Trump Administration    

New York Times: Trump Is Expected to Relax Tax Rules on Churches Endorsing Political Candidates

By Michael D. Shear, Laurie Goodstein, and Maggie Haberman

Mr. Trump’s executive order on political activity, which he will sign while hosting conservative religious leaders, tries to overcome a provision in the federal tax code that prohibits churches and other religious organizations from directly opposing or supporting political candidates.

Officials said Mr. Trump will direct the Internal Revenue Service to exercise “maximum enforcement discretion” so that religious organizations and other nonprofit groups are not subject to punishment for expressing political views during campaign seasons…

Mr. Trump seized on the issue of limited political activism by religious leaders during the presidential campaign, winning cheers at rallies when he proclaimed that the tax code provision, known as the Johnson Amendment, denied pastors their right to free speech during elections…

White House officials said the president’s order will not eliminate the legal provision since doing so would require legislation from Congress. Instead, they said Mr. Trump would direct the I.R.S. not to actively investigate or pursue cases of political activism by members of the clergy.

Politico: Trump to relax enforcement of political activity by religious groups

By Colin Wilhelm

On Wednesday three Senate Democrats, Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), and Bob Casey (D-Pa.), criticized the executive order President Trump is expected to sign tomorrow in part to allow for religious organizations to more actively engage in politics…

“Proposals to weaken the prohibition on political campaign activity by charities will effectively lead to the elimination of our nation’s campaign finance laws,” the senators wrote in a letter to Republican congressional leaders, claiming that a relaxation of the prohibition would allow charitable causes to be used, “as shell companies to evade campaign finance transparency and contribution limits would increase the flow of dark money in politics.”

When questioned by reporters during a background briefing, the White House official acknowledged the concern.

“No one’s suggesting that churches can take out political ads,” the official said.

The White House said it did not expect a legal challenge.

“We don’t expect any legal challenges, we’re not changing the law, we’re not trying to violate the law,” the official said.

Washington Post: White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus on changes to libel law

By Eugene Volokh

Some commenters have noted that White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus spoke Sunday about possible changes to libel law – I agree that this would be a big story if any specific changes were called for, but at this point it’s just too hard to tell what, if anything, will ever be proposed…

“I think it’s something that we’ve looked at and how that gets executed or whether that goes anywhere is a different story” – not terribly specific. And the original “change the libel laws” isn’t terribly specific, either…

So at this point, we don’t have a concrete proposal, or even (as with the flag-burning reference) a specific indication of what a proposal would look like if there were a proposal. What we have is basically grumbling, and grumbling that seems to deliberately stress the absence of any concrete suggestion that “goes anywhere.” This makes it hard to offer much useful commentary, and makes it hard for me to get particularly concerned, until something more specific is raised.

Free Speech     

Wall Street Journal: Yale’s Quiet Majority

By James Freeman

At last, there’s hopeful news on intellectual liberty from a college campus. A new survey of students at Yale finds that a large majority favor free speech. Perhaps the kids can now also persuade the school’s administration of the virtues of academic freedom.

Your humble correspondent is an alumnus of the school and serves on the board of the William F. Buckley, Jr. Program at Yale, which commissioned the survey of 872 Yale undergraduates. Conducted from April 17th to the 23rd by the polling firm McLaughlin & Associates, the survey found that 72% of respondents oppose the idea of Yale “having speech codes to regulate speech for students and faculty,” while 16% favor the idea. Of course depending on one’s point of view, it can seem reassuring that free speech still wins in a landslide or disturbing that 16% of students actually want to surrender their right to express themselves.

Disclosure     

Fox Business: Buffett’s Berkshire Pressed to Disclose Political Spending

Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRKA) has largely avoided politics, but the pressure for more disclosure is increasing.

Shareholder advisory firms Glass Lewis & Co. and Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. are recommending that Berkshire shareholders approve a resolution asking for a twice-yearly report on the company’s political contributions and expenditures. Berkshire is run by billionaire Warren Buffett, a longtime Democrat.

Berkshire’s board opposes the resolution, arguing that political contributions make up less than 0.1% of Berkshire’s annual expenditures and the parent company doesn’t make any contributions. Berkshire subsidiaries including BNSF Railway and Berkshire Hathaway Energy do make political contributions. The vote on the matter will be finalized Saturday at the company’s widely attended annual meeting in Omaha, Neb.

Glass Lewis and ISS say the company’s current disclosures are insufficient and the board’s oversight of political spending is unclear.

Congress     

The Intercept: How Much Does a Politician Cost? A Groundbreaking Study Reveals the Influence of Money in Politics

By Jon Schwarz

Strangely, almost the only human beings who think that money doesn’t warp politics are academic political scientists who study it. The Roosevelt study quotes a previous paper summarizing the “scholarly consensus” as being that “candidate spending has very modest to negligible causal effects on candidate vote shares.”…

First of all, the study explains, “exceptions, additions, and loopholes have proliferated around the rules governing legal contributions and expenditures. Congress has many times enacted rules that appeared to close off gushing torrents of money while in fact opening new ones.” The system is now “worthy of Gogol: a maze of bureaucratic spending and expenditures”…

The Roosevelt authors went to the effort of capturing as much of it as possible – and found that academic examinations of this subject miss as much as 50 percent of the money being spent on elections…

But what the Roosevelt study demonstrates is that “for every $100,000 that Democratic representatives received from finance, the odds they would break with their party’s majority support for the Dodd-Frank legislation increased by 13.9 percent.

Candidates and Campaigns

Rhode Island Public Radio: End Citizens United PAC Endorses Sen. Whitehouse For 2018 Race 

By Ximena Conde

End Citizens United, a national grassroots political action committee, is officially endorsing U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse for his 2018 re-election, calling him a “champion of campaign finance reform.”

The PAC contributes to the campaigns of politicians who oppose the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which significantly expanded the ability of corporations to make political contributions.

Whitehouse has opposed the decision and has a record of calling for greater transparency in political spending and donations. He published a book on the subject in 2017 – “Captured: The Corporate Infiltration of American Democracy.”
Most recently, Whitehouse questioned Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch about the millions in “dark money” spent to support his nomination… 

End Citizens United said it raised more than $4 million in the first quarter of the fiscal year.

Washington Post: Northam grilled on campaign finance, Perriello on abortion at progressive forum 

By Fenit Nirappil

The two Democrats vying to be Virginia’s next governor came face to face with some of their toughest critics at a Tuesday forum in Arlington…

For Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam, that meant a grilling from liberal voters who asked about his acceptance of campaign cash from Dominion Resources, a state-regulated utility and Virginia’s biggest political donor…

A questioner drew applause by pointing out dozens of Democratic candidates for the state legislature are now refusing to take money from Dominion and asked Northam whether he would support a ban on campaign contributions from companies with business before the state.

Northam said he puts the interests of constituents over corporate interests, citing when he shepherded a ban on smoking in restaurants and opposed offshore drilling. He said he would support comprehensive campaign finance changes but did not offer details.

“Let’s not pick out one corporation that someone has taken a contribution from; let’s do comprehensive campaign finance reform and take care of all of these issues,” Northam said, adding later in the evening: “I’m not out there rustling money from big corporations. My support is grass-roots Virginia.”

The States

Missouri Times: Schaaf gets hearing on ‘dark money’ legislation 

By Travis Zimpfer

Sen. Rob Schaaf got his wish Tuesday morning when the Senate Rules, Joint Rules, Resolutions and Ethics Committee met to hear testimony on a bill that would force the disclosure of contributions to political nonprofits…

Sens. Jason Holsman and Bob Dixon each noted they would like to add amendments to the bill that would help ensure non-political nonprofits and longstanding political organizations, like the NRA or the NAACP, would not apply to the bill. However, Sen. Bill Eigel noted he had concerns with the legislation, which he called a “careful dance between transparency and privacy.”

“Although intended to provide more transparency, what we may find is we’re delving into the privacy of citizens that are donating to these organizations and they don’t want their name associated with these organizations because they feel there could be some sort of retribution,” Eigel said…

Those who testified in opposition to the bill, Jeremy Cady of the Missouri arm of Americans for Prosperity and James Harris of the Adam Smith Foundation, echoed that concern. Harris said the bill could have a “chilling effect on free speech” that would force “people to publicly display what their beliefs are.” 

Springfield News-Leader: ‘Dark money’ bill finally gets hearing after secretive attack ads, Senate slowdown 

By Will Schmitt

Way back in December, Sen. Rob Schaaf filed Senate Bill 73 to require certain politically active nonprofit organizations to disclose donor information. He told the Senate Committee on Rules, Joint Rules, Resolutions and Ethics that his bill would require 501(c)4 organizations who spend significantly on candidate-related political advertising to say who is footing the bill…

Sen. Bob Dixon, R-Springfield, readied some legislative changes to protect members of organizations such as the National Rifle Association, which sent Dixon an email expressing concern that Schaaf’s bill might infringe on the freedom of speech…

No witnesses came forward to support the bill, but two opponents showed up.

Jeremy Cady, state director of Americans for Prosperity, argued that nonprofits usually are advocating for or against specific issues as opposed to supporting or opposing certain candidates…

Also against the bill was James Harris, a lobbyist representing the conservative Adam Smith Foundation. While Harris praised Schaaf’s intentions, he echoed concerns the bill could have a chilling effect on free speech.

Los Angeles Times: Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra recaps his first 100 days in office fighting the Trump administration 

By Patrick McGreevy

Becerra told reporters during an appearance to mark the completion of 100 days in office that he will also pursue other  priorities, including a crackdown on nonprofit groups that scam consumers or improperly spend their money on political campaigns.

“I am tired of seeing people abuse the not-for-profit status for their own benefit or for someone’s benefit except for those they say they are trying to help when they ask you for charitable contributions,” Becerra said. He condemned “veterans organizations that are out there doing anything but helping veterans,”…

Becerra, who took office Jan. 24, also noted that some nonprofits have gotten heavily into politics.

The state’s campaign finance agency levied $1 million in fines in 2013 against two secretive nonprofits from Arizona that funneled $15 million from undisclosed donors into initiative campaigns in California.

“The last thing I think most people want to find out is that all these groups that are getting tax breaks because they are not-for-profit are actually going out there and influencing our political system,” Becerra said.

U.S. News & World Report: Republicans Aim to Erase Campaign Spending Laws 

By Brian Edwards, Associated Press

Republicans are moving to erase Minnesota’s public campaign subsidies, which could reshape the fundraising fight in next year’s gubernatorial election and unleash more money into statewide and local elections.

Passed in 1974 as part of an anti-corruption wave triggered by President Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal, Minnesota’s subsidy has become ingrained in state elections. With all 201 legislative seats up for grabs last year, nearly nine of every 10 candidates agreed to limit their total campaign spending. In return, they shared in $2.2 million in public funding.

In 2014, when both Gov. Mark Dayton and Republican challenger Jeff Johnson accepted subsidies, that public money accounted for more than 20 percent of the $4.5 million spent on the race.

But Republicans say the program is little more than welfare for politicians – and typically helps Democrats more. Democrats argue ending the subsidy will hurt less affluent candidates, and increase the influence of outside groups.

Houston Chronicle: Proposed ethics, campaign finance measures move forward in Texas House 

By James Drew

State officials — including legislators — would be required to disclose their government contracts, bond counsel work and legal referral fees under a bill that the House of Representatives gave preliminary approval to on Tuesday…

House members also gave preliminary approval to a bill that would prevent ex-legislators who become lobbyists from using their campaign accounts for contributions for two years after they leave office.

The House approved amendments to make the bill take effect immediately if it becomes law, and to clarify that House members could use their campaign accounts if they decide to run for the state Senate.

The vote was 145-0. The bill is expected to win final approval Wednesday and then would go to the Senate.

Missouri Times: ‘Holly PAC’ and the campaign contribution atmosphere after Amendment 2 

By Travis Zimpfer

The next permutation of political donating in Missouri has emerged in response to the passage of a new constitutional amendment in November which overhauled Missouri’s campaign finance rules.

Rep. Holly Rehder will begin fundraising for a new political action committee (PAC), called “Holly PAC,” which will donate to other candidate committees, though without her oversight, approval or direction. Those decisions will fall to the discretion of PAC Treasurer James Thomas, and it will not legally be able to benefit Rehder in her own campaigns.

Amendment 2, which passed by a 70-30 margin, limited campaign contributions to $2,600 per candidate per election, meaning a donor now can only donate a maximum of $5,200 to an individual candidate in an election cycle – $2,600 during a primary and $2,600 in the general.

However, another major function of the bill will stop contributions between candidate campaigns…
“In the past, I’ve been very aggressive at raising money and giving to individual candidates, and of course, we can’t do that with the new rules,” Rehder said. “So, our only other opportunity to help other candidates are these outside PACs.”