So-called campaign finance “reform” advocates often express befuddlement and outrage that anyone might oppose public disclosure of citizens’ donations to private organizations that engage in some political or public policy speech. An example of this occurred last year during debate over the DISCLOSE Act, when a staffer for former Republican Congressman Mike Castle, a supporter of the bill, said “It’s just disclosure, for God’s sake.”
One of the biggest reasons to oppose disclosure of donations that go to public policy and advocacy groups, of course, is that the information revealed can be used to build an ‘Enemies List’ for vengeful politicians and activists seeking to intimidate, harass, and punish their political opponents.
This danger was made clear today in an article about the Keystone XL Pipeline project from Canada to the U.S. that is currently seeking approval from the Obama administration. Apparently, the pipeline might in some way benefit Charles and David Koch, owners of privately-held Koch Industries, and so the permit should be denied.
The Koch brothers, of course, are well-known supporters of libertarian causes, groups skeptical of climate change theory, and grassroots groups that oppose the Obama administration’s agenda. All of which has brought the attention of groups like Common Cause, last seen protesting outside a meeting hosted by the Koch brothers in California last week.
The possible connection between the Koch brothers and the oil pipeline is apparently too much for some to bear, and they are suggesting the Obama administration reject the project because it might benefit their political opponents. From the article:
The Keystone XL pipeline, awaiting a thumbs up or down on a presidential permit, would increase the import of heavy oil from Canada’s oil sands to the U.S. by as much as 510,000 barrels a day, if it gets built…
What’s been left out of the ferocious debate over the pipeline, however, is the prospect that if president Obama allows a permit for the Keystone XL to be granted, he would be handing a big victory and great financial opportunity to Charles and David Koch, his bitterest political enemies and among the most powerful opponents of his clean economy agenda…
Koch Industries is already responsible for close to 25 percent of the oil sands crude that is imported into the United States, and is well-positioned to benefit from increasing Canadian oil imports…
The Koch brothers are not run-of-the-mill political opponents. An investigative report last year by the New Yorker magazine on the secretive and deep-pocketed pair have shown them to be “waging a war against Obama.” They have bankrolled the Tea Party movement, climate change skepticism and right-wing think tanks, such as the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the National Center for Policy Analysis…
“The Koch brothers are architects of the dirty energy strategy, both in Washington and through their commercial interests,” Jeremy Symons of the Reston, Va.-based National Wildlife Federation said. “It wouldn’t make any sense at all for the president to give this pipeline project the thumbs up and undermine his own clean energy efforts.”
[The pipeline] would send at least an additional $2 billion from American consumers to Canadian and multinational oil interests… Given its deep involvement in the Canadian petroleum industry, the Koch brothers’ operation stands to snare some of the windfall…
It is unclear whether the president or his advisers are aware of the extent of the Koch brothers involvement in tar sands imports or have tried to quantify the economic benefit they could derive from the Keystone XL pipeline…
This would be a breathtaking and almost certainly illegal abuse of power, if the Obama administration were to deny a project the necessary permit based, even in part, on the political views and spending of the Koch brothers.
More alarmingly, it would represent a full-scale attack on the First Amendment, with the government punishing people based on their exercise of the right to donate to or spend money on political and public policy causes.
Imagine the chilling effect on free speech if it became known that elected officials, political appointees, and sympathetic bureaucrats could deny citizens the ability to do business or anything else that requires government approval (building permits for a house, for example) if they supported the “wrong” side. Who would give to the Heritage Foundation, Center for American Progress, Sierra Club, National Right to Life, or countless other organizations that work on public policy issues or speak out in politics if potential donors believed the disclosure of their donations would be used by politicians to ruin them, financially and otherwise?
And worse (as if it could get worse!), the suggestion here that the permit be denied because of the Koch brothers political and public policy spending is targeted not at a Koch Industries project, but merely one that activists believe might, in some way, benefit the Koch brothers! Meaning that not only could citizens be punished directly by their government for daring to support causes out of favor with those in power, but other citizens would be likewise punished merely for doing business with or associating with those donors!
Disclosure has been offered by many as a noncontroversial type of campaign finance “reform,” with little downside. In fact, as the crusade against the Koch brothers and the Keystone XL Pipeline demonstrates, disclosure can be the most insidious threat to free speech and the First Amendment in the campaign finance “reform” arsenal.
