The Advocate: Gov. Bobby Jindal Organizing National Fundraising

“Every major candidate is going to have a super PAC created for their election, and it’s probably going to be run by a close friend or family member of the candidate and its fundraising activities will likely be closely related to the candidate,” said Paul S. Ryan, of the nonprofit Campaign Legal Center in Washington, which tracks campaign-finance law. ...

“The notion that these super PACs are independent of candidates is ridiculous,” Ryan said. “They’re not. They are joined at the hip to these candidates.” ...

“The court basically said, yes, we’re going to allow a flood of unlimited money into our elections, but don’t worry, America, this money will be independent and it will be fully disclosed,” Ryan said. ...

Leadership PACs and their relatives are subject to the old $5,000 limit on individual contributions received. And up to a maximum of $5,000 per candidate, they can contribute directly to campaigns — as super PACs cannot — and often do so. But in practice, Ryan said, many have evolved into “slush funds” for the politicians who control them: Candidates “save” their official campaign funds to pay for explicit campaign activity, such as advertising, yard signs and campaign-staff salaries, while tapping their leadership PACs for travel, meals and other expenses. ...

“The IRS has taken a lot of heat for some inappropriate targeting of conservative groups,” Ryan said. “I would expect we would see very, very little enforcement by the IRS in this 2016 presidential election cycle.”

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