In the News
Delaware Newzap: State to appeal ruling in election disclosure case
By Jen Rini
Delaware Strong Families, a conservative think-tank, filed a complaint in 2013 related to the Delaware Election Disclosures Act, which requires nonprofits who publish voters guides and similar electioneering material costing $500 or more to file campaign reports with the elections commissioner within 30 days of a primary and 60 days before a general election.
Prior to the law, known as House Bill 300, nonprofits like Delaware Strong Families were not regulated under the state’s election laws.
Nicole Theis, president of Delaware Strong Families, said in 2012 the organization distributed a statehouse non-partisan voter guide on about 15 bills. The guide was distributed via the Internet within 60 days before Delaware’s 2012 general election.
IRS
Powerline: The Lois Lerner Files
By Scott Johnson
The Times notes the existence of an ongoing Department of Justice Investigation. Yet it fails to note that three months ago that “law enforcement officials” leaked word that they doesn’t plan to file criminal charges over the IRS misconduct, or that Obama promptly weighed in with his analysis that the events disclosed “not even a smidgen” of wrongdoing. The investigation continues, but what manner of investigation is this?
The Hill: IRS to tackle political spending rule again
By Benjamin Goad
The Internal Revenue Service is poised to take another stab at regulations governing political activities by the type of tax-exempt groups at the center of the agency’s year-old targeting scandal.
The decision to revise a draft rule, unveiled in November, follows pressure from congressional Republicans to push the rule back and as the agency pores over an unprecedented number of comments submitted in response to the proposal.
“In all likelihood we will re-propose a redefined rule and ask for more public comment,” IRS Commissioner John Koskinen told USA TODAY Monday.
Washington Post: GOP lawmakers oppose bonuses for IRS division that targeted groups
By JOSH HICKS
A group of House conservatives is pushing to cut off bonuses for the Internal Revenue Service division that targeted advocacy groups during the past two election cycles based on their names and policy positions.
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and six other Republican lawmakers wrote to House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) on April 2 requesting that the next general spending bill prohibit bonuses to the IRS’s Tax-Exempt Tax-Exempt and Government Entities Division, which carried out the agency’s screening efforts.
FEC
More Soft Money Hard Law: More Rows at the FEC
By Bob Bauer
The decision in McCutcheon has not been the only source of lively rhetoric in the world of campaign finance. The FEC’s commissioners took to very open squabbling, putting their cases in Statements of Reason and elaborating on them in op-eds andletters placed with the New York Times. The conflict in this instance involved Commissioner Ravel on one side and all of the Republican commissioners on the other, and they swiped at each other in strong terms over the properly defined responsibility of FEC Commissioners and the role of courts.
Commissioner Ravel complained that the Republican commissioners were refusing to even investigate major issues in the enforcement of disclosure requirements—in the case at hand, against Crossroads GPS. Having created deadlock and blocked enforcement, she charged, the Republicans expect the Commission to defend their inactions before inappropriately deferential courts that “have turned a blind eye to this [regulatory] paralysis.” For this reason, Commissioner Ravel joined Commissioner Weintraub and abstained from a vote to defend the suit brought by Public Citizen against the agency for failing to act against Crossroads.
Candidates, Politicians, Campaigns, and Parties
The Republic: Direct mail another legacy of ’64 Goldwater campaign
By Dan Nowicki
Barry Goldwater’s 1964 presidential campaign, which is getting new attention because 2014 marks its 50th anniversary, made plenty of mistakes in the Arizona Republican’s landslide loss to Democrat Lyndon Johnson. But one lasting innovation was its practical application of large-scale direct-mail fundraising to national politics, an idea that contributed to the conservative movement’s subsequent successes.
Direct mail allowed the anti-establishment Goldwater and his conservative supporters to circumvent the wealthy benefactors who at the time were relied on to bankroll White House campaigns. In the GOP primaries, Goldwater’s main rival was moderate Republican New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, who was tight with the big-money crowd. Instead of focusing on a few big donors who could write a check for a large sum, the Goldwater campaign reached out to larger numbers of potential supporters who could contribute smaller amounts.
State and Local
Florida –– Sun Sentinel: State lawmakers want to restrict lobbying, but exempt themselves
Declaring themselves fighters for clean government, Florida senators voted unanimously to stop local elected officials from moonlighting as paid lobbyists who try to influence other government officials on behalf of their clients.
But they don’t want to apply the same standard to themselves.
The proposed law would allow state senators and state representatives to continue working as lobbyists representing paying clients seeking favors from county commissions and city, town and village governments — a practice that’s good for two South Florida legislators.
Maryland –– Washington Post: Maryland won’t enforce aggregate campaign limits
By JOHN WAGNER
Maryland will no longer enforce its law that limits donors to giving $10,000 to state candidates during a single election cycle, elections officials said Friday, citing a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last week.
A memo distributed by the State Board of Elections said individuals and corporations are still bound by a state law that caps contributions to individual candidates at $4,000. But in light of the court’s decision in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, the overall limit on what donors can give during a four-year cycle is no longer enforceable, the memo said.
New York –– Newsday: Op-Ed: Albany’s whiff at public campaign financing
By IAN VANDEWALKER
What do you call a state program that’s supposed to be created from scratch by a notoriously dysfunctional agency in just a few months and will be repealed at the end of the year? A mistake, maybe — but not a pilot. Yet “pilot” is how the plan for public campaign financing in the 2014 state comptroller election is being characterized. Unfortunately, it’s destined to fail.
