In the News
Politico: H.R. 1 Is a Non-Solution to a Non-Crisis
By Rich Lowry
What’s the urgency to adopt to adopt public financing of congressional elections and make taxpayers fund political candidates they oppose and in some cases, revile?
Why does the composition of the Federal Election Commission need to change to make it less bipartisan?
H.R. 1 is a free-speech disaster.
As Bradley Smith, a former chair of the FEC explains, to this point, the definition of electioneering in election law has been carefully delineated to provide wide latitude for general policy advocacy. H.R. 1 widens the definition to treat more ads as election expenditures, crimping the ability of groups to criticize elected officials.
The bill would also make more organizations disclose their donors, opening them up to intimidation. Two ACLU lawyers wrote in the Washington Postthat H.R. 1 will likely hampers the political rights of “many non-profits, including civil rights organizations and other civil liberties movement builders.”
It requires internet platforms to gather a trove of information on every political ad and group running ads.
When Maryland passed a similar law a couple of years ago, newspapers that found the requirements onerous and unworkable sued, and won. A circuit court judge called the Maryland law “a compendium of traditional First Amendment infirmities.” …
The speech restrictions and donor requirements will rightly be challenged. In the case NAACP v. Alabama, the Supreme Court ruled that “inviolability of privacy in group association may in many circumstances be indispensable to preservation of freedom of association, particularly where a group espouses dissident beliefs.”
The Courts
Courthouse News: Issue-Advocacy Groups Face Tough Battle to Keep Their Donors Secret
By Thomas F. Harrison
An appeals panel of federal judges had tough questions Wednesday as to why concerns about “cancel culture” would allow two advocacy groups for conservative issues to keep their top donors secret.
“I’m not understanding,” U.S. Circuit Judge David Barron said at oral arguments this morning, trying to differentiate the case at hand from precedent such as the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling that approved state disclosure requirements.
U.S. Circuit Judge Bruce Selya, an 87-year-old Reagan appointee, voiced similar puzzlement. “It’s hard for me to square Citizens United with the idea that, if you’re a 501c3 group, no one is entitled to know where your money is coming from,” he said. “I think that’s antithetic to Citizens United.”
Rhode Island invited the challenge here after passing a 2012 law that says issue-advocacy groups must list all donors of $1,000 or more on a government website and include the person’s name, home address, employer, job title and donation amount. Should the groups publish any communications within 60 days of a general election, or 30 days of a primary, Rhode Island also requires that the communication name their top-five donors…
Two conservative groups, the Gaspee Project and the Illinois Opportunity Project, are seeking a First Circuit reversal now after a federal judge dismissed their suit last August. Attorneys for the pair have cited a poll that says 62% of Americans are afraid to share their political opinions for fear of negative repercussions.
MSNBC: Ted Cruz just gave donors a much louder voice in Washington
By Richard W. Painter
Thanks to a win for Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in a lawsuit last week against the Federal Election Commission, campaign contributors now have a foolproof way to make sure the money they donate goes right into a winning congressional candidate’s personal bank account.
Post election contributions are included in the $2900 maximum per donor contribution per election cycle and can be made to a candidate who wins or loses. But post-election contributions are particularly appealing to donors who prefer to know that a candidate has won before they contribute.
Contributors may want their money to go to the winning candidate’s personal funds, ensuring maximum gratitude and maximum probability of reciprocity (the Latin phrase for this is “quid pro quo,” but we’re not supposed to talk about that).
Thanks to Cruz’s successful lawsuit, candidates now can make unlimited use of a mechanism that gives these contributors a bigger voice in Washington.
Congress
Wall Street Journal: Democrats Consider Changes to Voting Bill Amid Manchin Opposition
By Siobhan Hughes and Eliza Collins
Senate Democrats said they were considering changes to their election overhaul proposal, after pivotal centrist Sen. Joe Manchin made clear he opposed both the current bill and any imminent move to weaken Republicans’ power to block legislation.
“We’re open to changes and modifications as long as it does the job,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.). He added that “we’ve had discussions with Sen. Manchin and they’re continuing.” …
Mr. Schumer spoke after Senate Democrats met behind closed doors at a weekly lunch at which the impasse was a central topic. Mr. Manchin has called the current bill, the For the People Act or S-1, too partisan and said any changes to election law should have support from both parties. He missed the gathering, and a Manchin spokeswoman said he had a conflicting meeting.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D., Ill.), the Democratic whip, said members had a candid conversation during Tuesday’s lunch. “There’s a lot of strong feelings about that bill,” he said, adding that most members felt it was necessary and popular. “But we’re waiting to see how Sen. Manchin is going to react.”
Mr. Manchin promised to share a list of provisions that he would find acceptable, said Mr. Durbin. The pledge came after Democrats complained that Mr. Manchin had declined to specify what changes he wanted…
Mr. Schumer said he was sticking to his plan to hold a vote on the measure this month despite the uncertainty about the bill’s fate. Democrats see little hope of drawing GOP support for any election-related measure, even as some have indicated they would be willing to make changes to the bill.
The Intercept: Republican Senators Lack Confidence Joe Manchin’s Loyalty to the Filibuster Will Hold
By Ryan Grim
Republican Senators are anything but confident that Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., will stand by his op-ed in West Virginia’s Charleston Gazette-Mail this weekend promising to oppose his party’s effort to reform the filibuster along with Democrats’ signature democracy reform legislation.
On Tuesday, civil rights leaders met with Manchin to persuade him to abandon his opposition. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York told reporters that negotiations with the West Virginia senator were ongoing and that changes could still be made to the bill, S. 1, the “For the People Act,” to placate Manchin.
Republicans said they are nervous the pressure will work. “You think it’s over?” asked Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., rhetorically. “I’m not confident on anything until the day after it’s been done, so I appreciated his comments and thought that was a strong, smart move for the country, and I hope that he continues to have that approach to S. 1 as well as to the filibuster.” …
The sprawling legislation also includes campaign finance disclosure reforms and federal matching funds for candidates, elements that could be jettisoned in talks with Manchin.
Asked if he thought Manchin’s opposition was a done deal, Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., shook his head: “You can’t guess at that.”
Fox News: On Supreme Court steps, Dem senator calls right-leaning justices ‘servants’ of dark money interests
By Marisa Schultz
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse stood outside the Supreme Court Wednesday and called out GOP justices for the “evil” of allowing unlimited dark money into elections and partisan gerrymandering.
The Rhode Island Democrat was speaking at an event with other senators and activists to promote election reform legislation, known as S.1, when he took a personal swipe at the justices.
“We got to keep the spotlight on the six Republicans in the building behind me who are the servants of right-wing dark money interests,” Whitehouse said at the steps of the Supreme Court. “That is no place for a court to be in our great republic, and we have got to call it out.”
Whitehouse said it was fitting to hold a rally on the S.1 legislation at the Supreme Court since the For the People Act aims to curb dark money political donations and end partisan gerrymandering.
FEC
Daily Beast: State GOPs Can’t Explain Millions In ‘Trump Victory’ Cash
By Roger Sollenberger
Months after the Federal Election Commission notified several GOP state parties of major gaps in their 2020 fundraising and spending reports, the committees are correcting their numbers—but they still can’t explain why the discrepancies occurred.
The issue has raised new questions about possible abuse of a longstanding campaign finance loophole that allows wealthy megadonors to cut massive checks. Last year a number of Republican state parties failed to disclose transfers in the hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions, of dollars, which violates reporting requirements.
“There are layers of problems here, but the basic question is whether the state parties complied with federal disclosure requirements,” Paul Ryan, vice president of policy and litigation at election reform advocacy group Common Cause, told The Daily Beast.
It appears systemic. The FEC has so far sent notices to 10 of those 46 state parties that failed to report high-dollar same-day transfers from joint fundraising committees and to the RNC. So far, all but one have responded.
But their explanations have been incomplete or nonexistent…
The problem stems from joint fundraising agreements—teams of political committees that join together to increase their party’s fundraising power and reach. The arrangements are legal, but it appears the GOP has used them to secretly pass millions of dollars from Trump Victory to the RNC through apparently oblivious state committees.
Independent Groups
New Republic: Are Democrats Done Fighting Big Money in Politics?
By Walter Shapiro
All of the seven top Democratic candidates for [New York City] mayor now have a super PAC working on their behalf…Through mid-May, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, super PACs were responsible for roughly a third of all the money spent on the mayoral race. This trend has not received the public attention it deserves, but it serves as a symbol of growing Democratic hypocrisy about big money in politics…
But what are super PACs doing in the middle of a Democrats-only primary for New York mayor? New York City has fulfilled the fantasies of every reformer by creating a campaign finance system so pure that it might be emulated in the Garden of Eden. So why are all these liberal candidates turning to the superwealthy (including some Republicans) to aid their campaigns?
The States
WRAL: NC lawmakers weigh making online impersonation a felony
By Laura Leslie
State lawmakers are debating a proposal to make it a felony to impersonate someone else online for malicious reasons. An added amendment would allow someone to sue over “deceptive research.” …
Sen. Warren Daniel, R-Burke, added an amendment [to House Bill 341] to classify “fictitious communications designed to elicit a response” as an “unfair and deceptive trade practice” under the bill, punishable by a fine of up to $50,000.
Daniel said he was sent a survey by a Cornell University researcher posing as a constituent.
“They did a deceptive research project, and they impersonated a constituent, and they sent all of us in this legislature emails to see how we would respond,” he told the committee…
“They didn’t say, ‘You know, we sent out secretive, deceptive emails to try to lure you into responding,'” he said. “This kind of lit my fuse, personally.”
Senators of both parties expressed concern about Daniel’s amendment, saying it’s overly broad….
Sen. Amy Galey, R-Alamance, said she’s “a little concerned that this would be some kind of limitation on political speech. I don’t defend people doing that, but I think they probably have a right under the First Amendment to do it in the political arena.”
“I don’t have a lot of sympathy for people who want to hide behind alter egos or fictiious names,” Galey said, but added, “even cowards have rights under the Constitution.”
The Intercept: $800,000 of Mystery Money Shaped the Virginia AG Race in the Final Weeks
By Ryan Grim and Rose Adams
But the mysterious $800,000 during the closing weeks of the June 8 election has the Jones campaign crying foul…
The funding comes from the Democratic Attorneys General Association, an organization that works to elect Democratic attorneys general across the country and counts Dominion as one of its hundreds of corporate donors. Although DAGA says it is not allowed by law to earmark the donations it receives for certain uses, the organization and its Republican counterpart, RAGA, have previously received millions of dollars in contributions from corporations seeking to anonymously fund attorney general candidates whose jurisdiction overlaps with particular corporate interests…
DAGA’s PAC doesn’t have to disclose its contributors until the Federal Election Commission’s second quarter filing deadline in July. (Virginia election law allows federal PACs registered with the state’s Department of Elections to spend on behalf of local and state candidates.) But even then, the source of the $800,000 between April and June, when the money was spent on payroll, digital consulting, and media, won’t ever be clear, since DAGA’s second-quarter filings won’t reveal how DAGA spent the contributions it received.
Washington Post: Legendary fundraiser will face super-rich self-funder in Virginia governor’s race
By Laura Vozzella
In his victory speech after Tuesday’s Democratic primary, former governor Terry McAuliffe said Republican nominee Glenn Youngkin “has already pledged $75 million of his own private equity money to buy the governor’s mansion.”
Youngkin’s campaign said the former Carlyle Group executive plans to raise $75 million for his campaign but has not specified how much of that will come from his own bank account.
No matter the source, $75 million would be a record-smashing sum for a single gubernatorial candidate in Virginia, where unusually lax campaign-finance laws allow for unlimited personal and corporate contributions. That would exceed the combined $66 million spent on the governor’s race four years ago, when Democrat and now-Gov. Ralph Northam spent $37 million and Republican Ed Gillespie shelled out $29 million.
