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Center for Competitive Politics ifs

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KOCH CITIZENS UNITED AMICUS

~ ESG/SEC 1st amend compelled sp BS

why rebranded?

cu case koch ihs

Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas have attended these events. (According to Salon, "Thomas claimed he just made "a brief drop-by" at the Koch brothers' January 2008 Palm Springs political retreat to give a talk; in fact he was reimbursed for four days of “transportation, meals and accommodations” by the Federalist Society.[56]"). The attendance of Thomas and Scalia has sparked debate over judicial ethics and the2010Citizens United decision.[57] Common Cause filed a petition with the Justice Department in January 2011 alleging a conflict of interest for these Justices, as David and Charles Koch operate foundations that contribute to political groups, which might benefit from relaxed campaign finance rules. ^[58] Common Cause has also noted that the Cato Institute, which Charles Koch founded, filed an amicus brief in Citizens United opposing campaign finance. ^[59] The Center for Competitive Politics also filed a brief in the case; the Center is headed by Bradley Smith, who is affiliated with the Institute for Humane Studies where Charles Koch is Chair of the board and funder. ^[60] SW ^koch ^ind

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BS

https://thehill.com/blogs**/pundits-blog/**campaign/317618-possible-expansion-of-lobbying-restrictions-threaten-first

Trump’s immigration executive order has dominated the spotlight this week. Meanwhile, Washington’s so-called “influence industry” – and those seeking to influence the regulation of that industry – focused on another executive order prohibiting certain incoming administration officials from lobbying the administration after they leave government.

While the directive’s immediate effects are limited in scope, commentary on the order inevitably also has extended to demands for greater regulation of lobbying generally, and specifically so-called “shadow lobbying.” Putting aside the mellifluous rhetoric, cracking down on “shadow lobbyists” will have no meaningful impact on preventing corruption, and will merely impose more administrative burdens on citizens’ First Amendment activities.

The special-interest constituency pushing for more regulation of lobbying has long complained that too many lobbyists are exploiting purported legal loopholes. By keeping their activities outside of the legal definition of lobbying and under the threshold for registering and reporting, these “shadow lobbyists” are supposedly contributing to a culture of corruption in Washington.

At a high level, this grievance is as absurd as claiming that a citizen is exploiting a loophole in the tax code by not earning enough to trigger the threshold for paying taxes. For both policy and administrative reasons, most laws must set thresholds below which they do not apply. If every time someone acting below a regulated threshold prompts someone else to advocate lowering the threshold, the law’s scope will constantly expand until everything is regulated. This is both socially undesirable and practically untenable.

Indeed, we see this ill-advised trend in proposals to expand the federal and state lobbying laws, and many of which states have implemented. Last year the New York State Joint Commission on Public Ethics decided to regulate certain public relations consultants as lobbyists. After a wave of protest and litigation, brought in part by the Center for Competitive Politics on behalf of PR firms,the state legislature acted to reign in JCOPE’s overreach.Yet the agency still maintains its ruling covers PR firms if they contact bloggers, volunteer journalists, and social media personalities.

Still, the push to regulate these broader activities as lobbying continues. Last week, the National Institute for Lobbying, a lobbyist trade group, proposed regulating as lobbyists “public relations firms, political strategists, pollsters, advertising and media consultants, grassroots and coalition specialists, Internet and digital media experts and others who work to influence public policy decisions on behalf of their clients.” As policy advocacy increasingly shifts to these avenues, we should recognize this proposal for what it is: a few traditional lobbyists attempting to impose the same regulatory burdens that apply to them on other policy professionals.

Many state and municipal lobbying laws and regulatory agencies also purport to impose no minimum threshold for lobbyist registration. In Missouri, the Center for Competitive Politics is representing Ronald Calzone, a concerned citizen who merely shared his views on proposed legislation with state legislators, against the Missouri Ethics Commission’s charges that he failed to register as a lobbyist. This, despite the fact that Mr. Calzone was not paid or designated by anyone to act as a lobbyist, and merely referenced his affiliation with a non-profit organization with no financial resources in his discussions with legislators.

It is unclear exactly what the anti-corruption rationale is for forcing more individuals to register and report as lobbyists. In U.S. v. Harriss, a seminal case addressing the federal lobbying registration and reporting requirements, the Supreme Court identified a mere informational interest in enabling members of Congress “to properly evaluate” the “myriad pressures to which they are regularly subjected.” The majority opinion never discussed an interest in curbing “corruption,” and one justice who voted to invalidate the law even noted that “this [law] does not deal with corruption.”

Curiously, the majority also cited vaguely Congress’s interest in “self-protection” in regulating lobbying. Protection against what? The voices of constituents? Democratic accountability?

At the same time, the court also acknowledged the concern that the lobbying law may “act as a deterrent to the[] exercise of First Amendment rights.” This deterrent should not be understated. The lobbying laws are not easy to understand. Take, for example, the reporting last week comparing Trump’s lobbying executive order with his predecessor’s corresponding directive. Much of this coverage was inaccurate, due to journalists’ failure to grasp subtle legal distinctions between President Obama’s order defining “lobbying” in reference to the Lobbying Disclosure Act, versus Trump’s order incorporating by reference the LDA’s definition of “lobbying activities.”

These are the types of legal complexities that large corporations and well-funded advocacy groups pay fortunes for attorneys to navigate. Meanwhile, grassroots organizations are left at risk of running afoul of the law. To expand these lobbying laws to cover even more activities that are attenuated from direct lobbying would merely broaden the regulatory burdens without achieving any public benefit.

Eric Wang is a political law attorney in Washington, D.C. and a senior fellow with the Center for Competitive Politics.

The views expressed by contributors aretheir own and are not the views of The Hill.

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“Confirmed Judges, Confirmed Fears” is a blog series documenting the harmful impact of President Trump’s judges on Americans’ rights and liberties.

Trump Eighth Circuit Judge David Stras dissented from an opinion by two other Republican-appointed judges in late November and argued that Missouri’s lobbyist registration and disclosure law violated the First Amendment as applied to an unpaid conservative lobbyist. The majority strongly disagreed with Stras’ attempt to expand the reach of decisions like Citizens Unitedand explained that the state’s interest in transparency and public disclosure of who is trying to influence legislation clearly warranted the minimal burdens imposed by the law.

Ronald Calzone is the president, director, and unpaid lobbyist for Missouri First, a conservative nonprofit organization that regularly lobbies members of the state legislature. He filed a First Amendment challenge to the Missouri lobbying registration and disclosure law. The law simply requires filling out a form and paying a $10 fee once each year, as well as filing additional reports concerning lobbying-related expenditures. The district court rejected his claim that the law was unconstitutional as applied to him as an unpaid lobbyist, and he appealed.

In Calzone v. Summers,Judges Steven Colloton and Bobby Shepherd, both appointed by President George W. Bush, affirmed the lower court decision, but Judge Stras dissented. The majority explained that it was improper to consider Calzone’s additional argument that he makes no lobbying-related expenditures, as Judge Stras did in dissent, because that argument had not been raised below or even in the court of appeals until oral argument, noting that Stras’ view to the contrary was “unfair” to the lower court and to the state. All three judges agreed that Citizens Unitedrequired “exacting scrutiny” of the law as applied to Calzone, but Stras claimed that the state’s interest in “transparency” was not enough.

The majority strongly disagreed, explaining that based on precedent, there was a strong interest in disclosure of who is “pressuring and attempting to influence legislators.” They also noted that even unpaid lobbyists could offer “things of value” to legislators, raising the state interest in “avoiding the fact or appearance of public corruption.” The burden of complying with the law was “minimal,” they stated, particularly if Calzone did not make lobbying-related expenditures as he claimed in the court of appeals.

Overall, the majority concluded, the state system was “precisely that which we have previously held would satisfy” the requirement that such a disclosure law have a “substantial relationship” to the state’s interests. Stras’ dissent, on the other hand, would have further extended efforts in Citizens United and similar cases to misuse the First Amendment to undermine important public disclosure laws.

Tags:

Confirmed Judges Confirmed FearsDavid StrasFighting Big Money in Politicslobbyingmoney in politics

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http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Center_for_Competitive_Politics

The Center for Competitive Politics (CCP) is a conservative group that promotes the deregulation of U.S. elections, being against the McCain-Feingold act, the Disclose Act, the Fairness Doctrine, and being in favor of the Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission which allows unlimited corporate money in elections. It is a 501(c)(3) non-profit which states on its website that its mission is "to educate the public on the actual effects of money in politics, and the results of a more free and competitive electoral process." The Center was founded in 2005 by Bradley A. Smith, former Chairman of the Federal Election Commission, and Stephen Hoersting, formerly Smith's Legal Counsel at the Election Commission.[1] [2] [3] [4]

(Smith was a Republican appointed to the FEC by President Clinton in 2000 as part of the statutory requirement no more than three of the FEC's six commissioners come from any one political party. His nomination was promoted by Republican Senators, but was opposed by Vice President Al Gore and others because Smith opposed campaign finance regulations and thus they considered him "unfit" to regulate those campaign finance practices.[5] He was confirmed as part of a package deal to secure the confirmation of other nominees. In 2004, Smith was elected Chairman of the FEC. (Unlike most federal agencies, the FEC Chairman is not designated by the President. Rather, by law each year the FEC Commissioners elect one of the six Commissioners to serve as Chairman for a one year term. By custom, the Chairmanship of the Agency rotates between Republicans and Democrats; by law, the Chairman and Vice-Chairman must be from different parties.))

Overview

In August 2008, Jeanne Cummings of Politico wrote, 'Encouraged by the U.S. Supreme Court, conservatives are launching a wholesale legal assault on campaign finance laws. And among the leaders is a man once charged with enforcing those laws: former Federal Election Commission Chairman Bradley Smith. His goals are big. He doesn't want to just scale back the laws; he wants to pretty much wipe them out.'

Bradley Smith 'opened the Center for Competitive Politics to build a case against the regulatory system that limits individual donations to candidates, reins in the role of outside groups, and bans union and corporate contributions to political parties. With financial support that came largely from individuals he declines to name, Smith opened the Center for Competitive Politics a year later to begin challenging the current campaign finance system in both federal court and the court of public opinion. "What the Center for Competitive Politics can do and is trying to do is to bring the right kind of cases before the court," Hasen said, so Chief Justice John Roberts and his new coalition of conservatives can "knock them out of the park."'[6]

Ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council

CCP President Sean Parnell represents CCP on the Public Safety and Elections Task Force of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). At the 2011 ALEC Annual Meeting, he introduced the "Resolution in Support of Appropriate Disclosure Requirements" model policy for adoption by the Public Safety and Elections Task Force.[7] On July 20, 2011, Parnell published an article in The Daily Caller (conservative/Republican news spin organization founded by conservative reporter Tucker Carlson and former Dick Cheney aide Neil Patel) criticizing Common Cause for requesting that the Internal Revenue Service look into claims that ALEC, in violation of the laws governing 501(c)(3) organizations, has engaged in lobbying.[8]

About ALEC
ALEC is a corporate bill mill. It is not just a lobby or a front group; it is much more powerful than that. Through ALEC, corporations hand state legislators their wishlists to benefit their bottom line. Corporations fund almost all of ALEC's operations. They pay for a seat on ALEC task forces where corporate lobbyists and special interest reps vote with elected officials to approve “model” bills. Learn more at the Center for Media and Democracy's ALECexposed.org, and check out breaking news on our PRWatch.org site.

Opposing the Disclose Act

The DISCLOSE Act would require corporations to disclose the fact that they are giving money for campaign ads. This is in direct response to the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in the Citizens United case allowing unlimited corporate money for ads. People supporting stricter campaign finance laws say that the public has a right to know exactly who is funding political ads especially after a campaign marked by hundreds of millions of dollars in spending by groups, corporations, and unions that did not have to disclose the true source of the funding.[9]

The Center for Competitive Politics and other groups including Americans for Tax Reform, The American Conservative Union, CatholicVote.org, and Citizens Against Government Waste argue that provisions in the DISCLOSE ACT go beyond disclosure to actually prohibit speech, and have sent a letter to Congress calling the bill "an unequivocal ban on free speech, masquerading as an exercise in accountability."[10]

Funding

On its website, the Center for Competitive Politics (CCP) states that it "relies on individual and foundation support. Less than 1.5% of our funding comes from corporate support."[11] However, the group does not identify its donors.

In its 2006 annual return to the Internal Revenue Service, the CCP states that it had total revenue of $373,571 with expenses of $284,118. It listed its 2005 income as having been $251,005.[12] It reported income of $820,851 in 2007 and $1,425,502 in 2008. [13]

For 2008, Media Matters lists the following funders:[14]

Lee Fang, writing at the blog "Think Progress," has claimed that Center is a "front group" of libertarian activist Howie Rich, which the Center has denied.[15] The Center for Competitive Politics, along with groups such as the Cato Institute and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, worked in favor of the Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The groups filed amicus briefs to the Court.[16]

Research

The CCP releases regular research studies on the role of money in US elections. This research has been criticized by groups such as the Brennan Center for Justice, which generally takes the opposite side from the CCP on questions of campaign finance and corporate speech. The Brennan Center argues that the CCP's research is plagued by methodological flaws and inappropriate conclusions drawn from undisclosed data points.[17] CCP's original research reports, as well as copies of legal briefs, legislative testimony, and commentary published by the organization, are available through the organization's website.

Personnel

On its website the CCP lists its staff, as of May 2010, as being[18]:

Board of Academic Advisors

Contact details

124 S. West Street, Suite 201

Alexandria, VA 22314

Tel: (703) 894-6800

Fax: (703) 894-6811

Email: sparnell AT campaignfreedom.org

Website: http://www.campaignfreedom.org

Articles and Resources

Related SourceWatch articles

References

  1. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, "About Center for Competitive Politics", Center for Competitive Politics website, accessed February 2009.
  2. ↑ Mark Arsenault, "Congress trying to ease campaign finance rules", The Boston Globe, May 24, 2010.
  3. ↑ Susan Crabtree, "Sen. Kerry backs changing Constitution to deal with Supreme Court decision", The Hill, February 2, 2010.
  4. ↑ Robert Barnes, "Roberts Court rulings on campaign finance reveal shifting makeup, forceful role", Washington Post/Democracy 21, October 29, 2010.
  5. ↑ http://www.jedreport.com/2008/12/just-who-is-bradley-a-smith.html
  6. ↑ Jeanne Cummings, "Conservatives plot on campaign finance", Politico, August 12, 2008.
  7. ↑ American Legislative Exchange Council, "Public Safety and Elections Task Force Meeting," agenda and meeting materials, August 4, 2011, on file with CMD
  8. ↑ Sean Parnell, Common Cause’s selective outrage, The Daily Caller, July 20, 2011
  9. ↑ Susan Crabtree, "Supreme Court won't hear challenge on campaign disclosure", The Campaign Legal Center, November 1, 2010.
  10. ↑ David A. Patten, "GOP Makes Last-Minute Bid to Derail 'Disclose' Act", NewsMax.com, June 14, 2010.
  11. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, "Support Center for Competitive Politics", Center for Competitive Politics website, accessed February 2009.
  12. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, "2006 IRS Return", Guidestar, August 2007, page 1.
  13. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, "2008 IRS Return", Guidestar.
  14. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, Media Matters, accessed November 2010.
  15. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics "Press Release" Center for Competitive Politics, May 3, 2010]
  16. ↑ Lee Feng, "Secretive Right-Wing Plutocrats Use Front Groups To Attack New Campaign Finance Disclosure Bill", Think Progress, May 1, 2010.
  17. ↑ MacCleery, Laura, "CCP Survey Debunker", Brennan Center for Justice website, accessed February 2009.
  18. ↑ Center for Competitive Politics, "CCP Staff", Center for Competitive Politics website, accessed February 2009.

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