In the News
Washington Post: Don McGahn was one of the most principled members of the FEC
By Bradley A. Smith
Federal Election Commissioner Ellen L. Weintraub’s attack on former FEC commissioner Donald F. McGahn was misleading [“A disquieting pick for White House counsel,” op-ed, Dec. 11]. Ms. Weintraub claimed Mr. McGahn said, “I’m not enforcing the law as Congress passed it. I plead guilty as charged.” However, the article containing that quote noted, “McGahn’s admission of ‘guilt,’ however, came with a catch: He argued that it wasn’t his job to enforce this law as Congress passed it. Instead, he said, the commission’s job was to enforce the law as it’s been upheld by the judicial branch of government.”
Mr. McGahn made an important and correct point: The Supreme Court has ruled that many campaign finance laws are unconstitutional. If Mr. McGahn had said he would “ignore decisions of the Supreme Court,” he would face just and vociferous criticism.
Time: The Forgotten Tool in Donald Trump’s ‘Drain the Swamp’ Effort
By Dave Levinthal/CPI
Donald Trump panned “pay-to-play” politics, blasted “rigged” elections and vowed to “drain the swamp” that is Washington, D.C.
But Trump has so far forsaken the very government agency Congress created after Watergate to work as the nation’s campaign season Roto-Rooter.
The Federal Election Commission’s six commissioners, including the agency’s three Republicans, say neither Trump nor his transition team has contacted them…
And, save for Ravel, all of the FEC commissioners’ six-year terms have expired. But they continue to serve, because no law compels them to leave, and their authority remains the same. Come April, Weintraub will have served 10 years past her term’s expiration date, Walther eight years. Petersen’s term ended nearly six years ago, Hunter’s term four years ago.
“Congress has limited commissioners to one six-year term, and that was precisely because at the time many commissioners had been there for many years,” said Brad Smith, a former Republican FEC chairman who now leads the Center for Competitive Politics, which favors campaign deregulation. “Clearly, Congress did not want commissioners being there forever.”
Courthouse News Service: Taxpayer Group Fights California Political Reform
By Nick Cahill
Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 1107 on Sept. 9, eliminating a longstanding, voter-approved ban on public financing of local campaigns. While the bill breezed through the Legislature, its critics have not quieted down.
The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association and a former judge sued the governor on Monday, claiming that changes to the Political Reform Act require voter approval…
“We think this is a pretty clear violation of the [state] constitution,” said Anthony Caso, plaintiffs’ attorney. “Any actions taken to enforce this are going to be an illegal expenditure of taxpayer money.”
Political law attorney Chuck Bell and Allen Dickerson with the Center for Competitive Politics also represent the plaintiffs.
he taxpayer association and Quentin Kopp, a former state senator and retired San Mateo County Superior Court judge, request an injunction to stop the amendments from taking effect on Jan. 1. They want SB 1107 ruled invalid and sent to voters on a statewide ballot.
CCP
Issue One Launches Plan to “Return Government to the American People” By Empowering Government
By Joe Albanese
On Wednesday morning, the self-styled campaign finance “reform” group Issue One hosted an event at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The event, entitled “Returning Government to the People,” was billed as the launch of a new policy initiative to further regulate our campaign finance system. Several members of the press were in attendance (who seemed to make up most of the audience), and the main speakers were former members of Congress and cabinet members: Dan Glickman, Ray LaHood, Connie Morella, Tim Roemer, and Zach Wamp. Also speaking were Meredith McGehee and Nick Penniman of Issue One…
Congressman Wamp asserted that we have a “rigged” system devoted to “incumbent protection,” where lawmakers only care about gaining and holding onto power. (In reality, high incumbent re-election rates are nothing new and “reform” policies tend to protect incumbents). Secretary Glickman, meanwhile, cast lawmakers as victims of a system that “does not reward courage,” forces them to constantly fundraise, and exposes them to more negative advertising due to the volume of money being spent. Frankly, lawmakers should not expect to be above criticism by private citizens, and raising or eliminating our low contribution limits would alleviate lawmakers’ fundraising burden.
Free Speech
Cato: Today Is Bill of Rights Day
By Tim Lynch
Today is Bill of Rights Day. So it’s an appropriate time to consider the state of our constitutional safeguards…
The First Amendment says that “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech.” Government officials, however, have insisted that they can gag recipients of “national security letters” and censor broadcast ads in the name of campaign finance reform and arrest people for simply distributing pamphlets on a sidewalk…
It’s a disturbing snapshot, to be sure, but not one the Framers of the Constitution would have found altogether surprising. They would sometimes refer to written constitutions as mere “parchment barriers,” or what we call “paper tigers.” They nevertheless concluded that having a written constitution was better than having nothing at all.
The key point is this: A free society does not just “happen.” It has to be deliberately created and deliberately maintained. Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.
Congress
Associated Press: Trump urged to tackle campaign finance in ‘swamp draining’
By Julie Bykowicz
Issue One has united 165 former members of Congress, governors and administration officials behind a plan to rewrite campaign finance laws to give small donors more power in the political process. The coalition is led by former Indiana Rep. Tim Roemer, who says Republican and Democratic lawmakers often describe their fundraising duties as “sickening.”…
Lawmakers, Roemer said, think Trump could use his political juice next year to help pass the first major campaign finance overhaul in more than a decade. After the 2002 legislation known as McCain-Feingold, which limited how much special interests could give to the political parties, court rulings and legal and regulatory changes have cleared a path for unlimited donations to outside groups. That has reduced the importance of smaller donations…
The group is hoping to break through to Trump, who has put forward no policy proposals on campaign finance even as he has repeatedly pledged to “drain the swamp” of Washington.
The Media
Daily Caller: Facebook Wants To Hire 20-Year Media Veteran To Help Solve ‘Fake News’ Problem
By Eric Lieberman
The social media company is criticized profusely because certain false, or unsubstantiated, stories are publicized on the site due to its role as a news aggregator. But how Facebook will be able to decide what is “fake news” and what is legitimate is not yet known…
Zuckerberg now seems to feel inclined to employ a mediator who can help objectively (if that’s possible) decipher high-quality content from lower quality, misleading news stories…
Facebook was accused of suppressing news stories more likely to be interesting to conservative readers, which subsequently bumped positive liberal stories up higher, in May, according to Gizmodo. It was later discovered that the trending news section on the social media platform was mostly operated and controlled by liberal-leaning employees until a large portion of them were ultimately fired.
Trump Administration
Wall Street Journal: What Purple America Wants From Trump
By Paul C. Light
My analysis of survey data collected by nonpartisan organizations suggests that this year’s voters can be broken down into not two main groups, but three.
First there are the angry “dismantlers,” who favor smaller government and support major political reform, such as term limits, constitutional limits on campaign spending, and a lifetime ban on lobbying by former members of Congress…
Finally, there are “priority setters,” who favor both bigger government and major political reform…
To a large extent, these priority setters will determine whether President Trump is re-elected in 2020.
So what do priority setters want?…
They want major campaign-finance reforms. These voters worry about the amount of money in politics and say that the high cost of presidential campaigns discourages good candidates from running. They support limits on election spending, and they believe that effective laws-or even a constitutional amendment-could be written to fix the system.
Politico: Democrats call on DeVos to pay $5 million in long-overdue elections fines
By Benjamin Wermund
A group of Democratic senators are calling on Trump’s Education secretary pick to repay more than $5 million in election fines owed by her school-choice advocacy group…
Four Democrats, including Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), sent a letter Wednesday to DeVos that expresses “significant concerns” about the fine…
A DeVos spokesman, Ed Patru, called the Democrats’ letter “a transparently political maneuver.”…
“Betsy was not a party to the suit, a trial court judge ruled none of ACM’s officers or board members can be held liable for the fine,” he said. “That ruling was never challenged by the state of Ohio, and as a result, the issue was put to rest eight years ago.”
A Trump transition representative suggested that the fine is no longer legally binding because of the Supreme Court’s landmark Citizens United ruling in 2010. Attorneys for All Children Matter have previously said that the PAC spending would be legal in a post-Citizens United world.
Candidates and Campaigns
CBS News: Jill Stein announces plans for leftover recount money
By Emily Schultheis
Stein’s campaign is planning to reach out to each of its 161,000 donors and ask them to vote on which “non-partisan election reform and voting rights organizations” will receive the leftover money. The campaign did not immediately release a list of possible organizations, but said it will do so “in the coming weeks” when it begins surveying donors.
Under FEC law, money raised into a recount account can only be used for recount-related expenses — and a campaign must reach out to donors to either refund their excess donations or ask them whether the funds can be used for another purpose. Based on Tuesday’s announcement, it sounds like Stein’s campaign is looking to go the route of repurposing the funds.
The States
Portland Tribune: Council approves new public campaign finance program on split vote
By Jim Redden
The City Council approved a public campaign financing program funded by Portland taxpayers on a split vote Wednesday.
The proposal was introduced by Commissioner Amanda Fritz, the only member of the council elected with public funds under a previous program subsequently repeated by Portland voters. It will not be submitted to voters for approval before taking effect after the 2018 general election.
The proposal passed on a 3 to 2 vote…
Commissioners Nick Fish and Dan Saltzman voted “no.” Both said it should be refered to the voters.
In a statement posted on his city website, Fish said, “In 2010, we asked voters for permission to continue the Voter Owned Elections program.
“The Yes campaign outspent the No campaign 5 to 1, and still lost.
“The public was asked, the public spoke, and the program was repealed.
“Under these circumstances, I’m not comfortable taking taxpayers’ money to fund my own campaign without their permission.”
New York Daily News: City Council alters bill that would have made campaign donation fraud easier
By Erin Durkin
After critics – including the Manhattan District Attorney – charged it would make it easier for pols to get away with fraud, the City Council made changes to a bill to remake parts of the city’s strict campaign finance rules.
The original legislation would have allowed candidates to “correct” the contribution cards that campaign donors are required to fill out to document their gifts.
The final version takes out that provision, and says candidates can’t alter contribution cards after they’ve been signed by the donor.
Manhattan DA Cy Vance had warned the bill would make it easier for pols to rip off taxpayers and get campaign matching funds they’re not entitled to by forging or altering cards.
