In the News
USA Today: SEC puts corporate political disclosure on back burner
By Fredreka Schouten
The Center for Competitive Politics, which opposes limits on campaign spending, praised the decision.
“We applaud the SEC for refusing to allow itself to be dragged into regulating political speech in pursuit of a partisan agenda,” Bradley Smith, the center’s president, said in a statement. “The SEC can now return its focus to protecting investors and regulating capital markets.”
The Hill: SEC backs off corporate giving regs
By Ben Goad
“This proposal would have involved the SEC in the difficult business of regulating political speech, a job for which it is poorly equipped, and which would have proved a distraction from its important work in the economic sphere,” said Allen Dickerson, legal director for the nonprofit Center for Competitive Politics, which promotes First Amendment protections.
Congressional Republicans had pressed SEC Chairwoman Mary Jo White and the commission’s other members against pursuing the regulations, pointing to unfinished agency business they said was more central to the agency’s primary responsibilities. Key rules being drafted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law and the 2012 Jumpstart Our Business Startups, or JOBS, Act remain incomplete, they noted.
Acton Institute: SEC Deals Blow to ICCR Agenda
By BRUCE EDWARD WALKER
Note that the WSJ and CCP identify the legitimate role of the SEC as protecting investors rather than forcing companies to disclose donations to nonprofits and campaigns. This is something Ms. Berry, ICCR and Mr. Freed should keep in mind before mounting yet another attack on the First Amendment. Why am I not optimistic?
CCP
Group Commends SEC Decision to Forego Rulemaking
By Joe Trotter
“We applaud the SEC for refusing to allow itself to be dragged into regulating political speech in pursuit of a partisan agenda,” said former Federal Election Chairman Bradley A. Smith. “The SEC can now return its focus to protecting investors and regulating capital markets, and leave campaign finance law to the FEC and the Congress.”
The Commission had been asked to open a rulemaking by a number of legal academics. Their petition argued that corporations should be required to disclose otherwise non-material activity merely because it might have some effect, even indirectly, on politics.
“The overwhelming majority of political activity—corporate or otherwise—is publicly disclosed under current regulations, and federal law already requires the disclosure of all material corporate activity,” said CCP Legal Director Allen Dickerson. “This proposal would have involved the SEC in the difficult business of regulating political speech, a job for which it is poorly equipped, and which would have proved a distraction from its important work in the economic sphere.”
$60 Million Down the Drain
By Luke Wachob
The article, written by Citizen Action of New York’s Executive Director, Karen Scharff, does not cite any evidence from existing tax-financed campaign programs to support its bold claim. All Ms. Scharff points to are instances of government giving handouts to large corporations, and hope that a tax-financing program will put a stop to it.
It won’t. A CCP study of voting records in the Connecticut legislature determined that after the state implemented tax-financing in 2008, there was no change in how often participant legislators voted with organized interests. A Goldwater Institute study of Arizona’s system found no difference in voting behavior between candidates who used the tax-financing program and those who did not. In Maine, lobbyist registrations have increased since the implementation of tax-financed campaigns in 2000, and Arizona recorded its highest number of lobbyist registrations ever as recently as 2010. Put simply, tax-financed campaigns don’t put an end to special interest influence. They don’t even put down a speed bump.
Independent Groups
Wall Street Journal: The Latest IRS Political Crackdown
Editorial
The Obama Administration doesn’t lack for nerve or, more to the point, disdain for the law. Even as investigations continue into the IRS targeting of conservative nonprofit groups, Treasury and the IRS are introducing a new regulation to further restrict the ability of nonprofit groups to participate in elections.
Treasury’s draft of the proposed rule would redefine as political activity a wide range of actions currently undertaken by hundreds of 501(c)(4)s, which are allowed to engage in politics as long as it is not their “primary purpose.” The rule amounts to a crackdown on the Administration’s opponents, limiting their ability to talk about their core issues during an election cycle.
More Soft Money Hard Law: The IRS Proposed Rules on (c)(4) Political Activity
By Bob Bauer
Immediately upon the Treasury and IRS’s publication of proposed rules on 501(c)(4) activity, the political jockeying began. Reformers said high time; critics replied that the suppression of free speech was at hand. The IRS Notice is not all that dramatic because what the Service may eventually do is up in the air: the IRS invites comments on all aspects of the definition of (c)(4) political activity. There is no way of knowing how this will all end up many months from now. But the IRS appears to be doing what both sides had demanded that it do for different reasons—improve on current rules—and its notice of proposed rulemaking simply calls for comment on a baseline proposal, which is fairly normal for this type of agency rulemaking setting. This is a reasonable place to begin.
Moreover, the goal of clarity the IRS is emphasizing is a sound one. The tax authorities should not be called upon to make nuanced political judgments about what does or does not constitute political activity. And the IRS should not be asked to bear the full burden of disappointments over the enforcement of the campaign finance laws. To the extent that the Service has in mind simplifying its task and keeping quite limited its presence in political activity, it seems to be marching in the right direction.
Candidates, Politicians, Campaigns, and Parties
NY Times: As Fund-Raisers in Congress, Women Break the Cash Ceiling
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
For decades, female candidates lagged behind their male counterparts in fund-raising, largely because donors, most of them men, did not have faith in their ability to win. Women — the go-to donors for female office seekers — were historically more interested in giving to causes than to candidates.
But over the last decade, women running for Congress have raised on average more than their male counterparts, and substantially more in the Senate in election cycles when prominent women like Hillary Rodham Clinton and Elizabeth Warren were in the game.
FEC
LA Times: Bitcoin campaign donations have regulators scratching heads
By Becca Clemons
But as with any budding technology, federal agencies must examine how its use fits in with the law, including rules for campaign donations. The Federal Election Commission discussed the technology last week, while federal regulators and experts testified about it before two Senate committees.
The FEC plans to revisit the topic in the next year and may issue a set of rules. But the technology, embraced by some high-profile entrepreneurs who have invested in it, is already being accepted by the national Libertarian Party and some local chapters and candidates.
