[Vision2020] A Judge Turns on the Light

[Art Deco]

  [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>


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April 2, 2012
A Judge Turns on the Light

A federal judge took an important step toward ending secret donations to
big-spending political groups, striking down regulations that permitted
some groups to hide their donors. Unfortunately, the ruling probably came
too late to flush this corrupting practice from this year’s elections —
though there is still time for Congress to do so.

The secret-donor problem began in 2007 when the Supreme Court, in the
Wisconsin Right to Life
case<http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/06-969.ZS.html>,
ended restrictions on corporate and union political spending by advocacy
groups in the weeks prior to an election. A few weeks later, the Federal
Election Commission, naïvely suggesting that some corporate donors to those
groups might not have intended to give for political purposes, said that
only those donations explicitly earmarked for political purposes had to be
disclosed. The loophole was obvious: Just don’t declare any donation to be
political, and they can all be secret.

The rule does not apply to modern “super PACs,” which exist for political
purposes and must disclose their donors. But it allowed groups that accept
money for other purposes, like the United States Chamber of Commerce, to
collect millions of undisclosed dollars to buy ads that criticize
candidates who differ with their pro-business agenda.

During the 2010 Congressional elections, political operatives like Karl
Rove helped set up a variety of purported charities or educational groups
to provide a shield to anonymous political donors. Along with the
chamber, these
groups took in more than $138
million<http://www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending/summ.php?cycle=2010&disp=O&type=U>in
undisclosed money that year, 80 percent of which was spent supporting
Republican candidates. Many of the same secretive groups have already begun
running ads in this year’s campaign, and the flood will shortly begin in
earnest.

A year ago, Representative Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat from Maryland, filed
suit<http://www.campaignlegalcenter.org/attachments/Van_HollenvFEC_Plntff_Complaint_Dist_Ct._4.21.11.pdf>against
the F.E.C., saying its 2007 regulation violated the intention of
Congress when it passed the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform act in
2002. That law makes it clear that donations greater than $1,000 to
advocacy groups have to be disclosed.

On Friday, District Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington agreed.
Sheruled that<https://ecf.dcd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_public_doc?2011cv0766-48>the
F.E.C. overstepped its boundaries in requiring disclosure only of
explicit political donations. “Congress spoke plainly” in requiring full
disclosure, she wrote, and even the Citizens United decision called for
disclosure of the unlimited corporate and union donations it permitted.

Judge Jackson’s clearsighted opinion is a win for clean elections. But it
will probably be appealed, which could delay a final decision by months or
years. If it were a functioning body, the F.E.C. would change its
regulations to comply with the court ruling, but its three Republican
commissioners have repeatedly blocked attempts to require disclosure.

Congress could quickly resolve the issue if it were truly interested in
cleaning up campaign finance. Mr. Van Hollen has introduced a new
version ofthe Disclose
Act<http://vanhollen.house.gov/UploadedFiles/DISCLOSE_Summary_042910.pdf>that
would go even further than the court decision in making donations
transparent, requiring the names of top donors to appear in ads, and
imposing stronger reporting requirements for super PACs. Republicans
filibustered a similar bill last year in the Senate, and no Republicans
have stepped up to support this version. In the meantime, the grim tide of
secret money keeps rising.

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-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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