National: Hillary Clinton Unveils Campaign-Finance Plan | Wall Street Journal

Hillary Clinton is rolling out a policy plan Tuesday aimed at lifting the veil on some of the wealthy donors who have bankrolled political campaigns while taking advantage of laws that allow them to remain anonymous. Mrs. Clinton, who along with her husband has been among the most prodigious fundraisers in U.S. history, is also proposing ways to give candidates more incentives to collect money from small donors. Since entering the race in April, Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner, has said she wants to impose new restraints on campaign spending to restore people’s confidence in the political system. Along with her top rival for the Democratic nomination, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, she has taken aim at a 2010 Supreme Court ruling that gave rise to political-action committees known as super PACs, which are permitted to raise unlimited sums of money on behalf of candidates.

California: A new way to track political money in California | Los Angeles Times

Californians will have an easier time determining who is giving money to political candidates and causes starting Thursday, when a new tool becomes available on the secretary of state’s website. The antiquated CalAccess system, which shows political donations and lobbying information on the site, is clunky and difficult to use, especially for searching and sorting the data. A new search engine has been added to help users see more fully and easily, for example, the money received by candidates and ballot-measure campaigns. It will also be easier to see where industries and other special interests are concentrating their money.

New Mexico: Secretary of state accused of fraud, money laundering | Albuquerque Journal

Secretary of State Dianna Duran was charged Friday in state District Court with fraud, embezzlement, money laundering and other crimes related to allegedly converting thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to her personal use in 2013 and 2014. At the same time, it appears she was frequenting casinos across the state and withdrawing hundreds of thousands of dollars at them from accounts in her name. Democratic Attorney General Hector Balderas alleged 64 violations in a criminal complaint and information that said Duran shifted money between campaign and personal accounts and withdrew sums at eight casinos. Duran is a Republican in her second term; she was elected in 2010 and re-elected last year. The secretary of state, who oversees elections and campaign finance, has the role of state government ethics regulator.

Editorials: Dumbing Down American Politics: Lawrence Lessig and the Presidency | Thomas E. Mann/Institute of Governmental Studies – UC Berkeley

Donald Trump and the Amen chorus of Republican presidential aspirants may have appeared to monopolize the capacity to make fantastical claims about what’s wrong with America and how to fix it. But a rival has appeared on the scene, outlining a very different fantasy plan to run for president on the Democratic side of the aisle. Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig looks meek — a dead ringer for Mr. Peepers – yet is anything but. Lessig built an impressive career in legal scholarship on the regulation of cyberspace, and the mild-mannered, soft-spoken academic became a cult hero among libertarians fearful of increasing legal restrictions on copyright, trademark and the electromagnetic spectrum. But Lessig’s transformation into a political activist was spurred by his personal revelation that money in politics is the root of all our governing problems. Eliminate the dependence of elected officials on private donors and the formidable obstacles to constructive policymaking will crumble. Simple but searing truth, or a caricature of a complex governing system shaped by institutions, ideas/ideologies, and interests?

National: Mega-donors extend ‘shelf life’ of struggling 2016 hopefuls | AFP

Chris Christie and Rick Perry may have stalled in the US presidential race but they could struggle on to the first primary votes, thanks to the mega-donors keeping their campaigns afloat. But in American politics a few generous donors can keep a sputtering campaign alive, even when the political winds fail to fill a candidate’s sails. “This is the bring-your-own-billionaire election,” Chris Gates, president of the Sunlight Foundation, a non-partisan, pro-transparency group that is tracking 2016 campaign finance, told AFP on Monday. “It does allow them to hang on,” he said of the largesse. “It extends the shelf life of candidates who may not be creating any buzz or fire in the electorate.”

National: Billionaires crowd out the bundlers in White House race | USA Today

During the 2012 presidential campaign, Montana lumber company owner Sherm Anderson found it “fairly easy” to help raise $2 million from his fellow Republicans to boost Mitt Romney’s presidential hopes. Anderson expects a far tougher road in 2016, given the growing dominance of super PACs and other outside groups that are amassing millions in political contributions from a small cluster of the nation’s richest individuals. “It turns small contributors off,” Anderson said. “They say, ‘Gee whiz, I thought I was helping by giving $100 or $1,000, but how can I help when someone else is giving $100,000?’ These super PACs are definitely changing the dynamic,” he said.

Editorials: The McCain-Feingold Act May Doom Itself | Richard Hasen/National Law Journal

Did the congressional drafters of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law build within it the seeds for its own destruction? Tucked within the Bipartisan Cam­paign Reform Act (the formal name for “McCain-Feingold”) is a provision requiring that certain constitutional challenges to the law be heard by a three-judge court, with direct appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. This special jurisdictional provision makes it much more likely that within the next few years the Supreme Court will strike limits on the amounts people and entities can contribute to the political parties in so-called party soft money. If the court does so, it would be knocking down the second of McCain-Feingold’s two pillars. The court knocked down the first pillar—the limits on corporate and union spending—in the 2010 case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

California: Follow the money? It’s not always so easy | Los Angeles Times

During a hotly contested race this year to replace Los Angeles City Councilman Tom LaBonge, three apartment rental companies that listed the same chief executive and same address in state records each contributed the maximum donation allowed to candidate Carolyn Ramsay. Such a cluster of giving can trigger the suspicion of watchdog groups and city investigators, because if the money is coming from the same business owners, it can exceed legal limits on donations from one source. Campaign finance experts say the key question is whether the money is coming from the same source. But the answer is unclear. Publicly available campaign and business records don’t spell out who owns the companies. The companies’ chief executive did not respond to repeated emails, phone calls and letters seeking information on the firms and the donations.

Connecticut: Advocates Call On Democratic Party To Drop Lawsuit, Comply With Subpoena | CT News Junkie

Common Cause of Connecticut on Wednesday called upon the Connecticut Democratic Party to drop its challenge of the state’s clean election laws. The lawsuit served Tuesday is the second since the start of the 10-month investigation into mailings the party did on behalf of Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy during the 2014 election cycle. The Democratic Party believes federal law trumps state law when it comes to the mailings, but the State Elections Enforcement Commission told the Federal Elections Commission in October 2014 that it would be wrong for federal regulators to assume they have jurisdiction over the mailing because it “glibly” includes “a stray get-out-the-vote message.” However, a draft decision by the FEC shows that it was poised in October to rule against the Connecticut Democratic Party. But the party withdrew its request for the ruling before it could be issued and went ahead and sent the mailings to prospective voters anyway shortly before the election.

Editorials: A wealthy oligarchy of donors is dominating the 2016 election | The Washington Post

The United States may be turning a corner in presidential politics. Although the election itself is more than a year away, the latest reports to the Federal Election Commission show that a wealthy oligarchy of donors has come to dominate campaign finance, particularly in the crowded Republican contest. Fewer than 400 families are responsible for almost half the money raised in the campaign so far, according to an analysis by the New York Times. This class of wealthy patrons, some with new fortunes and others of long-standing, is throwing money into campaigns, not of all which will end happily. But the preeminence of this clan of tycoons so early in the season is not a good sign.

Maine: Anti-gay marriage group must disclose donors | Associated Press

Maine’s highest court on Tuesday rejected a national anti-gay marriage group’s latest bid to shield the identities of the donors who contributed to its effort to defeat the state’s gay marriage law in 2009. The National Organization for Marriage had sought permission to delay submitting a campaign finance report that the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices ordered it to file last year when it fined the group $50,250 for its involvement in overturning the law supporting same-sex marriage six years ago. But the Maine Supreme Judicial Court said Tuesday that NOM can’t put off filing the report and revealing its donor list until after the court considers the group’s challenge of the commission’s ruling because the justices said it’s unlikely that the Washington D.C.-based organization will win its appeal.

Editorials: John Doe Decision – After Doe investigations, a chance for sensible reform | Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

A 4-2 state Supreme Court decision last month ended a controversial investigation into coordination between Gov. Scott Walker’s recall election campaign and conservative groups and left a broad swath of Wisconsin’s long-standing campaign finance law unconstitutional. The court’s decision halted the second of two criminal investigations into Walker led by Milwaukee County prosecutors using the state’s powerful “John Doe” statutes. The first led to the convictions of six Walker aides, associates or appointees but the second was stalled by litigation for more than a year amid bitter complaints from conservatives about prosecutors’ tactics and theory of law. Even if the final chapter of these investigations is now at hand, many questions remain. Among the most important: Should two of the justices whose campaigns received heavy support from the groups under investigation and involved as litigants before the court have heard the cases?

National: New ‘super PACs’ help 2016 mega-donors customize their political clout | Los Angeles Times

For discerning, super-wealthy donors looking for a distinctive way to advertise clout, the 2016 presidential election offers a new perk — their own specially tailored “super PAC.” Political professionals working on behalf of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and for former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, both Republicans, have set up multiple super PACs with nearly identical names, all in the interest of catering to the wishes of the well-heeled, particularly the moguls willing to write seven-figure checks. The idea is to convince these donors they will have a measure of control over how their money is spent. “Whether they have $5,000 or $5 million, they want to be able to participate in the process and give their thoughts and ideas,” said Austin Barbour, main strategist for the three super PACs backing Perry — all bearing the name Opportunity and Freedom.

Canada: Imminent federal election to be costliest, longest in recent Canadian history | Daily Courier

Stephen Harper is poised to fire the starting gun for the Oct. 19 federal election as early as Sunday. Sources say the prime minister is set to visit Gov. Gen. David Johnston within days, possibly as soon as Sunday, to formally dissolve Parliament and launch what will be the costliest and — at 11 weeks — one of the longest campaigns in Canadian history. Here are five things voters should know about Canada’s imminent 42nd general election campaign: Elections law requires a minimum campaign of 37 days. It does not impose a maximum length. Harper is choosing to make this the longest traditional campaign in Canadian history. Only the first two election campaigns after Confederation were longer — 81 days in 1867 and 96 days in 1872 — but in those early days voting was staggered across the country over a period of several months, necessarily extending the length of the campaigns. Since then, the longest campaign was 74 days, way back in 1926.

Canada: Conservatives likely to lengthen election campaign: sources | Reuters

Canada’s governing Conservatives are likely to lengthen this year’s election campaign by launching it in August, three senior party sources said, a move that would benefit the cash-rich party. Canadians go to the polls on Oct. 19. Given that campaigns must last at least 37 days, the latest date Prime Minister Stephen Harper could start this year’s would be Sept. 13. Five of the last six campaigns have run about that length. But the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Harper’s party already has its machinery in place and is expected to launch the campaign in August, possibly the first week. This would benefit the Conservatives, who last year changed a law that had imposed a maximum spending limit of around C$25 million ($19 million) on campaigns.

Wisconsin: Kevin Kennedy defends GAB against foes who ‘want to have more control’ | The Cap Times

Gov. Scott Walker has called for the dissolution of Wisconsin’s nonpartisan elections and campaign finance agency, but the Government Accountability Board’s director said that’s a “short-sighted” opinion. Kevin Kennedy also said in an interview on WKOW-TV’s “Capitol City Sunday” that recent suggestions that his agency teamed with the Internal Revenue Service to investigate conservative groups were “absolutely ridiculous.” The GAB has been the target of scorn from Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, who specifically has mentioned ousting Kennedy as a goal. Vos and other Republicans have been critical of the GAB’s role in the John Doe investigations into alleged campaign finance coordination between Walker’s 2012 recall campaign and an outside advocacy group.

National: Presidential Race Just Started? Not According to the Spending | The New York Times

Since late last year, presidential hopefuls have been romancing donors, hiring staff and haunting the diners and senior centers of Manchester and Dubuque. But on paper, most of the candidates spent virtually no money exploring a presidential bid until very recently. According to campaign disclosures filed with the Federal Election Commission last week, the much-promoted campaign staff they hired had other jobs. And their many, many trips to New Hampshire and Iowa had nothing to do with running for president. Such accounting — which the campaigns defended as perfectly appropriate but some election lawyers said violated the law — has allowed would-be candidates to spend months testing the presidential waters while saving cash to use later in the primaries.

Editorials: The Only Realistic Way to Fix Campaign Finance | Lawrence Lessig/New York Times

For the first time in modern history, the leading issue concerning voters in the upcoming presidential election, according to a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, is that “wealthy individuals and corporations will have too much influence over who wins.” Five years after the Supreme Court gave corporations and unions the right to spend unlimited amounts in political campaigns, voters have had enough. Republican candidates, including Chris Christie, Ted Cruz and Lindsey Graham, and the main Democratic candidates, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders, all acknowledge the problem, with some tying it to the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United, which unleashed virtually unlimited “independent” political spending. The solution proposed by some, notably Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Graham and Mr. Sanders, is amending the Constitution. It sounds appealing, but anyone who’s serious about reform should not buy it. For a presidential candidate, constitutional reform is fake reform. And no candidate who talks exclusively about amending the Constitution can be considered a credible reformer.

Editorials: Scott Walker’s Wisconsin and the End of Campaign-Finance Law | Lincoln Caplan/The New Yorker

When Scott Walker announced last week that he is running for President, he pledged to pursue a conservative agenda that will transfer power back to the states. “We need new, fresh leadership, leadership with big, bold ideas from outside of Washington,” Walker said. “The kind of leadership that knows how to get things done, like we’ve done here in Wisconsin.” A few days later, the conservative-dominated Wisconsin Supreme Court issued a decision that shows an important part of how he and his political allies have gotten things done. They have substituted the misrule of politics for the rule of law. By 4–2, with the four conservatives in the majority, a liberal and a moderate in dissent, and one justice recused, the court halted the John Doe criminal investigation into whether Walker’s successful campaign to retain his post in a 2012 recall election violated Wisconsin law, by coördinating fund-raising and spending with so-called “independent” dark-money groups, and avoiding disclosure of donors’ names. The court did so by rewriting the state law in question, so that the kind of coördination the campaign was being investigated for is now unrestricted in Wisconsin.

Editorials: New York’s Big Money Loophole | The New York Times

Nearly two decades ago, New York’s Board of Elections quietly created a gigantic loophole in the state’s campaign finance laws when it decided that limited liability companies were no different from people when it came to donations to candidates. Under state law, corporations are limited to political donations of $5,000 a year. But limited liability companies are allowed to donate $60,800 a year to any statewide candidate, just like individuals. The loophole has been an invitation to abuse. The most recent campaign filings in New York revealed that in the last six months, Gov. Andrew Cuomo received $1.4 million from L.L.C.s while Attorney General Eric Schneiderman got about $220,000. Both politicians have called for closing the loophole, which allows donors to set up numerous small, secretive companies often identified only by an address. For instance, 56th Realty, 80th Realty and 92nd Realty are three L.L.C.s listed at the same address, which is also the address of Glenwood Management, a powerful real estate company.

Voting Blogs: Campaign Finance and Issue Advocacy: The Fight About Wisconsin | More Soft Money Hard Law

The Wisconsin Supreme Court was badly divided on the “coordination” question that it resolved in favor ending an ongoing criminal investigation. The majority and dissents expressed their disagreement in harsh terms, and there was a similar outbreak of ill-will or impatience among experts and seasoned observers trading views on the election law list serv. Dividing the camps for the sake of convenience into progressives and conservatives: the former were appalled by the case and the latter overjoyed, and neither could believe how the other was reacting. The case was either a nightmare for desperately needed reform, or a vindication of the rule of law in a struggle with political persecution and police state tactics. But are the issues being fairly brought out amid all this vitriol, and is it necessarily true that the opinions on the coordination issues in Wisconsin must always and inevitably fall out along ideological and party lines?

Editorials: Little evidence suggests the GAB is out to get the GOP | Wisconsin State Journal

Citing a Wall Street Journal editorial last week, Republican state lawmakers renewed and intensified their claim that the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board is politically biased and unfairly targeting conservatives. Little evidence supports such allegations. Moreover, GOP leaders are ignoring key facts about the GAB as they try to weaken if not disband the independent and nonpartisan watchdog agency that oversees campaign finance, elections, ethics and lobbying laws. For starters, half of the retired judges who serve on the GAB were elected decades ago as Republicans to the Legislature, Congress or district attorney. Only one member of the GAB is a former Democratic district attorney from the 1970s, and he was appointed to the GAB by GOP Gov. Scott Walker. … Now comes a Wall Street Journal editorial critical of GAB director Kevin Kennedy. Citing anonymous sources and some quotes from emails, the Wall Street Journal questioned if Kennedy was coordinating state investigations of conservative groups with the IRS.

Alabama: Lawmakers again try to tighten campaign finance law | AL.com

The Alabama Legislature has again tried to tighten up the state’s campaign finance law, following up on earlier efforts that haven’t worked as planned. The Fair Campaign Practices Act, on the books since 1988, has been criticized for lacking teeth and a designated authority for enforcement. With a bill that passed during the regular session, lawmakers gave the state Ethics Commission authority to investigate violations of the act, among other changes. The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, said the bill, based mostly on recommendations from a study committee, “will bring a lot more transparency and accountability to our electoral system.”

Canada: Timing of election call will affect parties’ campaign spending | Toronto Star

What voters will decide on Oct. 19 is beyond the Conservatives’ control. But one thing is firmly in their grasp: when to drop the writs that will take them to the polls. Exactly what day Prime Minister Stephen Harper will visit the Governor General to make the formal request to dissolve Parliament and call the election has been the source of weeks of political speculation. And with good reason: it’s ultimately a political calculus of the Conservatives’ own devising. Although a law passed in 2007 set a fixed election date for Parliament, it didn’t set a fixed length on how long the election campaign could be, only how short — no less than 37 days long including the day it begins. Fast forward to 2014 and the introduction and subsequent passage of the contentious Fair Elections Act, which among other things changed the rules around campaign finance. In short, the longer the campaign, the more everyone can spend.

Wisconsin: Key state lawmakers renew calls to overhaul elections board | Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

Key Assembly Republicans renewed their call Friday for overhauling the state’s elections and ethics board after The Wall Street Journal reported the agency had been in touch with the Internal Revenue Service as it investigated conservative groups. “Nothing should be more important than free speech and it’s outrageous that there’s a coordinated effort to undermine this basic constitutional right,” said a joint statement issued by Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) and Rep. Dean Knudson (R-Hudson). “Now that the state budget is complete, it’s time to double down on finalizing the necessary reforms for the (Government Accountability Board) so the bill can be ready for consideration this fall. Those reforms will include a means to change the way the GAB operates. The agency leadership needs to be accountable to the GAB board and the board needs to be accountable to the Legislature and the citizens of Wisconsin.”

National: U.S. court upholds federal contractor campaign finance ban | Reuters

A federal appeals court on Tuesday rejected a challenge to a long-standing ban on U.S. government contractors making campaign contributions in federal elections, emphasizing that the policy was put in place to prevent corruption. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled against three individual contractors who contended that the ban violated their constitutional rights to free speech and equal protection under the law. Writing on behalf of an 11-judge panel, Chief Judge Merrick Garland wrote that “the concerns that spurred the original bar remain as important today as when the statute was enacted” in 1940.

Voting Blogs: The D.C. Circuit in Wagner: Aspects of Appearances in the Defense of The Embattled Law | Moe Soft Money Hard Law

It is understandable that the D.C. Circuit’s Wagner decision upholding the federal contractor ban would attract a good bit of attention. The federal courts are suspected of harboring animus toward the campaign finance laws and here is a major decision going the other way and on fairly broad grounds. So it has been described as having the potential to be highly significant. The decision was notable for the clarity and thoroughness of its presentation. The Court also deftly reinforces the available authority by use of case law stressing the particular dangers presented by political pressure on, or from, government employees. A strength, perhaps also a surprise, was the unanimity of the opinion.

National: D.C. ranks high in ‘health of state democracies’ list. Virginia does not. | The Washington Post

The District government can lay claim to being the fourth-healthiest democracy in the country, according to a new report from the Center for American Progress Action Fund, a left-leaning policy institute and advocacy organization. Still, the report notes, while the city government has laudable laws encouraging participation and equality in local government, it’s impossible for it to have a truly healthy democracy without having representation in Congress and full control over its local budget. The study evaluated the District’s and each state’s government in three different categories: Accessibility in the ballot, representation in state government and influence in the political system.

National: Court upholds political contribution ban for federal contractors | The Hill

A federal court on Tuesday upheld a longstanding prohibition on federal contractors making political contributions, handing a rare win to proponents of stronger campaign finance restrictions in an era of relaxed regulations. The 75-year-old ban applies to individuals, corporations and firms that are negotiating or working under federal contracts. While doing so, they cannot give money to federal candidates, parties or committees. The rule is predicated on the idea that such donations could be a corrupting influence. In his decision, Chief Judge Merrick Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, wrote that the contribution ban did not constitute a violation of free speech or the plaintiffs’ equal protection rights “because the concerns that spurred the original bar remain as important today as when the statute was enacted.”

Editorials: Ban on contractors’ political donations upheld | Lyle Denniston

Finding that the problem of corruption in government contracting is still a major civic scandal, a unanimous federal appeals court on Tuesday rejected a new constitutional challenge to the seventy-five-year-old ban on political contributions by individuals who are hired under contract to do work for federal agencies — an increasing way that federal agency tasks get done. The sweep of the ruling by the en banc, eleven-judge U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit would also appear to support the ban as it applies to business firms with federal contracts, even though the ruling was technically limited to individuals who act as federal contractors because those were the only challengers.