would repeal controversial riders the Republicans forced through on spending bills that prevent the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) from requiring public companies to disclose their political spending to shareholders, bar the IRS from developing post-Citizens United regulations on political spending by 501(c)(4) organizations, and block the government from requiring federal contractors to disclose their political donations.</div><div>
</div><div>Lastly, the bill contains a “Stand by Your Ad” provision, authored by Sen. Wyden (D-OR), requiring corporations, unions, and other organizations paying for political ads to disclose their top five funders. A similar proposal earned the support of 59 senators in 2010 but was filibustered by the Republicans.</div><div>
</div><div>The 2018 DISCLOSE Act is supported by numerous reform groups, including Americans for Campaign Reform, Brennan Center for Justice, Campaign Legal Center, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Common Cause, Democracy 21, Demos, League of Women Voters, People For the American Way, Public Citizen, and the Sunlight Foundation.</div><div>
</div><div>VIGOROUS OPPOSITION FROM THE RIGHT</div><div>Opponents of the DISCLOSE Act include the Institute for Free Speech (formerly known as the Center for Competitive Politics), The Heritage Foundation, Americans for Tax Reform, The American Conservative Union, CatholicVote.org, and Citizens Against Government Waste.</div><div>
</div><div>These groups argue that the act violates the First Amendment, but a Brennan Center analysis found that “there can be no credible doubt” that a similar 2012 version of the DISCLOSE Act was fully constitutional. As Common Cause points out, “the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected any arguments that disclosure requirements silence speech” and has continually upheld their constitutionality on the grounds that the public has a right to know who is influencing an election. Even the late Justice Antonin Scalia supported disclosure, writing in Doe v. Reed that “[r]equiring people to stand up in public for their political acts fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed.”</div><div>
</div><div>Senator Elizabeth Warren said in an April speech that the DISCLOSE Act would expose the “billionaires [who] have been pouring unlimited, secret money into the hands of carefully picked candidates who will do their bidding.”</div><div>
</div><div>Those billionaires fund many of the organizations that oppose the DISCLOSE Act. The Institute for Free Speech (IFS), for example, is funded by conservative donors — such as Richard Uihlein and the Koch brothers — who support Republican candidates and may not want their donations made public.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2016, The Bradley Foundation gave IFS $125,000 to fight those calling for greater disclosure rules, something the Bradley Foundation claims will “chill speech,” according to documents acquired by the Center for Media and Democracy.</div><div>
</div><div>Rep. Cicilline argues that the lack of disclosure after Citizens United has led to more business-friendly legislation and that dark money in politics leads to “bad public policy.” “The DISCLOSE Act will bring a new level of transparency to our elections. It will ensure the American people know who is really fighting for them. It will restore public faith in our government. It will mark a major step towards fixing what’s broken in Washington,” Cicilline said.</div><div>
</div><div>The DISCLOSE Act is part of the Democrats’ broader plan, called “A Better Deal for Our Democracy,” aimed at fixing the federal campaign finance system, improving elections, and strengthening ethics laws.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>When Ulysses S. Grant ran for president in 1868, he benefited from large contributions from wealthy entrepreneurs, such as railroad tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt. “Never before was a candidate placed under such great obligation to men of wealth as was Grant,” one historian said of Grant’s donors’ largesse.</div><div>
</div><div>But if Grant was among the first presidents to receive large sums of campaign funds from rich businessmen, he was far from the last.</div><div>
</div><div>Money and politics in the United States have become increasingly intertwined, a relationship which reached new heights when the Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (FEC) to allow corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money independently in support of or in opposition to a candidate. The effects of Citizens United have been pivotal, and calls to overturn the ruling continue to this day.</div><div>
</div><div>However, Citizens United didn’t appear out of nowhere. The ruling was only the latest in a series of important court cases that have loosened campaign finance restrictions.</div><div>
</div><div>‘Magic Words’</div><div>
</div><div>In the U.S., political contributions are considered an exercise of First Amendment rights. The reasoning behind this was that communicating ideas required spending money.</div><div>
</div><div>The 1976 Supreme Court case Buckley v. Valeo was the first case to establish this idea.</div><div>
</div><div>In 1975, Sen. James Buckley of New York and others filed suit in U.S. district court against the FEC and Senate secretary Francis Valeo claiming that the 1971 Federal Election Campaign Act — the primary federal law regulating campaign finance — was unlawful. According to Buckley, the law’s limitations on campaign contributions and expenditures violated the First Amendment. When the law was upheld, the plaintiffs appealed to the Supreme Court.</div><div>
</div><div>In Buckley, the judges ruled that contribution limits were necessary to deter corruption as candidates would feel indebted to big donors. Expenditure limitations, on the other hand, violated freedom of speech since there was no clear connection between expenditure amounts and corruption. In short, candidates could spend unrestricted amounts to advance their campaign.</div><div>
</div><div>The Court also deemed independent expenditures – or outside spending by groups in support of or opposition to candidates – constitutionally protected in the Buckley case so long as these expenditures were not formally coordinated with the candidate.</div><div>
</div><div>The idea of “express advocacy” was first formulated in the case, too. The Court defined express advocacy as communications that “advocates the election or defeat of a clearly identified federal candidate” and are identifiable by eight so-called “magic words.” The words (and phrases) include “vote for,” “elect,” “cast your ballot for” and “reject.” Any ad using any one of these words would be considered “express advocacy,” according to the Court, and subject to federal campaign regulations.</div><div>
</div><div>Corporations have rights, too</div><div>
</div><div>Two years after Buckley, several corporations including the First National Bank of Boston were barred from contributing to a Massachusetts referendum on tax policy. The corporations took issue with the Massachusetts law and appealed to the Supreme Court, which ruled in First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti that corporations could contribute money to ballot proposals.&nbsp; Corporations’ right to participate in campaigns as a legal person, which was popularized in Citizens United, is not a new concept. Lesser-known cases after Buckley paved the way for the involvement of corporations.</div><div>
</div><div>Justice Lewis Powell, who delivered the opinion of the Court, argued that corporations, along with associations and unions, have the same rights as individuals to express political views.</div><div>
</div><div>Attempts to reign it in</div><div>
</div><div>In the 1980s, court cases challenged the definition of “express advocacy” put forward by Buckley.</div><div>
</div><div>In FEC v. Massachusetts Citizens for Life, the Supreme Court held that a communication does not have to use the so-called “magic words” to be considered express advocacy. Massachusetts Citizens for Life (MCL) had used treasury funds to create flyers encouraging people to vote “pro-life” and included the names of pro-life candidates running for office. Although MCL had not used any “magic words,” the judges ruled the ads were clearly an attempt to influence an election.</div><div>
</div><div>Also in the 1980s, the FEC took land developer Harvey Furgatch to court after he purchased a full-page ad in The New York Times and Boston Globe to encourage voters to prevent “four more years of incoherences, ineptness and illusion” under then-President Jimmy Carter. The case came to be known as FEC v. Furgatch. Furgatch’s defense was that the ad used none of the “magic words” listed in Buckley and remained vague enough to get a legal pass.</div><div>
</div><div>The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that speech could be express advocacy when it is “susceptible of no other reasonable interpretation” – as in this case. They ruled that implied meanings can be considered express advocacy, and therefore Furgatch’s advertisement expressly advocated the defeat of President Carter.</div><div>
</div><div>Despite these new limitations on independent expenditure, the ambiguous wording of these laws meant that they were ineffective regulatory tools. The lack of expenditure limits and loose regulations for outside spending created massive inflows of money into campaigns.</div><div>
</div><div>In response, Congress passed the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) in 2002 to eliminate soft money donations and more tightly regulate independently funded ads. Soft money encompasses the money donated to parties that support general political activities, such as voter registration drives.</div><div>
</div><div>The Act also prohibited corporations from funding electioneering communications, or broadcast advertisements mentioning a federal candidate within 30 days of a primary election and 60 days of a general election. It thereby ignored the ambiguities of the Buckley and Furgatch cases.</div><div>
</div><div>A year later, the Supreme Court upheld BCRA in McConnell v. FEC, determining most of BCRA’s provisions constitutional and noting the “substantial evidence to support Congress’ determination that large soft-money contributions to national political parties give rise to corruption…”</div><div>
</div><div>All this changed four years later in a case that a number of legal scholars believe was the stepping stone to Citizens United.</div><div>
</div><div>The rise of dark money</div><div>
</div><div>Wisconsin Right to Life (WRTL), a politically active nonprofit, ran ads encouraging viewers to contact two U.S. senators during the 2004 presidential election. By running the ads, the group broke the BCRA’s rules restricting political ads funded by corporations in the 60-day period before an election. WRTL ended up suing the FEC, claiming that BCRA was unconstitutional.</div><div>
</div><div>In FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life, the Court deemed BCRA’s prohibition on corporate electioneering communications as unconstitutional. Their reasoning was that ads crafted to focus on policy issues and implicitly advocating for or against candidates should not be considered express advocacy, and therefore cannot be regulated as such – essentially the opposite of the conclusions made in Furgatch.</div><div>
</div><div>As long as the ads left out the “magic words” then, a group could easily spend limitless amounts without needing to disclose their donors or report political spending to the FEC.</div><div>
</div><div>Wisconsin gave rise to massive spending by dark money groups like political nonprofits that are not legally obligated to disclose their contributions.</div><div>
</div><div>During the 2008 election cycle, the first presidential race after Wisconsin, dark money spending on presidential candidates increased from virtually zero to about $25 million. In the 2012 cycle, the amount soared to $141 million.</div><div>
</div><div>The Wisconsin Right to Life case is noteworthy not only for helping enable dark money spending but for demonstrating how much the composition of the Supreme Court matters, Brendan Fischer, an attorney with the Campaign Legal Center, said.</div><div>
</div><div>In 2006, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor retired and was replaced by Samuel Alito, a conservative-leaning justice, which shifted the dynamic on the court.</div><div>
</div><div>“Between the McConnell case and the Wisconsin Right to Life ruling, really nothing changed in terms of the statistics or practices of campaign finance,” Fischer said. “All that changed was the makeup of the court.</div><div>
</div><div>“[This case] is a reminder that the ideology of the court makes a significant impact.”</div><div>
</div><div>Citizens United</div><div>
</div><div>When Citizens United v. FEC was decided in 2010, its impact did not shock people closely monitoring campaign finance.</div><div>
</div><div>Citizens United wasn’t surprising, Fischer said, given the court’s previous rulings, including its findings in Wisconsin Right to Life.</div><div>
</div><div>Paul S. Ryan, vice president of policy and litigation for the watchdog group Common Cause said that the Wisconsin case did a lot of the damage often attributed to Citizens United as well as much of the damage to campaign finance laws attributed to the Supreme Court.</div><div>
</div><div>“Wisconsin Right to Life made permissible corporate funding and created the vague legal standard that acted as a major step toward Citizens United,” Ryan said.</div><div>
</div><div>In Citizens United, judges used the ideas stated in previous cases to make their conclusion: As long as money is not given directly to or used in coordination with a candidate, it is not corruptive, and corporations too have the right to freedom of speech.</div><div>
</div><div>Given that the Court had already deemed independent expenditure from an individual as not corruptive, it was only logical to expand this argument in Citizens United to conclude that independent expenditure from a group – including a corporation that has First Amendment rights – is also not corrupt, and therefore sanctioned. Now, corporations, as well as associations and unions, were granted legal rights to use unlimited sums of money from their treasury funds to fund independent expenditure.</div><div>
</div><div>This line of reasoning also led to the federal Court of Appeals’ 2010 decision in SpeechNow.org v. FEC, which reinforced Citizens United and removed all contribution limits to independent expenditure-only groups. The SpeechNow.org ruling created super PACs, which can raise and spend unlimited money to advocate for or against a political candidate, including donations from corporations.</div><div>
</div><div>The Supreme Court’s most recent major case on campaign finance, McCutcheon v. FEC, addressed direct contributions rather than outside spending. In this case, Alabama resident Shaun McCutcheon objected to the aggregate contribution limit of $123,200, the amount that individuals were allowed to donate to all federal candidates and parties combined in a single election cycle. He sued the FEC, claiming that the aggregate limit on contributions violated his First Amendment rights.</div><div>
</div><div>The majority of the Court agreed with McCutcheon, concluding that one individual donating to many groups does not necessarily give rise to “influence over or access to” elected officials or parties the same way that a single large contribution might. While base limits (the amount allowed to be donated to each candidate) were deemed constitutional, aggregate limits were ruled a violation of a person’s freedom of speech.</div><div>
</div><div>Because of these rulings, over the last half century or so, federal campaign finance has become an extremely complex system, balancing transparency and avoiding corruption with freedom of speech and political participation.</div><div>
</div><div>Freedom of speech is certainly winning: In 1868, Ulysses Grant’s election effort cost $150,000 – or $2.7 million in today’s money. In 2016, Donald Trump’s campaign committee and outside groups supporting him spent nearly 150 times more. Hillary Clinton’s campaign, combined with outside groups, spent nearly 300 times more.</div><div>
</div><div>RELATED TOPICS</div><div>Citizens United</div><div>dark money</div><div>FEC v. Massachusetts Citizens for Life</div><div>FEC v. Wisconsin Right to LIfe</div><div>mccutcheon</div><div>scotus</div><div>speechnow</div><div>SpeechNow v. FEC</div><div>super PACs</div><div>Supreme Court</div><div>trump</div><div>
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</div><div></div><div>618</div><div>Over the past two years, political operative Dylan Beesley paid his firm more than $100,000 from the campaign account of Rep. Mark Takai (D-Hawai'i) for "consulting services." Seems like an entirely appropriate expense for a public officeholder who must run for re-election every two years, right? There's just one problem. Rep. Takai was dead that entire time.1</div><div>
</div><div>While this may be the most offensive and egregious use of campaign funds long after the campaign is over, it is far from the only one. FEC filings show disbursements from campaign accounts years after candidates last held or ran for office, for everything from limo rides to sports tickets to lavish hotels and dinners.2</div><div>
</div><div>Tell the FEC: Kill zombie campaigns. Stop former candidates from using campaign accounts as their personal slush funds.</div><div>
</div><div>Federal Election Commission rules forbid the use of campaign funds for personal expenses, but the rules are vague and poorly enforced. In 2013, the FEC issued an advisory opinion that former candidates should wind down all campaign-related expenses within six months. But candidates routinely flout this rule.</div><div>
</div><div>An investigation by the Tampa Bay Times found roughly 100 zombie campaigns that were still spending cash long after candidacies have ended.3</div><div>
</div><div>Nearly 40 campaigns kept staff on the payroll, including 12 that made payments to family members. About half the former candidates became lobbyists, and many used the extra cash to curry favor with future clients and other candidates.</div><div>
</div><div>Perhaps the oldest zombie campaign of all belongs to former Rep. Robin Tallon, Jr. He left office in 1993 with $400,000 in his campaign account. Through investing, he turned that $400,000 into $1 million. Beginning in 2005, Tallon has used the account for everything from new computers, an iPad, $20,000 to his son who was listed as campaign treasurer, and dues to a country club near his home in South Carolina.</div><div>
</div><div>The FEC requires candidates who are no longer running for office to either give the money to charity, other candidates, or refund it to donors.</div><div>
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</div><div>=</div><div>https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/03/29/alec-legislator-fast-tracks-bill-block-local-campaign-finance-ordinances-arizona/</div><div>
</div><div>A state bill that would ban cities and counties from requiring dark money groups to disclose their donors is moving rapidly through the Arizona state legislature. HB 2153 would make it illegal for localities to require tax exempt organizations to disclose donors and register as political action committees. The bill introduced by Rep. Vince Leach (R-11) was approved by the House and is waiting a final roll-call vote in the Senate.</div><div>
</div><div>This state interference in local democracy initiatives is a response to a Tempe ballot measure that passed earlier this month by a 9-to-1 margin which creates an ordinance that requires groups that make more than $1,000 in independent expenditures in municipal elections to disclose its financial supporters and details of the organization. The city of Phoenix is considering revising its charter to curb dark money in a similar fashion.</div><div>
</div><div>HB 2153 is based on an American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) resolution that was adopted last year which spins campaign finance disclosure as an attack on “donor privacy.” ALEC is a corporate-funded organization that brings lobbyists and state politicians together behind closed doors to rewrite state laws.</div><div>
</div><div>Rep. Leach is a GOP legislative member of ALEC, and 22 other Arizona representatives and 8 senators have ties to the group.</div><div>
</div><div>ALEC and its sister organization, the State Policy Network (SPN), have made fighting campaign finance disclosure a central goal. ALEC founded the misnamed “Center to Protect Free Speech,” which produced a Donor Disclosure Toolkit for legislatures that details how lawmakers should respond to donor disclosure laws.</div><div>
</div><div>ALEC’s toolkit lifts whole sections from an SPN Donor Privacy Toolkit published on its United for Privacy campaign website. Both toolkits are partially written by Jon Riches, Director of National Litigation and General Counsel for the Goldwater Institute, Arizona’s SPN affiliate. Goldwater is lobbying for the passage of HB 2153 and sent its vice president for litigation to testify in support of the bill in front of a House committee.</div><div>
</div><div>If the preemption bill passes by roll-call vote in the Senate, it will head to Gov. Doug Ducey’s desk. Ducey has written for ALEC and spoken at ALEC meetings, so the measure trampling local democracy is likely to get his signature.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2018/03/29/alec-legislator-fast-tracks-bill-block-local-campaign-finance-ordinances-arizona/</div><div>
</div><div>A state bill that would ban cities and counties from requiring dark money groups to disclose their donors is moving rapidly through the Arizona state legislature. HB 2153 would make it illegal for localities to require tax exempt organizations to disclose donors and register as political action committees. The bill introduced by Rep. Vince Leach (R-11) was approved by the House and is waiting a final roll-call vote in the Senate.</div><div>
</div><div>This state interference in local democracy initiatives is a response to a Tempe ballot measure that passed earlier this month by a 9-to-1 margin which creates an ordinance that requires groups that make more than $1,000 in independent expenditures in municipal elections to disclose its financial supporters and details of the organization. The city of Phoenix is considering revising its charter to curb dark money in a similar fashion.</div><div>
</div><div>HB 2153 is based on an American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) resolution that was adopted last year which spins campaign finance disclosure as an attack on “donor privacy.” ALEC is a corporate-funded organization that brings lobbyists and state politicians together behind closed doors to rewrite state laws.</div><div>
</div><div>Rep. Leach is a GOP legislative member of ALEC, and 22 other Arizona representatives and 8 senators have ties to the group.</div><div>
</div><div>ALEC and its sister organization, the State Policy Network (SPN), have made fighting campaign finance disclosure a central goal. ALEC founded the misnamed “Center to Protect Free Speech,” which produced a Donor Disclosure Toolkit for legislatures that details how lawmakers should respond to donor disclosure laws.</div><div>
</div><div>ALEC’s toolkit lifts whole sections from an SPN Donor Privacy Toolkit published on its United for Privacy campaign website. Both toolkits are partially written by Jon Riches, Director of National Litigation and General Counsel for the Goldwater Institute, Arizona’s SPN affiliate. Goldwater is lobbying for the passage of HB 2153 and sent its vice president for litigation to testify in support of the bill in front of a House committee.</div><div>
</div><div>If the preemption bill passes by roll-call vote in the Senate, it will head to Gov. Doug Ducey’s desk. Ducey has written for ALEC and spoken at ALEC meetings, so the measure trampling local democracy is likely to get his signature.</div><div>
</div><div>=</div><div>=</div><div>judge elections:</div><div>
</div><div>https://freespeechforpeople.org/williams-yulee-three-years-later/</div><div>=</div><div>
</div><div>city ord</div><div>
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</div><div>https://freespeechforpeople.org/st-petersburg-city-council-votes-abolish-super-pacs-limit-foreign-corporate-money-local-elections/</div><div>
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</div><div>As the school shooting in Parkland, Florida has shown, what was considered insanely corrupt political behavior 40 years ago is now normal. And you can thank right-wingers on the Supreme Court.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Back in 1982, the late novelist Robert B. Parker was hard at work on one of his Spencer novels, titled The Widening Gyre. In the book, a local businessman owns a local politician; the politician then makes tax decisions and real estate zoning decisions that help the businessman. Both the politician and the businessman are working as hard as they can to cover it all up.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 1982 this sort of thing was a major, career-ending scandal for both the politician and the businessman.&nbsp; A wealthy man owning a politician, who, in turn, changed the tax code and altered regulations to increase the businessman’s profits, was considered a symptom of intolerable corruption.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But what Parker and most Americans didn’t realize was that, in 1982, the die had already been cast and the oligarchs had already begun seizing the levers of power in America; a seizure that would lead to the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The billionaires doing the seizing of our nation just didn’t come out about it until the presidency of Barack Obama, when the Koch Network, Adelson, the Mercers and the Waltons all became openly, and in some cases braggadociosly political in their “giving.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>As I noted in my book The Crash of 2016, The American Legislative Exchange Council was founded in 1973, right after Lewis Powell’s memo –&nbsp; suggesting a propaganda program to promote the interests of big business and the rich – began circulating through top corporate and high-net-worth circles. That year, too, the Heritage Foundation was created. And in 1977, Charles Koch and friends founded the CATO Institute.</div><div>
</div><div>While the efforts of these groups have been multifaceted, their most obvious and deadly impact has been on the ongoing proliferation of weapons of war in America, and the denial of healthcare to millions in so-called red states. With the installation of Reagan, big business and billionaires were finally to get the tax breaks and other goodies that they wanted from Congress and the Executive Branch, while waging war on unions and working people.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But to Lewis Powell, a lawyer by training and the author of the infamous blueprint for billionaires to take over America (now known as The Powell Memo), nothing was more important than targeting the courts.</div><div>
</div><div>In his memo, Powell wrote, “Under our constitutional system, especially with an activist-minded Supreme Court, the judiciary may be the most important instrument for social, economic and political change.”</div><div>
</div><div>He noted, “This is a vast area of opportunity for the Chamber, if it is willing to undertake the role of spokesman for American business and if, in turn, business is willing to provide the funds.”</div><div>
</div><div>Laying out specifics, Powell added, “The Chamber would need a highly competent staff of lawyers. In special situations it should be authorized to engage, to appear as counsel amicus in the Supreme Court, lawyers of national standing and reputation. The greatest care should be exercised in selecting the cases in which to participate, or the suits to institute. But the opportunity merits the necessary effort.”</div><div>
</div><div>In the 1970s, as the US Chamber of Commerce focused on the courts, employing high-priced, savvy lawyers, and flooding the Supreme Court chamber with amicus briefs, a string of explosive decisions throughout the decade gave the #MorbidlyRich what they needed to eventually overthrow FDR’s New Deal and to radically reinterpret the 2nd Amendment.</div><div>
</div><div>In 1976, in Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court (which Nixon appointed Lewis Powell to in 1972, the year after Powell wrote his infamous memo) ruled that political money is constitutionally protected free speech, changing American law so that those who have the most money would have the most “First Amendment free speech” in our political system. And if there was anything that the NRA was getting good at, it was raising money from weapons manufacturers and others.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>And in Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, the Supreme Court ruled that corporate advertising (including promoting M15 weapons of war to our kids) is a protected form of free speech.&nbsp; (Ironically, William Rehnquist was the sole dissenter; he argued that corporate “speech” [advertising] was often deceptive. But the deed was done; Caveat emptor became the new American normal.)That same year, in United States v. Martin Linen Supply Co., corporations – as persons – were given Fifth Amendment protections against double jeopardy, limiting the ability of citizens to go after gun manufacturers, among others.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>A year later, in 1977, in First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, the Supreme Court overturned state restrictions on corporate political spending, saying such restrictions violate the First Amendment rights of corporations, and giving the NRA and other interest groups an added lever to use to extract legislation.</div><div>
</div><div>In their dissents in that case, Justices White, Brennan, and Marshall argued, “The special status of corporations has placed them in a position to control vast amounts of economic power which may, if not regulated, dominate not only our economy but the very heart of our democracy, the electoral process.”</div><div>
</div><div>But their warnings were ignored.</div><div>
</div><div>Then came the Federalist Society, founded in 1982 with millions of dollars in funding by the Koch-connected Bradley Foundation.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>They built a nationwide network of jurists, attorneys, legal scholars, and politicians to indoctrinate a new generation’s legal system with billionaire-friendly interpretations: Corporate personhood is real, money is speech, democracy is not sacred, and organized money should always have privilege over organized people.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>They also helped lay the case for the Heller decision, which, for the first time in nearly 230 years, found a “right to individual gun ownership” in the 2nd Amendment.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 2010 the Supreme Court wrapped its gift to corporations and gun manufacturers all up in a neat little bundle with their 5-4 Citizen’s United ruling.&nbsp; With that decision, America was nearly completely turned over to the wealthy and corporations.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Thereafter, oligarchs like Adenson and the Kochs began openly bragging about how much they were spending to buy politicians, legislation, tax breaks, and the deregulation of consumer protections.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>President Obama called this out in his 2010 State Of The Union speech:&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“It’s time to require lobbyists to disclose each contact they make on behalf of a client with my administration or with Congress. It’s time to put strict limits on the contributions that lobbyists give to candidates for federal office.</div><div>
</div><div>“With all due deference to separation of powers, last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that, I believe, will open the floodgates for special interests, including foreign corporations, to spend without limit in our elections.</div><div>
</div><div>"I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests or, worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people.”</div><div>
</div><div>Hard-right corporatist judge Sam Alito silently (and disrespectfully) mouthed, “Not true!” at Obama, but history shows that Alito was the one in error, not Obama.&nbsp; Right on down to the ability of foreign entities to influence our elections and lawmaking by, for example, the possible laundering of campaign money through the NRA.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>And so, a few days after Paul Ryan shepherded through Congress a law that confers potentially billions of dollars in tax benefits to them, the Kochs and their friends put a half-million dollars into Ryan’s fundraising committee, while the NRA continues to shower him and Mitch McConnell with support.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In Robert B. Parker’s 1982, this would have been the end of Ryan’s career, and the Kochs and the NRA would be vilified as corrupters of the political process.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 1971, only 175 companies had registered lobbyists. By 1982, there were nearly 2,500, and today there are over 12,000 lobbyists just registered in DC. Oligarchs were dumping huge amounts of money lobbying for favorable legislation, although it still isn’t really visible to most Americans until tragedies like mass shootings give us an insight into how it all works.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>As the Reagan administration rolled into power in 1981, so, too, did the #MorbidlyRich oligarchs, who were seeding brand-new right-wing think tanks devoted to espousing the same free-market, Andrew Mellon/Warren Harding ideologies that led to the 1929 Great Crash: massive tax cuts, deregulation, and privatization.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Back during the era of Nixon, Americans understood the power and dangers of corruption.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>As Lamar Waldron and I point out in our book Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination, when the milk producers association wanted the Nixon administration to increase milk price supports (to increase their profitability by over $3 billion), they hid/laundered their “campaign donations” through local GOP groups and a briefcase with $3 million in cash, which were later determined to be illegal, an event that became a major part of the Watergate-era Nixon scandals.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But that was all so pre-1976, the year when the Supreme Court’s Buckleydecision ruled that rich people (or rich corporations) owning their own personal politicians wasn’t corruption; it was free speech.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>While it’s taken us over 40 years to fully integrate the 1976 Buckley decision and its spawn into our body politic, the corruption of this entirely new interpretation of the First Amendment is systematically taking apart our nation. And has made it easier and easier for maladjusted people among us to stockpile weapons of war.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp; For example, can you imagine Richard Nixon lying about how environmentally destructive some industrial poisons are? Nixon couldn’t imagine it; he put into place the Environmental Protection Agency.&nbsp; And he was fine with the fairly strong gun control laws that several states, from California to New York, had in place.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>But today’s Republican Party (with a few very, very rare exceptions) is so in debt to – so owned by – a few petrobillionaires and coal multimillionaires and oil companies that they’re perfectly willing to look the world in the face and lie through their teeth about the science of global warming.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>They’re so fully-owned by the gun lobby/NRA that they’ve made it illegal for the US government to do any meaningful research into gun deaths; they’ve banned doctors, in a number of states including Florida, from even asking kids if there’s a gun in their home; and McConnell and Ryan have successfully prevented any sort of meaningful legislation to restrict guns from getting a vote even when they know it would pass.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>As a result, we’re the laughingstock of the world, and we lose over 30,000 people a year to guns and another 40,000 a year to a lack of access to health care.&nbsp; That’s a lot of blood on GOP hands.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Good government was perceived, prior to the Buckley decision and its embrace by the Reagan administration, as the singular hallmark of American democracy.&nbsp; Today it’s a joke.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In the wake of the most recent Florida school shooting, we find politicians who’ve taken literally millions of dollars through their careers from groups like the NRA refusing to engage in any meaningful discussion about gun control.&nbsp; Forget legislation; they won’t even allow a debate.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>This echoes the legislators who’ve taken Koch or ExxonMobil money and refuse to discuss climate change.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Or those indebted to Big Pharma who won’t talk about reforming Medicare Part D so the government can negotiate discounted drug prices.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Or those taking money from agricultural chemical and seed companies who ignore evidence of cancer and other problems with GMOs and the herbicides and pesticides associated with them.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The young people of Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida see this situation with new and clear eyes. They see it for what it is: Corruption.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>And they’re mad as hell about how that corruption has led to the deaths of 17 of their friends and teachers.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Every new assault – be it from an “active shooter” or a corporate raider – shows us how the radical shift in the Supreme Court starting with the 1976 Buckleydecision has turned America from a democracy into an oligarchy.&nbsp; Even former President Jimmy Carter came onto my radio/TV program in 2015 to proclaim it:&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>HARTMANN: Our Supreme Court has now said, “unlimited money in politics.” It seems like a violation of principles of democracy. Your thoughts on that?</div><div>
</div><div>CARTER: It violates the essence of what made America a great country in its political system. Now it’s just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president. And the same thing applies to governors and U.S. senators and congress members. So now we’ve just seen a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect and sometimes get favors for themselves after the election’s over. The incumbents, Democrats and Republicans, look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves. Somebody’s who’s already in Congress has a lot more to sell to an avid contributor than somebody who’s just a challenger.</div><div>
</div><div>The most effective way to solve this problem is to pass a constitutional amendment that will proclaim, clearly and unambiguously, that corporations are not persons and that money is not “free speech.”&nbsp; Groups like MoveToAmend.organd Public Citizen have been working on these campaigns for years, and they’re bearing fruit.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Once the power of money is stripped from our political system, the power of gun manufacturers through the NRA will largely evaporate.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>During the years I lived and worked in DC, several Republican politicians confided in me – off the record – that they would love to be out of the clutches of their wealthy donors.&nbsp; And that they’d quickly vote with Democrats to get free of the need to fundraise for hours every day.&nbsp; This could easily become bipartisan quickly, with the right leadership.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>The NRA’s essentially outright purchase of senators like Richard Burr ($6.3 million in 2016), Marco Rubio ($3.2 million in 2016), Roy Blunt ($3 million), and Rob Portman ($2.2 million) – and Donald Trump ($30 million in the presidential race) – is so obviously corrupt to many of the students in Parkland that they’re furious.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>We should all share their anger, and use it to fight to amend our Constitution to undo the damage these oligarchs and their toadies on the Supreme Court have done to our republic.</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>
</div><div>http://freespeechforpeople.org/</div><div>
</div><div>superpacs</div><div>
</div><div>https://freespeechforpeople.org/speechnow-v-fec-case-created-super-pacs-challenge/</div><div>
</div><div>SpeechNow v. FEC – The Case that Created Super PACs, and Our Challenge</div><div>Posted on January 27 2018 by Ron Fein</div><div>January 27 marks the eighth anniversary of oral argument in the case that created super PACs. Contrary to popular belief, super PACs were not created by the Supreme Court in Citizens United, but rather by a subsequent lower court decision called SpeechNow v. FEC, argued on January 27, 2010 (just six days after the Citizens United decision).</div><div>
</div><div>As we explained in 2015, there are significant cracks in the legal foundation that created super PACs, and several converging developments in election law, constitutional law and even criminal law suggest the end may be in sight.</div><div>
</div><div>As a matter of practical reality, empirical research shows that top donors to super PACs are generally the same people as top donors to candidates and political parties, with ample opportunities to exchange super PAC contributions for political favors in a quid pro quo corruption scheme, whether or not the super PAC “coordinates” its media purchases with the campaign. In fact, a federal judge recently went out of his way to reaffirm in a criminal bribery case that contributions to super PACs can be part of bribes, notwithstanding Citizens United, although he found that the particular facts of that case didn’t support a bribery charge.</div><div>
</div><div>As a matter of legal doctrine, as explained in a forthcoming article by a group of pre-eminent constitutional scholars, SpeechNow simply misapplied Citizens United: “In Citizens United the Supreme Court struck down limits on a political group’s expenditures while the issue in SpeechNow was the validity of limiting contributions to a political group.” That distinction between limits on expenditures versus limits on contributions is critical because since Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court has recognized different standards of scrutiny for limits on contributions and limits on expenditures. Unfortunately, then-Attorney General Eric Holder decided not to appeal SpeechNow to the Supreme Court, on the (clearly mistaken in retrospect) theory that the SpeechNow decision would “affect only a small subset of federally regulated contributions.” Now, there’s good reason to think that Chief Justice Roberts and/or Justice Kennedy would be willing to overrule SpeechNow even if they are not prepared to retreat on Citizens United.</div><div>
</div><div>So how do we do it? Learn more about Lieu v. FEC, our federal lawsuit challenging SpeechNow (covered here in the Washington Post), and about our legislative efforts in St. Petersburg, Florida, Massachusetts, and elsewhere to challenge super PACs.</div><div>
</div><div>----</div><div>
</div><div></div><div>WISC WILL</div><div>Support for Act 10</div><div>In February 2013, WILL helped 3 teachers file an amicus curiae brief defending Governor Scott Walker's union-busting reforms.[6]</div><div>
</div><div>WILL also filed a lawsuit against the Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC) for allegedly violating Act 10 by approving a labor agreement. The plaintiff in the lawsuit has been teaching at MATC since 1984. She said, "I'm appalled that my union would flout the law and negotiate an illegal contract." [7]</div><div>
</div><div>McCutcheon, et al. v. FEC</div><div>Shaun McCutcheon and the Republican National Committee (RNC) filed a lawsuit challenging the Federal Election Commission's biennial limit on individual contributions contending the limit is unconstitutionally low and not supported by a sufficient governmental interest.[8] WILL filed an amicus curiae brief in support of the plaintiff-appellants. The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari and will hear the case during the Fall 2013 session.[9]</div><div>
</div><div>=no lnx</div><div>Leaked Video: Dark Money Group Brags About Writing GOP Voter Suppression Bills Across the Country</div><div>“We did it quickly and we did it quietly,” said the executive director of Heritage Action.</div><div>ARI BERMAN</div><div>NICK SURGEY</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>In a private meeting last month with big-money donors, the head of a top conservative group boasted that her outfit had crafted the new voter suppression law in Georgia and was doing the same with similar bills for Republican state legislators across the country. “In some cases, we actually draft them for them,” she said, “or we have a sentinel on our behalf give them the model legislation so it has that grassroots, from-the-bottom-up type of vibe.”</div><div>
</div><div>The Georgia law had “eight key provisions that Heritage recommended,” Jessica Anderson, the executive director of Heritage Action for America, a sister organization of the Heritage Foundation, told the foundation’s donors at an April 22 gathering in Tucson, in a recording obtained by the watchdog group Documented and shared with Mother Jones. Those included policies severely restricting mail ballot drop boxes, preventing election officials from sending absentee ballot request forms to voters, making it easier for partisan workers to monitor the polls, preventing the collection of mail ballots, and restricting the ability of counties to accept donations from nonprofit groups seeking to aid in election administration.</div><div>
</div><div>All of these recommendations came straight from Heritage’s list of “best practices” drafted in February. With Heritage’s help, Anderson said, Georgia became “the example for the rest of the country.”</div><div>
</div><div>The leaked video reveals the extent to which Heritage is leading a massive campaign to draft and pass model legislation restricting voting access, which has been swiftly adopted this year in the battleground states of Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and Iowa. It’s no coincidence that so many GOP-controlled states are rushing to pass similar pieces of legislation in such a short period of time.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Republican legislators claim they’re tightening up election procedures to address (unfounded) concerns about fraud in the 2020 election. But what’s really behind this effort is a group of conservative Washington insiders who have been pushing these same kinds of voting restrictions for decades, with the explicit aim of helping Republicans win elections. The difference now is that Trump’s baseless claims about 2020 have given them the ammunition to get the bills passed, and the conservative movement, led by Heritage, is making an unprecedented investment to get them over the finish line.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“We’re working with these state legislators to make sure they have all of the information they need to draft the bills,” Anderson told the Heritage Foundation donors. In addition to drafting the bills in some cases, “we’ve also hired state lobbyists to make sure that in these targeted states we’re meeting with the right people.”</div><div>
</div><div>“In some cases, we actually draft [the bills] for them, or we have a sentinel on our behalf give them the model legislation so it has that grassroots, from-the-bottom-up type of vibe.”</div><div>To “create this echo chamber,” as Anderson put it, Heritage is spending $24 million over two years in eight battleground states—Arizona, Michigan, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Texas, and Wisconsin—to pass and defend restrictive voting legislation. Every Tuesday, the group leads a call with right-wing advocacy groups like the Susan B. Anthony List, Tea Party Patriots, and FreedomWorks to coordinate these efforts at the highest levels of the conservative movement. “We literally give marching orders for the week ahead,” Anderson said. “All so we’re singing from the same song sheet of the goals for that week and where the state bills are across the country.”</div><div>
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</div><div>Days before the Georgia legislature would pass its sweeping bill rolling back access to the ballot, Anderson said she met with Gov. Brian Kemp and urged him to quickly sign the bill when it reached his desk. “I had one message for him,” said Anderson, a former Trump administration official in the Office of Management and Budget. “Do not wait to sign that bill. If you wait even an hour, you will look weak. This bill needs to be signed immediately.” Kemp followed Anderson’s advice, signing the bill right after its passage. Heritage called it a “historic voting security bill.”</div><div>
</div><div>Anderson said she delivered “the same message” to Republican governors in Texas, Arizona, and Florida. Texas is the next big fight for Heritage. Anderson said Heritage Action wrote “19 provisions” in a Texas House bill that would make it a criminal offense for election officials to give a mail ballot request form to a voter who hadn’t explicitly asked for one and would subject poll workers to criminal penalties for removing partisan poll challengers who are accused of voter intimidation. It’s expected to pass in the coming days.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“Gov. Abbott will sign it quickly,” Anderson said. She warned of corporate opposition to the bill, following actions by Georgia-based companies to distance themselves from the restrictive voting bill there. “American Airlines, Dell, they’re coming after us,” she said. “We need to be ready for the next fight in Texas.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In response to a request for comment, Anderson said in a statement, “We are proud of our work at the national level and in states across this country to promote commonsense reforms that make it easier to vote and harder to cheat. We’ve been transparent about our plans and public with our policy recommendations, and we won’t be intimidated by the left’s smear campaign and cancel culture.”</div><div>
</div><div>Heritage Foundation fellow Hans von Spakovsky, a former George W. Bush administration official who for two decades has been the driving force behind policies that restrict access to the ballot, spoke alongside Anderson at the donor summit.</div><div>
</div><div>“Hans is briefing governors, secretaries of state, state attorney generals, state elected officials,” Anderson said. “Just what three weeks ago, we had a huge call with secretaries of state, right?”</div><div>
</div><div>“We’ve now for several years been having a private briefing of the best conservative secretaries of state in the country that has so annoyed the left that they have been doing everything they can to try to find out what happens at that meeting,” von Spakovsky replied.</div><div>
</div><div>“So far unsuccessfully,” Anderson said. “No leaks.”</div><div>
</div><div>Though the bills shaped by Heritage have been sold as advancing “election integrity,” they appear aimed more at helping GOP candidates take back power. “We are going to take the fierce fire that is in every single one of our bellies,” Anderson told the donors in April, “to right the wrongs of November.”</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;GET OUR AWARD-WINNING MAGAZINE</div><div>Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.</div><div>
</div><div>Subscribe</div><div>The Heritage Foundation was co-founded in 1973 by Paul Weyrich, a well-connected conservative activist on a mission to create more aggressive conservative infrastructure to rival more liberal think tanks like the Brookings Institution. Weyrich, who was also Heritage’s first president, went on to co-found the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which pairs corporations with conservative state legislators to draft model legislation, and the Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell, which mobilized evangelical voters behind GOP causes and candidates. Heritage received major funding from leading right-wing donors such as Charles and David Koch, Richard Mellon Scaife, and Joseph Coors.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Speaking in 1980 at a meeting of evangelical leaders in Dallas, Weyrich bluntly articulated his radical views on voting rights. “I don’t want everybody to vote,” he said. “Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.”</div><div>
</div><div>In the years since, the Heritage Foundation became the driving force behind much of the Republican Party agenda, writing many of the policy recommendations that were enacted under the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Heritage is spending $24 million over two years in eight battleground states—Arizona, Michigan, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Texas, and Wisconsin—to pass and defend restrictive voting legislation.</div><div>It remains one of the best-funded organizations in GOP circles. It raised more than $76 million in 2020, according to its most recent annual report. More than $1.6 million of that was raised from corporations, most of which chose to remain anonymous. But according to the annual report from 2019, Google, the pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline, and the multi-level marketing company Amway all gave at least $100,000, and Citigroup and Hitachi each gave $25,000.&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>In 2010, as opposition on the right to the Obama administration reached a fever pitch, Heritage launched Heritage Action, a dark money group that does not have to disclose its donors but has received at least $500,000 from the Koch brothers. The goal was to connect the Heritage Foundation to the growing Tea Party movement and to enable the group to undertake more aggressive political activities, such as leading opposition to the Affordable Care Act and promoting a government shutdown in 2013. This right-wing advocacy alienated Republicans on Capitol Hill, with former Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn accusing the group of “destroying the Republican Party.”</div><div>
</div><div>Former Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint described the relationship between Heritage Foundation and Heritage Action as “the one-two punch.” The foundation writes the policy, and Heritage Action makes it happen. Heritage Action raised more than $11 million in 2019.</div><div>
</div><div>The mastermind behind the nationwide voting restrictions operation is von Spakovsky, who’s done more than just about anyone in GOP circles to spread the myth of widespread voter fraud over the past two decades.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>During the Bush administration, von Spakovsky was a special counsel at the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, where he played a key role in the department’s approval of a 2005 voter ID law from Georgia—among the first of its kind—over objections from career department lawyers, who said it was discriminatory. While advocating internally for the law, von Spakovsky published a law review article under the pseudonym “Publius” praising voter ID laws, in a move that experts said violated Justice Department ethics guidelines. (Von Spakovsky said in a statement that he received approval from a Justice Department ethics adviser and his supervisor for the article. He added, “Contrary to the maliciously false claims in the Mother Jones story, I have worked hard for many years to ensure that every eligible citizen is able to vote.”)</div><div>
</div><div>&nbsp;SUPPORT OUR JOURNALISM</div><div>Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.</div><div>
</div><div>Donate</div><div>“It’s like he goes to bed dreaming about this, and gets up in the morning wondering, ‘What can I do today to make it more difficult for people to vote?’” the late civil rights icon John Lewis once said of von Spakovsky.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“I don’t want everybody to vote,” said Heritage co-founder Paul Weyrich.</div><div>In 2017, von Spakovsky joined Donald Trump’s ill-fated Commission on Election Integrity, which was formed after Trump falsely claimed 3 million people voted illegally in California in the 2016 election, with the aim of unearthing evidence of voter fraud in order to justify new ballot restrictions. Von Spakovsky argued the commission should exclude Democrats and “mainstream Republican officials and/or academics” and helped Vice Chair Kris Kobach, then the Kansas secretary of state, draft a letter requesting sensitive voter data from all 50 states. The request was met with massive pushback, and the commission, facing a flurry of lawsuits, abruptly disbanded in January 2018 without finding any evidence of fraud.</div><div>
</div><div>Though Anderson called von Spakovsky “the premier election law expert across this country,” his work has not fared well in court. During a trial challenging Kansas’ proof-of-citizenship law for voter registration, Kobach hired von Spakovsky to support his claim that illegal votes by noncitizens had swung US elections. But under questioning, von Spakovsky admitted he couldn’t name a single election where votes by noncitizens had decided the outcome. A federal judge wrote that the court gave “little weight to Mr. von Spakovsky’s opinion,” citing “several misleading and unsupported examples of noncitizen voter registration.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Nonetheless, von Spakovsky’s sensationalist claims about stolen elections and advocacy for policies that restrict voting have found an increasingly receptive audience among Republicans following Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.</div><div>
</div><div>“The one good thing that came out of last year’s elections,” von Spakovsky said at the Heritage Action event in April, “is I think finally a lot of members of the public, and particularly state legislators, realized that these vulnerabilities exist, have existed for a long time, and have figured out in many states we really need to do something to fix it.”</div><div>
</div><div>Indeed, Heritage has been at the forefront of weaponizing Trump’s Big Lie of widespread voter fraud in order to build support for policies that restrict access to the ballot. “A lot of bad things happened in 2020,” Heritage Foundation senior adviser Genevieve Wood said in April to the donors, who ranked “election integrity” as their top issue in a survey this year. “But you should know a lot of good things are beginning to happen now in 2021. You’re seeing it in Georgia. You’re seeing in the state of Arizona. You’re beginning to see it in Texas and so many more.”</div><div>
</div><div>Heritage began its lobbying campaign early in Georgia. In February, a representative from the group delivered a letter signed by 2,000 conservative activists to Republicans in the state legislature, urging them to rewrite the state’s voting laws after GOP defeats in the November presidential election and the January Senate runoffs (where Heritage Action contacted 1.5 million voters on behalf of the losing Republican candidates). The activists wrote that they had “lost faith in the process and the outcome of their elections.” Soon after, bills restricting voting access started moving through the legislature.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“Then we provided testimony, expert witnesses, analysis, and actually how to draft these bills so that they were legally tight,” Anderson said. “So, [Democratic voting rights lawyer] Marc Elias, if you know that name from the progressive left, he’s like their legal pit bull. He goes after all of this with lawsuits, so that Marc Elias can’t find any holes.”&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Elias has filed a suit challenging the Georgia law. “The Georgia law violates both the Voting Rights Act and the US Constitution,” Elias told Mother Jones. “Heritage Action claiming that this is legally tight is like hearing from the Titanic shipbuilders about how much confidence they have in its maiden voyage. This law is based on a Big Lie, denies Black, Brown, and young voters of their rights, and will be struck down in court.”</div><div>
</div><div>Republican state Rep. Barry Fleming, the author of the bill in the Georgia House, was a guest at Heritage’s donor summit. “I can tell you, back in February, I felt like some days we were alone in Georgia,” Fleming said. “And then the Heritage Foundation stepped in, and that began to bring us a boost to help turn around, get the truth out about what we were really trying to do. And I’m here in part to say thank you and God bless you.”</div><div>
</div><div>A number of majority-Black counties that Fleming represents as a lawyer in private practice when he’s not at the legislature fired him in protest after the bill passed. But he credited Heritage for helping Republican legislators resist what Anderson called “economic terrorism.” (The group has launched a $1 million ad campaign to defend the law on CNBC and local Georgia stations, which Anderson said is aimed at “woke CEOs [who] didn’t read the bill.”)</div><div>
</div><div>“But for the Heritage Foundation and you stepping up to help us, what are other part-time legislators across this nation going to think when they try to do the right thing and secure our elections if they’re allowed to fire us from our jobs, threaten our livelihoods just because we stood up to try to make it easy to vote and hard to cheat?” Fleming asked.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>Other measures Anderson said Heritage drafted included “three provisions” in legislation adopted by Iowa Republicans a few weeks before Georgia’s law, including one placing voters on inactive status if they sit out one election cycle and removing them from the rolls if they fail to take action, a system that could lead hundreds of thousands of voters to be purged.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“Iowa is the first state that we got to work in, and we did it quickly and we did it quietly,” Anderson said. “We worked quietly with the Iowa state legislature. We got the best practices to them. We helped draft the bills. We made sure activists were calling the state legislators, getting support, showing up at their public hearings, giving testimony…Little fanfare. Honestly, nobody even noticed. My team looked at each other and we’re like, ‘It can’t be that easy.’” (Elias has also filed suit against the Iowa law.)</div><div>
</div><div>Heritage has been at the forefront of weaponizing Trump’s Big Lie of widespread voter fraud in order to build support for policies that restrict access to the ballot.</div><div>Anderson also took credit for a Arizona law enacted in early April that prohibits election officials from accepting private funding, which was used in 2020 in both red and blue counties for things like opening more polling locations and drop box sites, saying, “We’re kicking Mark Zuckerberg out of all of our state and federal elections.” And she claimed that another bill signed by Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey on Tuesday, which could purge more than 100,000 people from the state’s list of voters who automatically receive a mail ballot, was “straight from the Heritage recommendations.”&nbsp;&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>A Heritage lobbyist met early on with Florida Republicans to draft a bill largely mimicking the Georgia law, which passed the legislature over the unanimous opposition of Florida’s county elections supervisors. While the bill worked its way through the legislature, Anderson urged DeSantis to champion it. “I’ve got a call this afternoon with Gov. DeSantis’ team getting an update,” she said on April 22 to her donors. “Why is that? He needs to do more. He needs to say, get this bill on my desk.” DeSantis signed the bill on May 6 behind closed doors, with only Fox & Friends cameras allowed in for an “exclusive.”</div><div>
</div><div>“The scandal is the national pressure coming down on states with an intent to keep people from voting,” says Lisa Gilbert, executive vice president of the corporate watchdog group Public Citizen. After record turnout in 2020, “writing these bills, pushing these bills, is a mechanism to attempt to return to those new voters being unable to vote.”</div><div>
</div><div>In addition to pushing state-based voting restrictions, Heritage Action is leading the effort to block the passage of HR 1, Democrats’ sweeping democracy reform bill that would preempt many of these voter suppression laws by enacting policies like automatic and Election Day registration, two weeks of early voting, and expanded mail-in voting on a nationwide basis. “HR 1 is basically the dream bill of every left-wing advocacy group we’ve been fighting against for years on election issues,” von Spakovsky said at the donor event.</div><div>
</div><div>Von Spakovsky said at the beginning of the year that Heritage put out “a short summary of the worst provisions of a 900-page bill. Now, you all know congressional staffers don’t like reading 900-page bills. That fact sheet we put out is being used by congressional staffers, members of Congress, to go up and fight HR 1.” The group dubbed the bill the “Corrupt Politicians Act,” a label that was soon being used by leading Republicans like Ted Cruz.</div><div>
</div><div>“We’ve made sure that every single member of Congress knows just how bad the bill is,” Anderson added. “Then we’ve made sure there’s an echo chamber of support around these senators driven by your Heritage Action activists and sentinels across the country where we’ve driven hundreds of thousands of calls, emails, place letters to the editor, hosted events, and run television and digital ads.”</div><div>
</div><div>In March, the group organized a rally in West Virginia to urge centrist Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin to oppose the bill and “stand up for WV values,” according to an invitation obtained by Documented, even as it bused in conservative activists from states hundreds of miles away. Heritage Action announced on Wednesday it would run ads this summer pressuring Democratic senators in West Virginia, Arizona, Montana, and New Hampshire to preserve the filibuster in order to block HR 1.&nbsp;</div><div>
</div><div>“It’s an all-hands-on-deck moment,” Anderson said in April. “If we don’t win this, we lose our republic, period.”</div><div>
</div><div>To Elias, the video from the Heritage summit is proof that Republican state lawmakers are pursuing voting restrictions not in response to real local problems, but at the behest of well-funded Washington insiders. “It’s not being run by a coalition of state legislators,” he says. “It’s not being run by election administrators. It’s being run out of an office in Washington, DC, by people whose sole agenda is to make it harder for Black, Brown, and young voters to participate in the electoral process. Republicans who adopt these model laws should be ashamed of themselves.”</div><div>
</div><div>Watch the full video here. This story has been updated to include comment from Hans von Spakovsky.</div><div>
</div><div>Nick Surgey is an investigative reporter and the executive director of Documented.</div></div>