Editorial: The Election Watchdog That Can’t Bark

Date
Publication
The New York Times
Expert

And even in its denuded state, the F.E.C. could occasionally get the job done. This spring, it levied fines totaling $940,000 in a case involving a Chinese-owned corporation that had illegally funneled $1.3 million through an American subsidiary into a political action committee supporting Jeb Bush’s 2016 presidential candidacy. The action not only held the involved parties accountable, it sent a message that “there are rules, and they will be enforced,” said Trevor Potter, a former F.E.C. chairman and the president of Campaign Legal Center, the watchdog group that filed the complaint.

Read the full editorial here.