Challenging the FEC’s Delay in Enforcing the Law Against the GEO Group — CLC v. FEC (GEO Group Contractor Contribution)

At a Glance

This case is a challenge to the FEC’s delay in enforcing federal campaign finance law against GEO Group, one of America’s largest private prison companies, which illegally made $225,000 in contributions to a super PAC supporting then-candidate Donald Trump in 2016.

Status
Active
Updated
Issues
Campaign Finance
About This Case/Action

In August 2016, the Obama administration announced that it would be phasing out federal private prison contracts like those held by GEO. The announcement sent GEO’s stocks tumbling. The next day, GEO contributed $100,000 to the pro-Trump super PAC Rebuilding America Now, and it made another $125,000 contribution just one week before the election. At the time, Mike Pence was telling donors that giving to the super PAC was “one of the best ways to stop Hillary Clinton and help elect Donald Trump our next president!” After Trump won, GEO gave $250,000 to the Trump Inaugural Committee.

GEO did not have to wait long to see its investment start to pay off. On Feb. 23, 2017, during his second full week on the job, Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued a one-paragraph memo reversing the Obama administration’s private prison phase-out, instead ordering officials to continue using for-profit facilities for federal inmates.

In April 2017, the Trump Administration awarded GEO a $110 million, 10-year federal contract to build and administer a new 1,000-bed immigration detention center in Texas. GEO expects $44 million a year in revenue from the facility. GEO also has enjoyed a soaring stock price; its stock shot up 21 percent the day after Trump won, and has continued to grow since then.

CLC filed an FEC complaint, which alleges that the contributions — made through a wholly-owned subsidiary, GEO Corrections Holdings, Inc. — violated the ban on federal contractors giving money in federal elections. This law has been in place for 75 years to protect the integrity of the contracting process.

CLC filed this case against the FEC on January 10, 2018 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after waiting more than a year for the FEC to resolve this complaint. CLC hopes the lawsuit will compel the FEC to act. 

There is recent precedent for the FEC taking action against government contractors for giving to super PACs. In September 2017, the FEC responded to a CLC complaint and found that the Massachusetts-based Suffolk Construction Company violated campaign finance law by making two $100,000 donations to a Hillary Clinton-affiliated super PAC in 2015. That company agreed to pay a $34,000 fine.

The reason that federal contractors have been barred from making contributions for the past 75 years is to prevent pay-to-play in the contracting process. Public officials are supposed to make contracting decisions based on what is best for the public, not based on who spent the most money getting them elected. GEO Group’s illegal donations have the appearance of a pay-to-play: since Trump was elected with GEO’s backing, the company has reaped enormous political and financial benefits, including a new $110 million taxpayer-funded contract.

The FEC is critical to the enforcement of the contractor contribution ban and in preventing pay-to-play politics. It is incumbent upon the FEC to enforce the longstanding federal contribution ban and take action against GEO Group to deter future violations. Without the contractor ban, the government contracting process becomes an obvious way for officials to reward friends and political donors.

In a separate but related case, CLC filed a lawsuit on June 15, 2017 seeking to compel the Department of Justice (DOJ) to disclose requested records that would gather information about how DOJ reached its conclusion to rescind official policy to phase-out the use of private prisons in the administration’s contracting process. Almost nine months later, the public still has not seen any documents that show how DOJ reached its decision to change course on its private prison policy.

Plaintiffs

Campaign Legal Center

Defendant

Federal Election Commission

Associated Cases & Actions

Exposing Pay-to-Play Scheme Enacted by the GEO Group

Doe v. FEC

At a Glance

Doe v. FEC is a case about a mystery donor's attempt to maintain secrecy around a $1.7 million donation to a super PAC whose spending was meant to influence the 2012 election. 

Status
Closed
Updated
Issues
Campaign Finance
About This Case/Action

Doe v. FEC is a case about a mystery donor's attempt to maintain secrecy around a $1.7 million donation to a super PAC whose spending was meant to influence the 2012 election. The nonprofit group Citizens for Reponsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) brought the original complaint against the super PAC, called Now or Never PAC, in February 2015 alleging that an unknown person made a contribution to Now or Never, violating the prohibition on contributions made in the name of another person.



CLC filed a motion to intervene in support of CREW's quest for transparency on January 3, 2018.



On March 23, 2018, the U.S. District Court issued an opinion that upheld the right of the Federal Election Commission to uphold its own disclosure policy and give the public the right to know the names of donors.



Importance of Case



Disclosure is critical because voters deserve to know the names of donors that are spending millions of dollars to influence their vote. Transparency is the foundation of an open democracy. Under the Federal Election Campaign Act, the FEC must be permitted to keep extensive recordkeeping and disclosure requirements of campaign contributions in order to remedy pay-to-play politics.

Plaintiffs

John Doe

Defendant

Federal Election Commission

Court-Ordered Report Reveals Low Voting Rates in Jails; Highlights Need for More Voter Engagement

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BOSTON — Compelled by a court-ordered settlement, Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin has released a long-overdue report on jail-based voting in Massachusetts, fulfilling an obligation mandated by the commonwealth’s VOTES Act. The report marks a significant victory for transparency, accountability and the public’s right to know how the commonwealth is implementing voting rights protections for incarcerated individuals.

The report was secured after voting rights and prisoners’ advocates filed suit in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) to compel the secretary’s compliance with the VOTES Act, a 2022 law that, among other provisions, mandates public reporting on statewide jail voting data. The Act also requires the secretary to provide voter education and election information to facilities, and those facilities to assist eligible incarcerated voters with registering and applying for ballots.

In Massachusetts, individuals who are convicted of misdemeanors or detained pre-trial retain the right to vote. But many face significant hurdles to exercising that right due to their incarceration.

The report exposes an extreme gap between the number of eligible incarcerated voters and those who successfully cast ballots, highlighting the need for increased voter engagement and support:

  • For the September 3, 2024, state primary, there were 5,590 eligible incarcerated voters. Just 159 (2.8%) applied for a ballot, and only 58 (1%) of those ballots were returned and counted.
  • For the November 5, 2024, state election, there were 4,647 eligible incarcerated voters. Just 422 (9%) applied for a ballot, and only 230 (5%) of those ballots were returned and counted.

“We sued to get this report—and now that we have it, the work is only just beginning,” said Brooke Simone, Staff Attorney at Lawyers for Civil Rights. “The numbers are abysmal: fewer than 5% of eligible incarcerated voters cast a ballot in the 2024 state general election. This report gives our clients the data they need to understand why the system failed so many eligible voters—and to demand the reforms necessary to ensure that jail-based voting rights are meaningful, accessible, and real.”

“Securing the right to vote for incarcerated individuals is a fundamental test of our commitment to a true democracy, and voting helps incarcerated individuals to civically connect with and care for the communities they will one day rejoin,” said Justin “Rico” Rodriguez, one of the petitioners in the case who was released from incarceration at MCI-Norfolk earlier this year. “Taking legal action to force the production of these reports and reaching a settlement with the state wasn’t just a bureaucratic dispute—it was an essential breakthrough needed to ensure the state complies with the law and actively ensures incarcerated individuals the democratic access they are legally and constitutionally entitled to.”

“This report is part of a much larger story about the incredible and highly successful organizing in Massachusetts,” added Kate Uyeda, legal counsel for Campaign Legal Center. “Jail voting data is notoriously difficult to get, and this report will help advocates build a path forward to ensure eligible voters in jail can have a voice in their democracy."

The report is a critical resource for Empowering Descendant Communities to Unlock Democracy, a coalition working in two Boston jails to help eligible incarcerated individuals register to vote, apply for absentee ballots, and advocate for jail voting statewide. The coalition, whose leadership includes petitioners in the lawsuit that resulted in the release of the data, will use the data to identify gaps and direct their jail voter registration and outreach efforts ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, helping eligible incarcerated voters cast a meaningful ballot.

The court-ordered settlement also requires the secretary’s office to submit progress reports through March 1, 2027, ensuring the delay in reporting is not repeated. Those reports will detail efforts to improve data collection and analysis processes ahead of the September 2026 statewide election, as well as progress toward generating complete and timely reports for the next two statewide elections.

The complaint that resulted in the favorable settlement was filed by Lawyers for Civil Rights and Campaign Legal Center in the state’s highest court, with pro bono support from Anderson & Kreiger and the Law Office of John Reinstein. The case is Hobbs et al. v. Galvin, No. SJ-2026-0053.

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The nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center advances democracy through law. We safeguard the freedom to vote, defend voters’ right to know who is spending money to influence elections, and work to ensure public trust in our elected officials.

Learn more about CLC. Don't miss out on our latest resources: Subscribe to President Trevor Potter's newsletter on LinkedIn or email and tune in to the latest season of our award-winning podcast, Democracy Decoded. 

Issues
Voting and Elections

Victory for D.C. Voters: Ranked Choice Voting, Semi-Open Primaries Upheld in the District

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Body

WASHINGTON — On June 2, 2026, Campaign Legal Center and its clients successfully defended a citizen-led ballot initiative introducing ranked choice voting and semi-open primaries in the District. In April 2025, Campaign Legal Center intervened in a lawsuit on behalf of Initiative 83's proposer Lisa D. T. Rice and Grow Democracy DC to defend the initiative against meritless legal challenges. If successful, those legal challenges would have undermined the will of D.C. voters, who approved Initiative 83 overwhelmingly. But instead, in a victory for the people of the District, the court has rejected baseless challenges brought by partisan actors against Initiative 83, confirming that the initiative’s provisions do not violate District or federal law. The June primary is already well underway and will be conducted using ranked choice voting for the first time in the District.

“I proposed Initiative 83 to bring much-needed inclusion in D.C. elections and give a voice to residents in the District who have been significantly disenfranchised. Tens of thousands of independent voters in D.C., like me, have been left without a voice in the District’s closed partisan primary elections,” said Lisa D. T. Rice, CEO of Grow Democracy DC. “Initiative 83’s meaningful pro-democracy changes, including ranked choice voting, are straightforward and bring more inclusive opportunities for participation and more representative outcomes to our elections. Now, it is time for the D.C. Council to deliver a democracy that belongs to the people and fully fund semi-open primaries, just as it has already funded Initiative 83’s ranked choice voting provisions.”

“This ruling reinforces what voters in the District of Columbia have already made clear: Ranked choice voting and semi-open primaries are legally sound reforms that help to ensure every voice can be heard equally,” said Ben Phillips, legal counsel at Campaign Legal Center. “Initiative 83 puts the power to advance democracy directly in the hands of the people. Voters in D.C. will get to use ranked choice voting in the primary election this month and experience firsthand how this reform makes elections more inclusive and more representative.”

More than 72% of voters in D.C. voted to adopt Initiative 83 in November 2024. The D.C. Council has already voted to fund ranked choice voting for this month’s primary, the Board of Elections has mailed ranked choice ballots to D.C. voters, and organizations like Grow Democracy DC are working alongside the Board to educate voters on the practice.

The ability of voters to exercise their freedom to vote should not require them to join a political party to make their voice heard. Semi-open party primaries would end the disenfranchisement of 85,000 independent D.C. voters in primary elections, ensuring their ability to participate in the district’s highly consequential primary elections. If this provision is funded by the D.C. Council, it will go into effect for a future election.

Traditional winner-take-all elections often discourage candidates with similar platforms from running because they risk splitting the vote. With ranked choice voting, however, this “spoiler effect” disappears, meaning more diverse candidates can run without fear of undermining the chances of other like-minded candidates; they can even work together to amplify their message and ensure their shared values are represented. D.C. voters will get to use ranked choice voting for the first time in the June 2026 primary and special elections.

Read more about our case here.

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The nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center advances democracy through law. We safeguard the freedom to vote, defend voters’ right to know who is spending money to influence elections, and work to ensure public trust in our elected officials.

Learn more about CLC. Don't miss out on our latest resources: Subscribe to President Trevor Potter's newsletter on LinkedIn or email and tune in to the latest season of our award-winning podcast, Democracy Decoded. 

Issues
Voting and Elections

Challenging President Trump’s National Guard Deployment in Washington, D.C.

At a Glance

Campaign Legal Center filed an amicus brief on behalf of 114 members of Congress supporting litigation challenging the Trump administration’s deployment of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., which is a clear example of executive overreach.

Status
Active
Issues
The Rule of Law
About This Case/Action

The Constitution gives Congress authority over the District of Columbia. In 1973, Congress used that constitutional authority to pass the Home Rule Act, which empowers the District to govern itself.    

In August 2025, President Trump deployed over 2,000 members of the National Guard to the District, against the will of D.C. residents. The democratically elected leadership in the District did not ask for or consent to the deployment, and on September 4, 2025, the District of Columbia filed suit, arguing that the president had no legal authority to deploy the National Guard to the District.  

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia denied the Trump administration’s motion to dismiss the case and preliminarily blocked the deployment. The Trump administration appealed the district court’s order and sought a stay of the preliminary injunction in the interim, which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit granted. As a result, the National Guard remains deployed in D.C.

As the D.C. Circuit prepares to hear the Trump administration’s appeal on the merits, Campaign Legal Center filed an amicus brief on behalf of 114 members of the United States House of Representatives explaining why the military takeover of the District both violates the Home Rule Act and flouts the careful statutory scheme Congress constructed to govern the District and the National Guard.  

President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., is dangerous executive overreach that tramples on the District of Columbia’s right to self-governance provided by Congress. Using federal troops to intimidate everyday Americans and override the District’s elected officials undermines this self-governance and ignores the limits Congress very intentionally placed on presidential authority. 

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