Recent high-profile ethics investigations have revealed that members of Congress are refusing to cooperate with the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) at a troubling rate.

Out of the eight members whose investigations have been made public by the OCE in 2022, five have refused to cooperate with the investigation, giving a rate of 63%...

By Emily Davis, a Summer 2022 CLC intern

Companies spend on political contributions and lobbying to influence elections and advance their policy goals.

Most of this spending is legal, but there are important, necessary legal barriers that help preserve the integrity of the democratic process.

For instance, corporations cannot give directly to...

A bipartisan, select committee in the U.S. House of Representatives held its first hearing this week on the January 6th attack on our country. The proceeding included speeches from committee members interwoven with new and disturbing video footage from Jan. 6, 2021, laying the groundwork for what’s to come in a series of hearings throughout the...

By Blair Page, a Summer 2022 CLC intern

The 80-year-old ban on federal contractors making political donations protects against the appearance or reality that taxpayer-funded federal contracts are effectively “for sale.” The ban is a key defense against the formation of a corrupt “pay-to-play” system in which wealthy special interests are rewarded...

Campaign Legal Center (CLC) attorneys are headed to Georgia this week to challenge restrictive measures in S.B. 202, which was signed into law in March 2021 and made significant changes to Georgia’s election system.

CLC is specifically challenging three provisions of the law that limit the ability of nonprofit civic engagement organizations to...

By Blair Page, a Summer 2022 CLC intern

To uphold transparency, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) must robustly enforce the federal straw donor ban, which prohibits donors from funneling their campaign contributions through another person or entity to try to evade disclosure requirements.

Voters have a right to know who is spending to...

Every 10 years, every state must go through something called “redistricting.” Redistricting is the process where states redraw the district lines for elections, which determines who you get to vote for. This process should be straightforward. Unfortunately, in the U.S., politicians in many states engage in gerrymandering.

Gerrymandering involves...

Campaign Legal Center welcomes eight new members to our team for the summer: our 2022 class of summer law interns. The summer interns are current law students who will work with CLC's full time staff to help advance our work in the areas of voting rights, redistricting, campaign finance, and ethics. 

Welcome, team!

Former Senate Majority Leaders Tom Daschle (D-SD) and Trent Lott (R-MS) argued that the Electoral Count Act of 1887 (ECA) should be updated in an op-ed published by The Wall Street Journal and highlighted the need for Congress to act in a bipartisan manner to close loopholes that could undermine voters’ ability to decide the outcome of the next...

The Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) found substantial reason to believe that Rep. Pat Fallon (R-TX) violated the STOCK Act by failing to disclose up to $17 million worth of stock transactions, following a CLC complaint. Most alarming, the OCE found STOCK Act noncompliance "is pervasive and reflects a culture of delayed filing contrary to the...

No matter our color, party or zip code, we all want an equal say in the decisions that shape our future. But in recent years, we’ve seen our freedom to vote come under attack.  

The U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration recently held a hearing on the administration of the 2022 midterm elections. Witnesses for the hearing included...

In a positive step forward for helping people with past felony convictions exercise their freedom to vote, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has released a “Guide to State Voting Rules that Apply After Criminal Convictions.” 

This guide draws upon, and links to, Campaign Legal Center’s (CLC) Restore Your Vote toolkit to provide information to people...

Every 10 years, the United States experiences a new cycle of “redistricting.” Responding to data from the census, state legislators or other map-drawers revise the district lines for the U.S. House of Representatives, state legislatures and other representative bodies, in order to equalize the districts’ population.

In that process, it is possible...

Voters have a right to know who is spending to influence their vote, and CLC is committed to protecting that right by filing complaints urging the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to investigate straw donors — including shell companies used to funnel political contributions to super PACs while avoiding the legally required disclosure of the true...

As a candidate, President Joe Biden created a plan to, “guarantee government works for the people.” Among these reforms was a promise to work with Congress to enact legislation that would prevent members of Congress, “from being influenced by personal financial holdings.”

A year and a half into his term, the president has not taken any steps to...

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia have both signed anti-voter bills into law to create partisan “election police force units.” These partisan agencies are ostensibly dedicated to pursuing voter fraud and other election crimes under the control of the governor’s office.

In reality, they are unnecessary wastes of taxpayer...

A recently published study in Vanderbilt Law Review entitled “Felony Financial Disenfranchisement” found that contacting people with past felony convictions to let them know that they can vote and helping them pay off restitution, fines and fees significantly increases voter participation.

This study, conducted in Florida during the 2020 elections...

Voters have a right to know who is trying to influence their vote and who is working to influence our government. 

Transparency about the sources of funding for our elections and candidates and how that money is spent is central to the free and fair functioning of our democracy. 

Increasingly, however, our elections are being drowned in secret...

“Dark money" groups are political organizations that masquerade as "social welfare nonprofits" under section 501(c)(4) of federal tax law, allowing them to avoid having to disclose where any of their money came from. Wealthy special interests use these groups to pour cash into elections and influence legislation in their favor, while keeping their...

Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed suit against Heritage Action for America, a political arm of the Heritage Foundation, which spent over $1 million in the 2018 election cycle to help elect numerous Republican candidates for Congress. The lawsuit alleges that Heritage Action failed to make mandatory disclosures of the donors who contributed to fund...

This week, the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee held a long overdue hearing on ethical standards in the U.S. Supreme Court. CLC’s Vice President, General Counsel, and Senior Director of Ethics Kedric Payne provided testimony for the hearing entitled “An Ethical Judiciary: Transparency and Accountability for 21st Century Courts.” 

CLC’s testimony focu...