Campaign Finance

Wikipedia: Campaign Finance.

Campaign finance, also known as election finance or political donations, refers to the funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policy initiatives and referendums. Political parties, charitable organizations, and political action committees (in the United States) are vehicles used for fundraising for political purposes. "Political finance" is also popular terminology, and is used internationally for its comprehensiveness. Political donations to funds received by political parties from private sources for general administrative purposes.

Political campaigns involve considerable expenditures, including travel costs of candidates and staff, political consulting, and advertising. Campaign spending depends on the region. For instance, in the United States, television advertising time must be purchased by campaigns, whereas in other countries, it is provided for free. The need to raise money to maintain expensive political campaigns diminishes ties to a representative democracy because of the influence large contributors have over politicians.

Wikipedia: Campaign finance in the United States.

The financing of electoral campaigns in the United States happens at the federal, state, and local levels by contributions from individuals, corporations, political action committees, and sometimes the government. Campaign spending has risen steadily at least since 1990 (for example the average campaign spending for a candidate who won an election to the House of Representatives in 1990 spent $407,600, while the average winner thirty years later spent $2.35 million (approximately $1 million adjusted for inflation);[1] in the Senate, average spending for winning candidates went from $3.87 to $27.16 million (about $13.71 million adjusted for inflation))

Major campaign finance laws and related court cases.

- Labor Management Relations Act of 1947.

- Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971.
- Buckley v Valeo. 

- Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002.
- McConnell v. FEC.
- Davis v. FEC.
- Citizens United v. FEC.
- FEC v. Ted Cruz for Senate.

___________

Related stuff: 

- From Oyez: Cases - Campaign spending.
- Previous posts on campaign finance.
- Texas Ethics Commission: Campaign Finance.
- Eight Magic Words.

Terminology

- donors
- political action committees
- Super PACs
- bundling
- 527 groups

 

Section Six - Suffrage, Elections, Campaigns, etc . . .

In this section we dig further into elections -  the mechanism that is used to tie the people with the government. 

In addition to the mechanics of he electoral process, this involves questions involving who gets to participate, who runs elections, who is allowed to run for office, and how they campaign for office. 

These can be divided into the following topics: 

1 - Suffrage 
2 - Elections 
3 - Voting 
4 - Voter Suppression
5 - Candidates 
6 - Campaigns 
7 - Campaign Consultants
7 - Campaign Finance
8 - The Donor Class

These can be defined as follows: 

1 - Suffrage: "Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote)."
 
2 - Elections: the formal process of selecting a person for public office or of accepting or rejecting a political proposition by voting.
 
3 - Voting:  a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, convenes together for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns.

4 - Voter Suppression: any legal or extralegal measure or strategy whose purpose or practical effect is to reduce voting, or registering to vote, by members of a targeted racial group, political party, or religious community.

5 - Candidate: A candidate is someone who is being considered for a position, for example someone who is running in an election or applying for a job.

6 - Campaign: an organized effort which seeks to influence the decision making progress within a specific group. In democracies, political campaigns often refer to electoral campaigns, by which representatives are chosen or referendums are decided.

7 - Campaign Consultants: 

8 - Campaign Finance: . . . the funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policy initiatives and referendums. Donors and recipients include individuals, corporations, political parties, and charitable organizations.

8 - The Donor Class: . . . a group of individuals or organizations that contribute significant amounts of money to political campaigns or causes. These donors often wield influence over political decision-making processes due to their financial contributions, which can fund advertising, lobbying efforts, and other activities that promote their interests or preferred policies.

Lectures: 

- U.S. Election Code.
- Texas Election Code.
- Is Voting a Right Guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution?
- Information, Disinformation, and Misinformation.
- Suffrage.
- Political Parties and Party Systems.
- Political Eras / Party Systems of the United States.
- Campaign Finance.
- Types of voter suppression.


Terminology

Elections
- elections
- regular elections
- voting
- adverse selection
- moral hazard
- institutions
- election rules
- suffrage
- participation rates
- who votes
- voter turnout
- nonvoters
- the franchise
- voter registration
- the ballot
- the secret ballot
- indirect democracy
- electoral districts
- single members districts
- electoral college
- majority rule
- minority rights
- redistricting
- fairness
- bias
- plurality
- proportional representation
- two party system
- winner take all 
- direct democracy
- referendum
- initiative
- recall
- party loyalty
- issue voting
- prospective voting
- retrospective voting
- spatial issues
- valence issues
- median voter theorem
- candidate characteristics
- campaigns
- campaign finance
- FECA
- media
- winning
- PACs
- Super PACs
- primaries
- general elections
- at large
- closed primary
- disenfranchisement
- early voting
- 15th Amendment
- get out the vote
- incumbents
- microtargeting
- motor voter law
- name recognition 
- negative campaigning
- open primary
- PACs
- Super PACs
- political efficacy
- political socialization
- poll tax
- primary election
- public opinion polling
- partisan election
- non-partisan election
- register
- runoff election
- single-member districts
- special election
- split ticket voting
- straight ticket voting
- Voting Rights Act

GOVT 2306
Assemblies
Parties in the Early Congress
Washington's warnings
Advantages of political parties
Expansion of suffrage
Democrats and the development of Texas
Rise of Republicanism
- business regulation
- civil rights
State parties
Local parties



Terminology

GOVT 2305: WTP - Chapter 8: Campaigns and Elections
advanced or early voting
blanket or wide-open primary
casework
closed primary
credit claiming
cross-filing 
direct primary
disclosure
equal protection clause
general election
grandfather clause
incumbent
independent candidate
literacy test
majority election
Motor Voter Act
open primary
party-line voting
party primary
plurality election
poll tax
position taking
preference primary
primary election
private financing
public financing
roll off
runoff election
second-order elections
suffrage 
voter turnout 
Voting Rights Act of 1965
white primary 

GOVT 2306: LSP - Chapter 9: Political Parties
allocation 
chronic minority
conventions (caucuses) 
county chair 
county or senatorial district convention 
electoral competition model 
executive committee 
grassroots organization 
party machines 
party platform
patronage 
permanent party organizations 
plank 
political party 
precinct chair 
responsible party model 
runoff primary 
state party chair 
straight-ticket voting 
temporary party organizations 

__________

Fall 2022

- What are parties and interest groups? 
- Contract allowing the formation of the Virginia Company
- Elite politics
- Interests highlighted in Federalist #10
- Territorial Expansion
- Free rider problem
- Tragedy of the commons 
- Public and private interests
- Federalists and Democrat - Republicans
- Party eras
- Contemporary politics
- The Powell Memo

Who is James Bopp Jr.?

He is one of the attorneys leading the charge to get the courts to overturn campaign finance laws - generally based on the idea that they violate free speech rights. He was mentioned in the post below on the Supreme Court's refusal to hear a case challenging Iowa's campaign finance laws. He was also involved in the McCutcheon decision. In class today we considered his being an example of an interest group - or policy advocate - using the courts as their preferred way of changing public policy.

Folks like this are responsible for many changes in public policy.

- Here's the Wikipedia on him.

On campaign finance, Bopp worked as a legal advisor to Citizens United leading up to their victory in the Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.[7] Another of Bopp's initiatives was bringing a lawsuit challenging what he believes to be a low limit for reporting campaign donations and the open way in which information on such donations is shared in California.

According the Campaign Legal Center, Bopp filed 21 of the 31 lawsuits it associated with challenging campaign finance regulations. All told, Bopp has spent 30 years fighting limits on campaign spending and is credited with changing the political landscape of the 2012 election. According to the Center for Responsive Politics. “It’s safe to say that groups on the left and right have Jim Bopp to thank for their new-found freedom.”In an interview with PBS' Frontline in 2012, Bopp said he was defending a "basically absolute" interpretation of the right to political free speech under the First Amendment. As such, he said he is working to eliminate or significantly loosen campaign spending limits and to eliminate donor-name-reporting requirements.

Bopp represented Phil Thalheimer and Associated Builders & Contractors PAC versus City of San Diego.[11] According to how the case was viewed in Hawaii, provided a PAC made "solely independent expenditures ...the case foreclosed the argument that the State has a justifiable interest in preventing corruption or the appearance of corruption in regulating independent expenditures"

From the NYT: Justices Decline Cases on Gay Rights and Campaign Finance

Sometimes the Supreme Court acts by not acting.

- Click here for the article.

The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear closely watched cases on gay rights, campaign finance and lethal injections. As is their custom, the justices gave no reasons for turning down the appeals.

The gay rights case, Elane Photography v. Willock, No. 13-585, was an appeal from a wedding photographer in New Mexico who asserted a constitutional right to refuse to provide her services to gay and lesbian couples.

The issue was broadly similar to one argued before the court last month, over whether companies may refuse to provide insurance coverage for contraception on religious grounds. But the New Mexico case was based not on a claim of religious liberty but on one of free speech.

The photographer, Elaine Huguenin, objected to a New Mexico law prohibiting businesses open to the public from discriminating against gay men and lesbians. She said that requiring her to photograph same-sex weddings violated her First Amendment rights because she was forced to say something she did not believe.

She rejected a request from Vanessa Willock and Misti Collinsworth to document their commitment ceremony. The women, who hired another photographer, filed a discrimination complaint against Ms. Huguenin’s studio, Elane Photography.

The New Mexico Supreme Court ruled for the couple, saying Ms. Huguenin’s “services can be regulated, even though those services include artistic and creative work.” Laws banning discrimination, the court said, apply to “creative or expressive professions.”

Justice Richard C. Bosson issued an ambivalent concurrence expressing sympathy for Ms. Huguenin and her husband.

“The Huguenins are not trying to prohibit anyone from marrying,” he wrote. “They only want to be left alone to conduct their photography business in a manner consistent with their moral convictions.” Instead, they “are compelled by law to compromise the very religious beliefs that inspire their lives,” he added.

“Though the rule of law requires it,” Justice Bosson wrote, “the result is sobering.”
. . . The justices also declined to hear a campaign finance case, Iowa Right to Life Committee v. Tooker, No. 13-407, which was a challenge to an Iowa law that bans contributions from corporations but allows them from unions. The case was brought by James Bopp Jr., one of the lawyers on the winning side on Wednesday in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, a major campaign finance case.

The McCutcheon decision struck down aggregate contribution limits in federal elections.

Mr. Bopp challenged the Iowa law on two grounds. He said distinguishing between corporations and unions violated equal protection principles. In any event, he added, “banning corporate political contributions violates the First Amendment.”

The Supreme Court also declined to hear two cases concerning whether death row inmates have a constitutional right to know what chemicals states plan to use to execute them.

The challenges said the court’s attention was needed to bring order to a capital justice system in disarray. Drug shortages and boycotts have caused prisons to scramble to find lethal chemicals, raising what opponents of the death penalty say is the possibility of executions so painful that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

From Politico: Last call for state parties?

We discussed state political parties in 2306 last week, and I mentioned that in our federal system states get to draft the rules that determine what parties look alike, which means that each state legislature has the greatest control over the parties. States provide the legal basis for parties. We mentioned that national parties - at best - try to reconcile differences between the states parties, but the later tend to be more powerful politically.

But Politico reports that not only are state parties are having trouble competing with SuperPACs for funds, the PACs are taking over some of the traditional functions performed by state and local parties - like organizing voters.

The article suggests that the reason is that limits on campaign spending by individuals and groups have been found to be unconstitutional restrictions on free speech. In 2305 we will be discussing the campaign financing and the Citizens United decision. One of the consequences appears to be that SuperPACs may now be able to challenge political parties as the dominant political entity in the nation.

Click here for the article:

State party officials across the country say the explosion of money into super PACs, nonprofit groups and presidential campaigns has made fundraising more difficult. And some of those outside groups are starting to take over the traditional local roles state parties play, spending big on voter contact and outreach operations.

The effect is candidates who can be more beholden to national organizations or single-issue groups rather than state party leaders. That’s leading to a change in candidates and their beliefs and the issues that come up in elections and statehouses.

The GOP takeover of North Carolina in 2010 and 2012, for example, was bankrolled largely by the network founded by GOP megadonors Charles and David Koch and primarily directed through the nonprofit Americans For Prosperity. AFP’s former chairman, Art Pope, now serves as North Carolina budget director.

In Texas, two Democratic outside groups have essentially built a party organization outside the official Texas Democratic Party. Several Obama campaign veterans are running the group Battleground Texas as a field and turnout operation, while the Lone Star Project is doing opposition research and tracking against Republicans.

There is a greater incentive now for individual donors with deep pockets to fund these groups, not the state party. Will this indirectly suppress voter participation by limiting the ability of parties to fulfill this traditional function?

Aside from the Citizens United case - which unleashed the amount of money that independent groups can change - campaign finance reform laws passed in 2002 removed a major source of funds that parties had access to - soft money:

Ironically, until Congress closed a key campaign finance loophole in the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance overhaul, most state parties were flush with cash.

The loophole allowed essentially unlimited funds known as soft money to be raised by the national political parties to be spent on party building activities and issue ads. Between 1992 and 2002, soft money fundraising for both parties skyrocketed — going from from $86 million to nearly $500 million. Much of that cash was spent through state and local party organizations.

In closing the soft-money loophole, the law created a complicated system of rules that state parties had to abide by when working on federal elections.

Under the rules, for example, state-party run phone banks for federal candidates had to be staffed only by volunteers. They could make calls only for presidential elections — not congressional races. Mail, campaign literature and get-out-the-vote operations around federal races were regulated by similarly strict rules, conditions and requirements regulating volunteer time, coordination with the national party and what kind of funds could be spent.

Those rules seem almost quaint now.

Proposals are being floated in Congress to rescind those rules - stay posted.

Money in Texas campaigns

Texas Tribune: Campaign finance for dummies: A guide to Texas election reporting rules.

Texas Ethics Commission: Search Campaign Finance Reports.

Transparency USA: TEXAS FINANCE SUMMARY.

Ballotpedia: Campaign finance requirements in Texas.

Open Secrets: Texas.

KVUE: 2022 campaign contributions: Who's backing Texas political candidates.

Texas Election Code: TITLE 15. CHAPTER 253. 

From the San Antonio Express-News: 'Dark money' disclosure fight heading back to the Texas Legislature

An early indication of what might be on the legislative agenda come January;

- Click here for the article.

AUSTIN — A top House lawmaker who led the charge to require politically active nonprofits to reveal their donors, a lightning rod issue opposed by Gov. Greg Abbott, says he wants Texas voters to decide the issue at the ballot box.

State Rep. Byron Cook, a Republican from Corsicana who narrowly won re-election earlier this month, said he is planning to propose next legislative session an amendment to the state constitution on the issue of disclosing so-called "dark money" donors.

A proposal to prevent politically active nonprofits from shielding the identities of their donors ended up tanking a comprehensive ethics bill last year. The House added the disclosure requirement to the Legislature's biggest ethics measure of the session, but the amended proposal was rejected by Lt. Gov Dan Patrick and the Senate.

Given that backdrop, Cook's proposal already is being cast by campaign finance reformers as more than a long shot. It would require approval from two-thirds of lawmakers in both chambers before it could be placed on a ballot for Texas voters.

But it appears to be the only gambit available to skirt Abbott's veto pen for Cook and lawmakers pushing for political nonprofit disclosure. The governor does not have the power to nullify a joint resolution proposing amendments to the state constitution. 

"It's a priority bill for the state of Texas," Cook, the chairman of the powerful House State Affairs Committee, said in an interview. "If we don't help give transparency to this issue, there'll be no reason for any candidate to do anything other than set up vehicles to allow them to receive money anonymously."

Most politically active nonprofits are allowed to spend money to influence elections independent of candidates but do not have to reveal who is funding the efforts (527 groups are required to disclose donors). The nonprofits, mostly 501(c)4s, have argued their donor lists are constitutionally protected.

Campaign cash from politically active nonprofits that do not disclose donors represents just a fraction of the hundreds of millions of dollars flowing into Texas elections. Some lawmakers, including Cook, have warned that the growing number of groups spending anonymous campaign cash in state elections could eventually lead to a major scandal.

The topic has become the most divisive campaign finance issue for the Legislature going back to 2013, when former Gov. Rick Perry vetoed a dark money disclosure measure authored by Republican state Sen. Kel Seliger. Last year's debate ended in the complete collapse of an emergency item for Abbott: ethics reform.

After the legislative session ended, Abbott signaled clearly how the state's top leader views the issue.

"As a justice on the Texas Supreme Court, I wrote that laws like that are unconstitutional and I based that decision on United States Supreme Court decisions," Abbott said at a news conference last year. "It's important for legislators to not to try and pass laws that have already been ruled unconstitutional."

Cook said given the political climate at the Legislature he believes the next logical step is to take the issue to Texas voters.

Details of the proposal are still being worked out, he said, but it could draw from a bill he authored last year that required groups making independent expenditures of $25,000 or more to disclose the names of donors who give $2,000 or more.

"This is an extremely important issue and only becoming more and more topical, as more groups move toward secretly funding campaigns, which is going to undermine transparency," he said. "We should make a serious effort to make sure the public is aware of who is behind the message with respect to political campaigns."

However, even supporters of campaign finance reform are largely skeptical that Cook's initiative will gain traction. Craig McDonald, director of the left-leaning watchdog group Texans for Public Justice, said "there's too much political clout lined up against transparency in elections."

"Keeping attention on the exploding use of dark money is laudable," said McDonald. "Getting a disclosure amendment to the ballot in the face of active opposition from the governor and lieutenant governor is politically impossible."

What is a Political Action Committee?

From Wikipedia: 

- Click here for the entry.

In the United States, a political action committee (PAC) is a 527 organization that pools campaign contributions from members and donates those funds to campaigns for or against candidates, ballot initiatives, or legislation. The legal term PAC has been created in pursuit of campaign finance reform in the United States. This term is quite specific to all activities of campaign finance in the United States. Democracies of other countries use different terms for the units of campaign spending or spending on political competition (see political finance). At the U.S. federal level, an organization becomes a PAC when it receives or spends more than $1,000 for the purpose of influencing a federal election, and registers with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), according to the Federal Election Campaign Act as amended by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (also known as the McCain-Feingold Act). At the state level, an organization becomes a PAC according to the state's election laws.

History:

The political action committee emerged from the labor movement of 1943. The first PAC was the CIO-PAC, formed in July 1943 under CIO president Philip Murray and headed by Sidney Hillman. It was established after the U.S. Congress prohibited unions from giving direct contributions to political candidates. This restriction was initially imposed in 1907 on corporations through the Tillman Act. The Smith-Connally Act extended its coverage to labor unions in 1943.[10] A series of campaign reform laws enacted during the 1970s facilitated the growth of PACs after these laws allowed corporations, trade associations, and labor unions to form PACs

US Code: Title 52 - Voting and Elections

Click here for it.


Categories


1 - Voting Rights

- Subtitle 1 - - Voting Rights.
- - Definition.
- - Free from interference.
- Relevant Amendments
- - 14th
- - 15th
- - 19th
- - 23rd
- - 24th
- - 26th
- Relevant Legislation: 
- - Civil Rights Act of 1964.
- - Voting Rights Act of 1965.
- Relevant Federal Agencies
- - Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division.


2 - Voting Assistance and Election Administration

- Subtitle 2 - - Voting Assistance and Election Administration.
- - Voting Accessibility
- - Voter Registration
- - Federal Election Records
- - Election Administration Improvement 
- Relevant Legislation: 
- - Help America Vote Act.
- Relevant Federal Agencies:
- - Election Assistance Commission.
- - Federal Election Commission.
- Relevant State Agencies: 
- - Texas Secretary of State, Elections Division.


3 - Federal Campaign Finance 

- Subtitle 3 - - Federal Campaign Finance.
- - Disclosure of Federal Campaign Finance Funds
- - General Provisions
- Relevant Legislation
- - Federal Election Campaign Act.
- Relevant Federal Agencies
- - Federal Election Commission.
- Relevant Supreme Court Decisions
- - Buckley v. Valeo.
See also: PACs and SuperPACs.

From the San Antonio News: Texas Supreme Court chief justice settles ethics fine

Here's a story that ties together the Texas Supreme Court and the Texas Ethics Commission together - not in a way that that chief justice would have liked probably.

- Click here for it.

Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht has ended an ethics dispute that languished in state court for nearly seven years, agreeing to pay a substantially reduced fine to settle charges that he broke state campaign finance laws.

The settlement, made public in court documents Wednesday, concludes a high-profile case that has become the longest-running appeal of a fine levied by the Texas Ethics Commission in the roughly two and a half decades since the agency was created.

Hecht was fined $29,000 in 2008, one of the largest campaign finance penalties ever issued in the state, after the commission determined he broke campaign finance laws while successfully fighting allegations that he abused his position by openly supporting President George W. Bush's short-lived U.S. Supreme Court nomination of Harriet Miers.

Hecht accepted a six-figure discount for his legal bill in the course of challenging the abuse-of-power charges. The commission concluded the discount was equivalent to a campaign contribution, one he failed to report, and that the total amount exceeded the $5,000 contribution limit on donations from law firms to judicial candidates.

Instead of paying, Hecht decided to fight the fine in state district court. And the lawsuit has stalled in the courts since it was filed in January 2009, raising the ire of watchdog groups that accused the state's Republican machine of working to bury the case.

Under the settlement, Hecht agreed to pay $1,000 and to "obtain a written fee agreement with any lawyer or law firm he hires to represent him either before or within a reasonable time after the representation commences."

Watchdog groups snarled at the final conclusion to the case, saying the commission let Hecht "off the hook" and that the fine is coming years late and "$28,000 light."

"This saga makes a mockery of so-called ethics enforcement," said Alex Winslow, executive director of Texas Watch, a liberal consumer rights group that filed the ethics complaint against Hecht in 2008. "Apparently, the way high ranking officials can beat the rap is to simply delay the process indefinitely."

From the Brennan Center: A Win Against Dark Money Eight Years in the Making

The fight over disclosure requirements continues.

- Click here for the article.

Good news is infrequent when you’re on the anticorruption beat. Notable recent incidents, for example, have included the sentencing of a former U.S. congressman’s wife for misuse of campaign funds and the resignation of a North Carolina state legislator who had pled guilty to tax evasion charges. However, in a rare positive development, the D.C. Circuit Court ruled last month that the Federal Elections Commission (FEC)’s disclosure rules on dark money were too weak.

In the case at hand, CREW v. FEC (which should not be confused with other cases, including a 2018 case of the same name), the plaintiffs were led by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a nonpartisan nonprofit organization whose mission is to hold government officials accountable to ethics rules, campaign finance laws, and the Constitution. Meanwhile, the defendant was the FEC, the agency responsible for administering federal campaign finance laws, including transparency rules. CREW sues the FEC often because the agency is known for failing to achieve its main objective — the enforcement of campaign finance laws. While many critics scream at the FEC, “you had one job!”, CREW actually does the hard work of litigation in order to prompt the agency toward action.

The case started eight years ago when CREW filed a complaint at the FEC against Crossroads GPS, a dark money group that had engaged in secret spending during the 2012 election cycle. When the FEC failed to take action, CREW then sued the FEC — and won their case in a federal district court in August 2018. The 2020 case involves an appeal of that lower court opinion.

From the Washington Post: Congress looks for ways around Supreme Court

File this story under checks and balances. 2301s are studying the separated powers this week, and how this separation is maintained by a system of checks and balances. As we will see, some of these are spelled out in the Constitution (the veto, overriding vetoes, Senate confirmation of appointments etc...), while others have evolved over time (judicial review, oversight, etc...).

In the spirit of the latter, here's a story about how Congress is attempting to get around recent Supreme Court decisions by rewriting laws - and proposing amendments - to explicitly, if not negate, temper the impact of those decisions:

Two years after the court drastically altered the landscape of campaign finance rules with its Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, some legislators are still trying to write new disclosure laws that comport with the ruling. Separately, a handful of senators are seeking to draw more attention to their proposed constitutional amendment explicitly allowing Congress to regulate campaign funding.

Another 2010 decision, Skilling v. United States , is also still reverberating in the Capitol. With the ruling having gutted an oft-used tool for prosecuting federal corruption cases, the House and Senate split last week on whether new anti-bribery language should be included in the STOCK Act, which seeks to ban insider trading by members.

Members of Congress argue - without explicitly saying so - that the dispute ultimately stems from the basic difference in the design of each institution:

A common theme for congressional critics of the court is that the nine justices don’t live in the real world, particularly when it comes to modern politics.

“I’m not sure they grasped the practical effects of the decision they were rendering,” Sen. Michael F. Bennet (D-Colo.), a co-sponsor of the constitutional amendment on campaign finance, suggested last week.

Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), the amendment’s lead author, complained: “None of the Supreme Court justices have run for office in this system. I don’t think they understand.”
The last sentence is especially telling - they don't have to run for office for the explicit reason that they are not intended to be tied into any external constituency. They are free to interpret the laws and the Constitution as they see fit. And then there's this:

“This is saying to the court: ‘We are going to regulate and legislate on campaign finance. We are taking it back,’ ” Udall said.
While this story focuses on current disputes, this type of conflict is actually quite common throughout US history. In fact the first amendment added to the Constitution after the Bill of Rights - the 11th Amendment -  was written following an unpopular Supreme Court decision. So there's nothing truly new here, but it does point out the flexible nature of the checks and balances.

From the National Journal: The End of Campaign Finance Reform? Wednesday's Supreme Court ruling is limited, but could lead to further rollbacks in regulations.

More fallout from McCutcheon:

- Click here for the article.

Despite the hype, the impact of the Supreme Court's decision striking down aggregate donation limits Wednesday is limited. The ruling doesn't mean that people can give unlimited amounts of money to candidates; it means a small pool of well-heeled donors can simply dole out donations to more candidates and party committees.

But campaign finance reform advocates are getting increasingly nervous over the longer-term impact of the Court's McCutcheon v. FEC decision, bolstered by other recent rulings on the subject. Experts see the possibility of a future battle over a more consequential subject: the decades-old cap on the amount an individual donor can give to a campaign.

Wednesday's 5-4 decision raised the possibility that the next step for those opposed to campaign finance regulations will be to contest the legality of individual donation limits, a bedrock principle of the current system. That such a move is even being discussed now is indicative of how much the courts have rewritten the laws governing money in politics.

Justices Strike Down Arizona Campaign Finance Law

Again, from the NYT. More limits on campaign finance laws:

In its first campaign-finance decision since its 5-to-4 ruling in the Citizens United case last year, the Supreme Court on Monday struck down an Arizona law that provided escalating matching funds to candidates who accept public financing.

The vote was again 5 to 4, with the same five justices in the majority as in the Citizens United decision. The majority said the law violated the First Amendment rights of candidates who raise private money. Such candidates, the majority said, may be reluctant to spend money to speak if they know that it will give rise to counterspeech paid for by the government.

“Laws like Arizona’s matching funds provision that inhibit robust and wide-open political debate without sufficient justification cannot stand,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote for the majority.

What is a Mega Donor?

Definitions

- From Good Party:  

. . . an individual who makes extraordinarily large political donations to a candidate, political party, or organization. These donations are often in the millions of dollars and greatly exceed the legal limits of donations set by the Federal Election Commission. Megadonors are often major players in American politics, contributing immense amounts of money to influence the outcomes of elections and policy initiatives.

In recent years, the influence of Megadonors has come under increased scrutiny from reform-minded critics. These individuals are often wealthy business owners and corporate executives who have taken advantage of the lax campaign finance laws in the United States to make large donations to candidates and organizations that align with their political beliefs. The result is a system in which a few wealthy individuals have a disproportionate amount of influence over the political process.

Given the outsized influence of Megadonors, reformers have advocated for stricter campaign finance laws to limit the power of these individuals. These reforms include capping the amount of money that can be donated to candidates and organizations, increasing transparency and disclosure requirements, and introducing public financing of campaigns to help level the playing field. By limiting the influence of Megadonors and introducing more equitable campaign finance laws, reformers hope to create a more democratic and responsive political system.

__________

For more: 

- Issue One: Megadonors. 

- Open Secrets: Who are the Biggest Donors?

- Washington Post: Meet the mega-donors pumping millions into the 2022 midterms.

- Market Watch: Meet the 10 biggest megadonors for the 2022 midterm elections.

__________

Megadonors in Texas: 

- How two Texas megadonors have turbocharged the state’s far-right shift.

- GOP megadonor couple from Hill Country launch PAC for 2022 Texas elections.

- Right-wing megadonors paying big in Texas to replace GOP lawmakers with insurgent challengers.

- Texas' political mega-donors.

Interest Groups

What is an interest group?

An interest group, also called special interest group, advocacy group, or pressure group, any association of individuals or organizations, usually formally organized, that, on the basis of one or more shared concerns, attempts to influence public policy in its favour. All interest groups share a desire to affect government policy to benefit themselves or their causes. Their goal could be a policy that exclusively benefits group members or one segment of society (e.g., government subsidies for farmers) or a policy that advances a broader public purpose (e.g., improving air quality). - Britannica.

How do interest groups form?

Simple answer: Because there is enough of a shared incentive by a group of individuals to engage in collective action, that is to work together for a common goal. This isn't as easy as it seems. There is always an incentive for some to free ride.

Collective action problems exist when people have a disincentive to take action.[1] In his classic work, The Logic of Collective Action, economist Mancur Olson discussed the conditions under which collective actions problems would exist, and he noted that they were prevalent among organized interests. People tend not to act when the perceived benefit is insufficient to justify the costs associated with engaging in the action.

[For example] Why do some students elect to do little on a group project? The answer is that they likely prefer to do something else and realize they can receive the same grade as the rest of the group without contributing to the effort. This result is often termed the free rider problem, because some individuals can receive benefits (get a free ride) without helping to bear the cost.

How do interest groups get what they want?

There are a variety of strategies, here are the dominant ones.

- Public Relations: Interest groups have the need or the resources to strive for a favorable image and promote themselves and their policy preferences. One way is through advertising. They place advertisements on the television networks’ evening news shows in policymakers’ constituencies, such as Washington, DC, and New York, where opinion leaders will see them and in prominent newspapers, such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal. Even media outlets with tiny audiences may be suitable for advertisements. - Source.

- Campaign Finance: Campaign finance, also known as election finance or political donations, refers to the funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policy initiatives and referendums. Political parties, charitable organizations, and political action committees (in the United States) are vehicles used for fundraising for political purposes. "Political finance" is also popular terminology, and is used internationally for its comprehensiveness. Political donations to funds received by political parties from private sources for general administrative purposes. - Wikipedia.

- Electioneering: the activities that politicians and their supporters carry out in order to persuade people to vote for them or their political party in an election, for example making speeches and visiting voters.

- Lobbying: the act of an individual or group attempting to influence politicians. The term “lobbyist” is most frequently associated with legal firms whose goal is to influence politicians on behalf of their clients, who are often times private corporations and unions. Although corporations and unions are banned from directly donating to political campaigns, their workers and CEOs can give money to a lobbyist, who then donates to a campaign. Lobbyists are also notorious for offering politicians high­paying careers with their firm once politicians leave office. - Source.

- Agency Capture: In politics, regulatory capture (also agency capture and client politics) is a form of corruption of authority that occurs when a political entity, policymaker, or regulator is co-opted to serve the commercial, ideological, or political interests of a minor constituency, such as a particular geographic area, industry, profession, or ideological group.[1][2]

When regulatory capture occurs, a special interest is prioritized over the general interests of the public, leading to a net loss for society. The theory of client politics is related to that of rent-seeking and political failure; client politics "occurs when most or all of the benefits of a program go to some single, reasonably small interest (e.g., industry, profession, or locality) but most or all of the costs will be borne by a large number of people (for example, all taxpayers)" - Wikipedia.

Terminology:

- K Street
- interest groups
- interest group formation
- free rider problem
- grassroots
- astroturf
- pluralism
- hyper-pluralism
- power elite theory
- professional associations
- trade associations
- citizen groups
- iron triangles
- issue networks
- revolving door
- reverse lobbying
- lobbying

From the Texas Tribune: West Texas rancher pours $2 million into Sarah Stogner’s underdog campaign for statewide oil and gas board seat

For our look at the impact of money in Texas politics - in addition to clarifying how much of a democracy we actually are.

This should help us understand the continuing political power of ranchers in the state, and the degree to which their interests are served by the Texas Railroad Commission.

- Click here for the article. 

A West Texas rancher who has battled the Railroad Commission over abandoned oil wells on her property has poured $2 million into a dark-horse challenger for a seat on the commission, Sarah Stogner, as she looks to pull off a major upset in the May 24 Republican primary runoff.

It is another striking twist in a race that Stogner, an oil and gas attorney, previously shook up in the primary when she released a campaign ad of herself riding a pumpjack nearly naked.

Ashley Watt, who owns a 75,000-acre ranch in the Permian Basin where Stogner currently lives, revealed to The Texas Tribune that she has provided the seven-figure funding to Stogner, saying it will be disclosed on a campaign finance report that is expected to be released Tuesday. The money is helping bankroll a substantial TV ad buy in the final two weeks before Stogner faces the commission’s chair, Wayne Christian, in the runoff.

“I am not a political person. I don't really care about politics,” Watt said in a statement. “But when an old Chevron oil well blew out radioactive brine water into my drinking water aquifer, ruining my ranch and forcing me to sell my entire cattle herd, the Railroad Commission teamed up with Chevron to work against me.

“I’m tired of fake conservatives like Wayne Christian trampling on Texans’ private property rights, while lining their pockets with poorly disguised bribes,” Watt added.

Stogner and Watt are friends. Stogner said they connected last year on Twitter and then Watt hired her as a lawyer. Stogner has been living on Watt’s ranch in Crane County after going through a marital separation.

Stogner said Watt approached her in recent weeks and said she had done some polling — unbeknownst to Stogner — that showed she had a shot in the runoff. It was a dilemma for Stogner, who had been self-funding her campaign and proudly swearing off donations. But she said Watt eventually convinced her to “get your ego out of the way” and accept the money to have a good chance to win.

I thought the following words and phrases relate to textbook info: 

- Railroad Commission

- $2 million into a dark-horse challenger for a seat on the commission

- May 24 Republican primary runoff.

- oil and gas attorney

- Ashley Watt, who owns a 75,000-acre ranch in the Permian Basin

- disclosed on a campaign finance report

- bankroll a substantial TV ad buy in the final two weeks

- the commission’s chair, Wayne Christian

- Chevron oil well

- Railroad Commission teamed up with Chevron

- fake conservatives like Wayne Christian

- private property rights

- poorly disguised bribes

- she had done some polling that showed she had a shot in the runoff

- self-funding her campaign and proudly swearing off donations

- not taking money from the industry I’m going to regulate

- the commission . . . regulates the oil and gas industry in Texas

- Christian as too cozy with the industry

- Christian’s campaign . . . calling her a Democrat trying to fool GOP voters

- “not a straight-ticket voter.”

- the biggest checks that Gov. Greg Abbott — a fundraising powerhouse — tends to receive are $1 million each.

- TV ads

- “the liberal anti-oil politicians — and the woke corporations bankrolling them.” The 30-second spot concludes by billing her as a “tough conservative mama.”

- abandoned wells

- Stogner has argued Chevron has not done enough to remedy the situation and the Railroad Commission, which is notoriously close to the industry, is not holding the company accountable by enforcing existing laws.

Buckey v. Valeo etc....

Wikipedia: Political Campaign.

Open Secrets: Money-in-Politics Timeline.

Wikipedia: Campaign finance reform in the United States.

Wikipedia: Watergate scandal.

New York Times: An Explanation: How Money That Financed Watergate Was Raised and Distributed.

Constitutional Rights Foundation: The Watergate Scandal.

Wikipedia: Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971.

Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974.

- Congress.gov: H.R.16090 - Federal Election Campaign Act Amendments.

- The Campaign Finance Institute.

The Federal Election Commission.

- Federal Register.

- Homepage.

- Wikipedia.

Original Provisions of the FECA

- Wikipedia.

Current Contribution Limits.

- Federal Election Commission.

Buckley v Valeo

- Federal Election Commission.

- Oyez.

- Wikipedia. 

Plaintiffs: 

- James L. Buckley.
- a candidate for the Presidency of the United States
- a United States Senator who is a candidate for reelection
- a potential contributor
- the Committee for a Constitutional Presidency -- McCarthy '76
- the Conservative Party of the State of New York
- the Mississippi Republican Party
- the Libertarian Party
- the New York Civil Liberties Union, Inc.
- the American Conservative Union
- the Conservative Victory Fund
- and Human Events, Inc.

Defendants: 

- Secretary of the Senate Francis Valeo in his capacity as a member of the FEC.
- the Secretary of the United States Senate
- the Clerk of the United States House of Representatives
- the Federal Election Commission
- the Attorney General of the United States
- the Comptroller General of the United States.



Wikipedia: Per Curiam Opinion. 

What is the Federal Election Commission?

From Wikipedia: Federal Election Commission. 

. . . an independent agency of the United States government that enforces U.S. campaign finance laws and oversees U.S. federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Campaign Act,[3] the commission describes its duties as "to disclose campaign finance information, to enforce the provisions of the law such as the limits and prohibitions on contributions, and to oversee the public funding of Presidential elections." It is led by six commissioners who are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate.

From Wikipedia: Federal Election Campaign Act.

. . . the primary United States federal law regulating political campaign fundraising and spending. The law originally focused on creating limits for campaign spending on communication media, adding additional penalties to the criminal code for election law violations, and imposing disclosure requirements for federal political campaigns. The Act was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on February 7, 1972.

Click here for the FEC website.

Click here for contribution limits.

What is an independent agency of the United States government?

The First Amendment v. Campaign Regulations

The Supreme Court has been veering towards eliminating most restrictions on campaign finance. This illustrates a variety of subjects we've covered in both 2301 and 2302.

From the National Journal:

For years, First Amendment champions have argued that all campaign finance rules tread on free speech and that American elections should be completely deregulated.

It's a sweeping premise that Congress has long rejected in favor of ever-tighter political money limits. But thanks to a sharp right turn in the judiciary, from the Supreme Court on down, those who favor a world without rules may be about to get their wish.

The Supreme Court appears poised to reverse a century-old ban on direct campaign expenditures by corporations large and small. A federal appeals court has rejected Federal Election Commission rules that restrict spending by non-party political groups, such as so-called 527 organizations -- a move that the FEC is prepared to let stand. And two other cases challenging the existing limits on soft (unregulated) money and on independent campaign expenditures are wending their way up to the Supreme Court . . .

Relevant topics include:

- Checks and Balances - the Supreme Court seems set to over turn legislation dating back 100 years (The Tillman Act of 1970)
- Civil Liberties - how do we define free speech? do corporations have free speech rights?
- Interest group influence on the democratic process - can democracy survive a public sector dominated by corporate interests
- Judicial Activism - is the Supreme Court acting within its proper boundaries or is it aggressively imposing its view of proper public policy on the other institutions.