Money in Politics This Week

Every Friday, the Brennan Center will be compiling the latest news concerning the corrosive nature of money in New York State politics—and the ongoing need for public financing and robust campaign finance reform. We’ll also be linking to dispatches from around the country highlighting the national scope of this crisis. This week’s links were contributed by Robert Friedman.

For more stories on an ongoing basis, follow the Twitter hashtags #moNeYpolitics and #fairelex.

New York Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. Numerous outlets reported that Citizen Action and other groups organized a grassroots door-to-door communication effort last Saturday, speaking with voters in the districts of eight state senators who have been slow to embrace new legislation to establish public financing and comprehensive campaign finance reform in New York State.  The groups vowed to make campaign finance reform a key issue in the 2013 state-wide elections if Albany does not enact a bill in the current legislative session.

2. On the eve of the door-to-door effort to communicate to voters the importance of campaign finance reform, Citizen Action’s Jesse Laymon urged New Yorkers to continue to press for passage of a bill, which would have the state match contributions under $250 at a six-to-one ratio, before the end of this year’s legislative session.  In an interview on YNN, Laymon stated that the support of only half a dozen more state senators is needed to make reform legislation a reality.

3. The Democrat and Chronicle reports on Governor Cuomo’s role in the campaign finance reform effort, as well as his current fundraising activities.  Citizens’ groups and legislators are urging Cuomo to continue to follow up on his publicly expressed distaste for the status quo, his success in fundraising under the current laws notwithstanding.  “He’s playing by the present rules, and he’s doing well under these rules,” said Lawrence Norden, deputy director of the Brennan Center for Justice.  “And he’s saying these rules are bad for New York, and we should change these rules.”

National Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. Is the U.S. Supreme Court ready to reconsider Citizens United?  The Montana Supreme Court recently upheld a state ban on corporate political spending, even though plaintiffs argued the ban is unconstitutional under Citizens United.  The Montana ruling was then stayed by the U.S. Supreme Court, which is now deciding whether to put the case on for a full public hearing. Senators John McCain and Sheldon Whitehouse formed a bipartisan alliance and submitted a friend of the court brief urging the Supreme Court to uphold Montana’s ban on corporate spending.  The McCain-Whitehouse brief, which echoes many of the points made in the Brennan Center’s brief, notes the considerable problems stemming from unlimited corporate expenditures: “Evidence from the 2010 and 2012 electoral cycles has demonstrated that so-called independent expenditures create a strong potential for corruption and the appearance thereof. . . . The news confirms, daily, that existing campaign finance rules purporting to provide for ‘independence’ and ‘disclosure’ in fact provide neither.”  Over ten groups have filed a friend of the court brief so far, including one filed in support of the Montana law by twenty-two states and the District of Columbia.

2. Proponents of reform are taking strong and creative steps to combat the specter surrounding corporate expenditures.  Already this year, investors have filed resolutions with over 100 companies that, if adopted, would require disclosure of funds used for political advocacy, according to a Chicago Tribune article.  Pressure from investors has also led 43 companies to voluntarily release some information.  At the federal level, advocacy groups have petitioned the Securities Exchange Commission to promulgate a rule that mandates disclosures, and the potential regulations have generated more than 285,000 comments. 

3. Wasteful government contracts continue to be tied to lobbying and campaign contributions.  The New York Times reports that Representative Harold Rogers inserted a provision into a spending bill that secured contracts for a helicopter-parts manufacturer that produces parts at eight times the price of competitors.  Unsurprisingly, the manufacturer, Phoenix Products, has spent $600,000 on lobbying since 2005, and its owners are frequent contributors to Representative Rogers’s political committee.

4. Super PACs provide a vehicle for unlimited spending without political accountability, and political operatives are reveling in the opportunities these new campaigning weapons create, according to an article in The New York Times.  Highlighting how super PACs enable a small group of donors to hold disproportionate influence, one strategist noted that a super PAC supporting former presidential candidate John Huntsman raised more money with only 20 to 30 donors than Huntsman’s own campaign was able to raise altogether.

5. While Citizens United opened the door for corporations and unions to contribute unlimited funds to support a candidate, it has largely been wealthy individuals that have walked through.  Publicity concerns may make public corporations hesitant to engage in partisan fights, but the prospect has yet to deter individuals from spending massive amounts of money to ensure the election of their preferred candidates, Roll Call reports.  From North Carolina to Colorado, aspiring politicians thought to lack a substantial chance at securing a victory have won primaries thanks, in large part, to the backing of a single, free-spending supporter.

Money in Politics This Week

Every Friday, the Brennan Center will be compiling the latest news concerning the corrosive nature of money in New York State politics—and the ongoing need for public financing and robust campaign finance reform. We’ll also be linking to dispatches from around the country highlighting the national scope of this crisis. This week’s links were contributed by Robert Friedman.

For more stories on an ongoing basis, follow the Twitter hashtags #moNeYpolitics and #fairelex.

New York Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. WYNC touts the findings from the new joint report by the Brennan Center and the Campaign Finance Institute, Donor Diversity Through Public Matching Funds. A significantly greater number of small donors contributed to campaigns in New York City, which matches donations of less than $175 at a six-to-one ratio, than contributed to state-level elections, where no matching exists. The results also evidence greater participation by minorities and low-income individuals under New York City’s public matching fund system. The report notes the ongoing campaign to institute a similar system for New York State elections, suggesting that small donor public financing could increase the diversity of the donor base for state elections.

2. Super PACs are already dominating this federal election cycle, and an article from Crain’s New York Business suggests they may play a major role in New York City elections as well. "There will be super PACs," said New York Republican State Committee Chairman Ed Cox. "It's impossible not to have them. They're a part of the process now." Such organizations could put unlimited dollars behind policy issues or mayoral candidates, according to some sources. Nonetheless, heightened disclosure requirements and a vigilant city Campaign Finance Board, according to the Board’s former general counsel, Laurence Laufer, may mean that these organizations work within greater restraints in New York City than at the federal level.

3. After more than a decade of accusations of misusing public funds, the law has finally caught up with the former New York State Senator Pedro Espada. A federal jury convicted Espada of four counts of theft, and he now faces up to forty years in prison. The charges stemmed from Espada’s unlawful use of over $400,000 belonging to a health clinic he helped found in 1978. Espada became known statewide in 2009 after taking part in a coup against party leadership shortly after the Democrats gained a narrow majority in the Senate. Two other Senators involved in that political turmoil – Hiram Monserrate and Carl Kruger – recently pleaded guilty to separate corruption charges.

National Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. The Federal Elections Commission continues to press Congress to extend the ban on using campaign funds for personal use, according to The Hill. The ban currently covers candidates and candidate committees, but the FEC is urging Congress to extend it to reach campaign funds held by all political committees, including Leadership PACs and party committees. The Department of Justice has echoed the FEC’s concern, noting a “dramatic rise” of theft of funds intended for use in a campaign. To date, Congress has not taken action to respond to the FEC’s recommendation.

2. An op-ed published in The Columbus Dispatch examines the distaste for Citizens United expressed on both sides of the political aisle. Particularly troublesome to congressional representatives is the lack of transparency, and both Republicans and Democrats interviewed cited the need for increased disclosure. “There are national groups dropping in and out of communities without it being clear as to their interests,” said Rep. Mike Turner, a Dayton, Ohio Republican.

3. Proponents of increased disclosure of campaign contributions and curbing rampant spending in politics won a victory this week. Last month, in Van Hollen v. FEC, the District Court for the District of Columbia struck down FEC rules that undermined a federal law requiring organizations that make electioneering communications to disclose their major donors. The Huffington Post reports on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals’ recent decision denying a stay of the District Court’s judgment.  While the FEC chose not to appeal the initial ruling, two private groups intervened to seek a stay. The Court of Appeals rejected their request two to one.

4. Some suggest that secretive spenders will find loopholes to exploit even after the Van Hollen decision. In an article on Slate, Richard Hasen argues that mandated disclosure for “electioneering communications,” which stop short of urging listeners and watchers to vote for a particular candidate, could lead to an increase in “independent expenditures,” which do expressly encourage voting for or against a certain candidate. While this express advocacy could cause the groups to lose tax-exempt status, Hasen notes that the FEC’s thin history of enforcement may lead to groups taking that risk. Another possibility Hasen flags is that the Supreme Court could hear the case, leading to a potential stay of the new disclosure requirements.

Money in Politics This Week

Every Friday, the Brennan Center will be compiling the latest news concerning the corrosive nature of money in New York State politics—and the ongoing need for public financing and robust campaign finance reform. We’ll also be linking to dispatches from around the country highlighting the national scope of this crisis. This week’s links were contributed by Matthew Ladd.

For more stories on an ongoing basis, follow the Twitter hashtag #moNeYpolitics and #fairelex.

New York Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries reiterated his strong support for public campaign finance in an interview on MSNBC this week, urging fellow state lawmakers to pass the Fair Elections Act before the end of the legislative session. Jeffries noted that Gov. Cuomo’s backing will be crucial to the success of the Fair Elections Act: “We need his leadership on this issue, and I’m convinced if he decides to lead and move this forward, we can get meaningful campaign finance reform in New York State.”

2. A new report issued by the Center for Working Families examines how money in politics led taxpayers to foot the bill for the new Yankee Stadium. In 2006 Yankees ownership paid over $300,000 to a lobbying firm run by former Bronx Assemblyman Roberto Ramirez—the largest lobbying fee reported that year—as well as other influential lawmakers including former state senator Joseph Bruno, in an apparent effort to secure funding for the stadium. The report highlights the financing of Yankee Stadium as a case study in the high-stakes influence-peddling permitted by New York’s current campaign finance regime.

3. The Democrat and Chronicle strongly urged Gov. Cuomo to stand behind his promise to prioritize campaign finance reform, recalling a 2010 campaign publication in which Cuomo called on state legislators to “fundamentally alter our system to give voices to all New Yorkers” by creating a small-donor matching program for publicly funded campaigns. Bills that would create such a program have been introduced in the Assembly, but Cuomo’s support is widely seen as instrumental in moving campaign finance reform through the Senate.

National Campaign Finance News

1. A new poll jointly released on Thursday by Democracy Corps, Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, and the Public Campaign Action Fund finds that swing voters are likely to support candidates who make campaign finance reform a priority in their legislative agendas. Key findings from the poll suggest that ordinary voters see money in politics as a key economic issue, and that reform alternatives—including small-donor matching programs—have garnered wide support among the voting public. Over a third of the voters polled said that they considered candidates’ willingness to make campaign finance reform a legislative priority as a litmus test for their support. According to David Donnelly, Executive Director of PCAF, “Money and politics is increasingly becoming a ballot box issue. An overwhelming majority of Americans believe there should be common sense restrictions on the amount of money people can contribute to politics and voters—especially independents—will strongly support those who take the issue head-on.” The polling memo can be downloaded here, and individual slides from the poll can be downloaded as well.

2. The results of Thursday’s poll generated articles this week from The Hill, National Journal, and Mother Jones, among other media outlets, some of which noted the poll’s findings that campaign finance reform is supported by a broad swath of the American electorate. Nearly 75% of respondents, for instance, expressed support for limiting the amount of money in politics—a number that included 60% of voters who identify with the Tea Party movement. As Greenberg Quinlan Rosner CEO Stan Greenberg noted, “There aren’t many things we’ve tested that are viewed as negatively as super PACs.” Moreover, less than a quarter of those polled found that limits on campaign contributions interfere with free speech rights.

3. On Sunday, the New York Times editorial board called for the resuscitation of the flagging presidential public financing program. The editorial notes that this will be the first presidential election since the program’s inception in 1976 that neither major-party candidate draws on public funds. Public funding of elections is crucial to the legitimacy of the electoral process: “The era of “super PACs” and secret donors has made public financing more urgent. A system that greatly magnified small donations with high matches would give ordinary citizens a shot at competing with corporations, unions and wealthy donors. It would allow candidates to campaign more instead of constantly begging among the rich. And it would give a challenger a chance to be competitive without the help of a super PAC.

4. The Washington Times reports this week that presidential fundraising efforts this summer cannot afford to overlook the importance of the small donor. Mitt Romney in particular will have to do much more to court small voters, according to Prof. Michael Malbin, Executive Director of the Campaign Finance Institute. Malbin’s analysis of the Romney campaign filings indicates that 64% of the presumptive Republican candidate’s total funds came from donors giving the maximum legal amount of $2500.

5. The Sunlight Foundation reports that former Sen. Richard Lugar’s defeat earlier this week was influenced by outside PAC spending in favor of his challenger, conservative state treasurer Richard Mourdock—including over $2 million from the anti-tax Club for Growth. Although Lugar outspent Mourdock by a 3-to-1 margin, the state treasurer was backed by a “flood of outside money” from PACs and super PACs, as well as from 501(c)(4) “social welfare” groups not subject to FEC disclosure requirements.

6. In a clear indication of the revolving-door nature of Super PACs, ABC News reports that now that Rick Santorum is no longer a candidate for public office, the “Red, White, and Blue Fund” super PAC that spent on his behalf during the race has become a “hybrid PAC” with which Santorum can freely coordinate. The hybrid PAC can also fund some of the costs of Santorum’s ongoing political activity—expenditures that are technically legal, since Santorum currently holds no office and is no longer running a campaign.

7. This week the disclosure website Open Secrets, a collaboration between the Center for Responsive Politics and Center for Public Integrity, published new information on presidential campaign bundlers for the both the Democratic and Republican campaigns.

Overvotes: Phantoms of the Ballot Box

The New York State Board of Elections, New York City Boards of Elections, and voting machine manufacturer ES&S each released reports yesterday detailing the results of an investigation into the abnormally high numbers of lost votes attributed to “overvoting” in the South Bronx in 2010. The upshot is that a machine defect led to “phantom votes” on at least one machine used in the 2010 election, resulting in some candidates receiving more votes than they should have, and the choices of many more voters being voided when the machines detected both actual and phantom votes in the same contest. Now that the reports on how this happened are out, election officials must make sure that what happened in the Bronx in 2010 does not happen again in the future.

Voting machines record overvotes when they detect more than one candidate selected for a contest. In such cases, no vote is recorded for any candidate in the overvoted contest, regardless of the voter’s actual intent. The Brennan Center first uncovered a high number of overvotes in the South Bronx while reviewing documents produced for discovery in a litigation it brought against the State and City. It published its findings in Design Deficiencies and Lost Votes; the report notes that in some election districts up to 40% of the votes cast did not count.

The investigations conducted by the City, State and ES&S conclude that the unusually high overvote rates were not due to voter error, but rather a malfunction in the voting machine once it became heated after a couple hours of use.  The malfunction resulted in a distortion of the ballot images as read by the machines, causing blank ovals to appear darker than they should have. The machines registered these darker images as votes. These “phantom votes,” either led to some candidates getting extra votes (if no candidate had been chosen by a voter) or overvotes (if the voter had filled out a different oval for another candidate in the same contest). 

While the machines in New York provide voters with a warning when ballots cannot be read because of overvoting, the warning used complex election jargon that gave voters misleading cues about their options. Voters in these predominantly Hispanic South Bronx districts apparently chose to override this message without understanding the result was that their votes were not counted. Fortunately, as part of a settlement agreement reached with the State, New York’s voting machines will be reprogrammed before the presidential election in November with an overvote warning message that uses plain language that more clearly explains to voters if the machine is having problems reading their ballot.

We applaud the State and City Boards for conducting a thorough investigation of this matter. The State Board of Elections has forwarded their report to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission so that it can be distributed to other jurisdictions across the country using the ES&S DS-200.

However, more steps need to be taken to prevent lost votes in the future by detecting these problems when they arise. Election officials in New York should publish election results by precinct and report the number of overvotes in each contest. Rockland County already does this. The only reason the Brennan Center was able to discover this anomaly was by reviewing documents obtained in the course of litigation. Had we not done so, the problems in the South Bronx would have likely gone undetected and the machines would continue to be used election after election. It should also be noted that we did not receive complete data from New York City or from other jurisdictions in the state that use the DS-200. As a result, there is no way of knowing where else these kinds of problems may have happened. 

Money in Politics This Week

Every Friday, the Brennan Center will be compiling the latest news concerning the corrosive nature of money in New York State politics—and the ongoing need for public financing and robust campaign finance reform. We’ll also be linking to dispatches from around the country highlighting the national scope of this crisis. This week’s links were contributed by Matthew Ladd.

For more stories on an ongoing basis, follow the Twitter hashtag #moNeYpolitics and #fairelex.

New York Campaign Finance and Ethics News

1. In a radio interview this week, Gov. Cuomo renewed the call for statewide campaign finance reform, decrying the corrosive effect that super PACs and high contribution limits continue to have on electoral politics in Albany. “The power of money in the Capitol is unbelievable,” Gov. Cuomo said. Cuomo has pledged to implement a public financing system similar to New York City’s small donor matching program, as well as to improve enforcement of state campaign finance laws, close campaign finance loopholes and lower contribution limits.

2. The debate over public financing has begun in the state Senate, with the introduction of new legislation by Senator Eric Adams, which would establish a public financing program, create an independent enforcement counsel in the State Board of Elections, lower contribution limits and improve disclosure of independent political spending.  At a press conference called by Senate Democrats, Senate Democratic Leader John Sampson told reporters that public campaign finance would dilute the influence of moneyed interests and enhance the power of small donors. Sen. Tom Duane added that Gov. Cuomo’s support is crucial for a bill’s passage, observing that the governor’s track record on marriage reform and pension benefits is clear evidence that “when he puts his mind to something, he can win.”

3. Reform groups including Citizen Action New York gathered in Albany on Monday to protest the outsized influence of the natural gas industry on the state legislature’s approach to hydrofracking, noting that the industry has contributed more than $1.3 million to state legislators in an effort to buy support for the controversial practice. Sierra Club representative Robert Ciesielski cited a study by Common Cause that the governor of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, had received over $1.6 million in political donations from the industry—a figure that, given the current state of New York’s campaign finance laws, lobbyists in Albany could well surpass.

4. On Wednesday, Fair Elections for New York held a screening in Albany of “Pricele$$,” a new documentary on the influence of money in politics that includes interviews with former Gov. Mario Cuomo and former U.S. Representative Dan Maffei (D—NY), who is currently running for the seat he lost in 2010. Filmmaker Steve Cowan posted full transcripts of his interviews with Cuomo and Maffei on the film’s website, which include Maffei’s observation he supports public campaign finance “because it means the only people we’ll have to worry about in our day are the taxpayers and constituents in our district, and that’s what we’re supposed to do.”

National Campaign Finance News

1. President Obama’s two most recent fundraising efforts have added at least $2 million to his campaign’s war chest, adding fuel to predictions that 2012 will be the costliest presidential race in U.S. history. The two fundraisers, in which contributors paid $40,000 a plate, are the latest in over 100 campaign fundraisers the president has held since early last year.

2. Nate Silver writes in the New York Times, however, that small contributions ($200 or less) still make up over half of the president’s total contributions during the current election cycle, in contrast to a mere 13% of Mitt Romney’s campaign contributions. Silver notes that in the current era of super PACs and big-ticket fundraisers, the dearth of small contributions does not indicate a weak campaign budget so much as it suggests a lack of support among grassroots Republican voters.

3. In an effort to draw attention to the coercive effects of Super PAC spending on the political process, two leading reform advocates have chosen an unusual strategy: creating a “hybrid” PAC and super PAC whose aim is to remind voters “that money and politics remains an issue in the campaign, and that we have the option of creating political accountability around it.” The announcement came just days before a new report by the Annenberg Center revealed that “Restore Our Future,” the super PAC supporting Mitt Romney’s election campaign, has spend $20 million in deceptive advertisements in early primary and caucus states.

4. Ciara Torres-Spelliscy notes in the Huffington Post that, in a victory for campaign finance disclosure, the FCC has decided to make public broadcasters’ records of how much they charge political candidates or committees for advertisements. The disclosure of these so-called “political files” allows voters to see whether broadcasters in TV or other media are charging some candidates more than others—a potential violation of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. The FCC’s rule, Torres-Spelliscy notes, is in stark contrast to the SEC’s foot-dragging over a recent call for disclosure of the political contributions of publicly traded companies.

5. Redistricting in California’s 53 congressional districts has set off a wave of hyper-partisan fundraising by super PACs, as both parties see California races as crucial to winning a majority in the U.S. House this fall. Super PACs such as American Crossroads, partly managed by Karl Rove, and the GOP Congressional Leadership Fund, to which billionaire Sheldon Adelson has contributed $5 million, are expected to play a leading role. Bill Allison, editorial director of the nonpartisan watchdog organization Sunlight Foundation, predicted that “After the election, it is these donors who will have access and entree to Congress at a level that will be unbelievable compared to what we’ve seen before.”