WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), alleging that Bill de Blasio’s campaign and two PACs associated with de Blasio violated federal law by arranging for a small number of wealthy donors to exceed the $2,800 legal contribution limit, and failing to report those contributions. At least 25 donors who gave the legal maximum to de Blasio’s campaign had also given $5,000 to a federal committee, Fairness PAC, and a state committee, NY Fairness PAC, which spent the money laying the groundwork for de Blasio’s presidential run.

“The de Blasio campaign appears to have concocted a shell game to arrange for a small number of wealthy donors to illegally support de Blasio’s presidential run above and beyond legal contribution limits,” said Brendan Fischer, director, federal reform at CLC. “Contribution limits are designed to prevent corruption. Presidential candidates cannot lay the groundwork for their campaign by accepting contributions nearly 300% in excess of federal limits.”

Fairness PAC and NY Fairness PAC paid for hundreds of thousands of dollars in staff, polling, and travel to early primary states in the months before de Blasio formally announced his candidacy. By law, de Blasio 2020 was then required to report those testing-the-waters expenditures on its first report, as well as the contributors who had paid for them. However, de Blasio 2020’s first report, filed last month, reported some of the testing-the-waters expenditures paid for by the two PACs, but failed to report any of the contributors. CLC’s analysis of the de Blasio 2020, Fairness PAC, and NY Fairness PAC campaign finance reports showed that at least 25 donors had exceeded legal limits by nearly 300%.  

Republican FEC commissioners let Clinton campaign off the hook for coordinating millions in spending with super PAC

WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) sued the Federal Election Commission (FEC) in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia over the agency’s failure to enforce the law limiting coordination between candidates and billionaire-funded outside groups and requiring full disclosure of such coordination. The super PAC “Correct the Record” (CTR) was a $9 million operation working by the admission of founder and chair David Brock “under the thumb” of the Hillary Clinton campaign for president in 2016. Despite the FEC career staff attorneys’ conclusion that CTR’s scheme likely violated the law and recommendation that the agency pursue the matter, the two Republican commissioners recently voted to let the Clinton campaign and super PAC off the hook.

“Unless the court intervenes, the FEC’s inaction has paved the way for 2020 presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle to break the law,” said Trevor Potter, president of CLC, and a former Republican Chairman of the FEC. “The Republican commissioners today are opposed to the campaign finance and disclosure laws they are supposed to enforce, and as a result, the FEC rarely pursues violators, allowing political operatives to ignore the rules without consequence.”

An outside organization can only legally raise unlimited donations to support a candidate’s campaign if it is completely independent of that campaign. But CTR disregarded these rules, declaring that it would coordinate a wide range of expensive activities, including polling, video production and opposition research, with the Clinton campaign. CLC filed a complaint asking the FEC to investigate in October 2016, which the agency dismissed earlier this year. The law gives complainants the right to sue the FEC if the dismissal was contrary to law.

“Allowing candidates to outsource millions in campaign operations to billionaire-funded super PACs further entrenches the power of wealthy donors over our democracy,” said Tara Malloy, senior director, appellate litigation and strategy at CLC. “Campaign finance laws are supposed to limit the influence of money on our politics and ensure public disclosure of campaign spending, and we need the FEC to do its job and enforce those laws.”
 

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*Tara Malloy, Megan McAllen, Maggie Christ and Urja Mittal also worked on this legal action for CLC.

WASHINTON – A new report released today by Campaign Legal Center (CLC), in collaboration with the Daily Beast, reveals how multiple former Members of Congress who registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) have used their old campaign accounts to contribute tens of thousands of dollars to the same legislators they have lobbied on behalf of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other foreign governments. CLC’s report, developed using FARA records and campaign finance reports from the past five years, underscores the importance of the Federal Election Commission (FEC) issuing clear rules for so-called “zombie campaigns,” such as requiring that old campaign accounts be shut down.

Former Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) left office in 2015 with $330,000 remaining in his campaign account, and after registering as a foreign agent of Qatar, used leftover campaign cash to advance Qatar’s interests. In 2017 and 2018, Moran used unspent campaign funds to give to at least a dozen current members’ campaigns within one year of him or his firm contacting those offices on behalf of Qatar.

Former Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA) became an agent of Saudi Arabia after leaving office in 2015, and demonstrated a similar pattern of using his old campaign funds to peddle influence on behalf of his foreign government lobbying client. For example, shortly after a U.S. Senator took the helm of a committee considering a proposal to cut U.S. military support for Saudi Arabia, McKeon used his old campaign funds to write that senator’s campaign four $1,000 checks, while also lobbying the senator’s office on behalf of Saudi Arabia. McKeon had never contributed to the senator until he took control of a committee that affects the interests of his foreign lobbying client.

“The problems with the congressional revolving door and lobbyists buying access with political contributions become amplified when politicians-turned-lobbyists are using leftover campaign funds to promote the interests of foreign governments, and advance their own lobbying careers,” said Brendan Fischer, director, federal reform program at CLC. “Donors who gave to support a candidate’s run for office probably didn’t expect that their money would be used years later to advance Saudi Arabia’s interests and the politician’s post-congressional lobbying career. The FEC and Congress should kill ‘zombie campaigns’ in order to prevent former officeholders from using their campaign accounts to grease the wheels for foreign powers.”

In 2018, reporting by the Tampa Bay Times and WTSP-TV revealed that dozens of former officeholders have continued using their old campaign funds for years after leaving office, for apparently personal expenses like country club dues, cell phone bills, and travel and lodging. This report reveals an additional category of misuse.

In February 2018, CLC filed a rulemaking petition calling for the FEC to clarify how former lawmakers can use leftover campaign funds, and to place a time limit on how long campaign accounts can remain open.

Congress could go further, and, in fact, both Republican and Democratic officeholders have called for limits on former officials leveraging their public service for foreign or domestic lobbying clients.

Read the Daily Beast story on the report.

10 million Americans owe more than $50 billion in fines and fees related to criminal convictions

Over half of the disenfranchised population is no longer incarcerated and is living in a state that could deny them the right to vote based on their wealth

WASHINGTON – Nationwide, as many as 23 million citizens have felony convictions. In 2019, at least 30 states continue to disenfranchise some of these citizens based on wealth, according to a new report released today by Campaign Legal Center (CLC) and Georgetown Law’s Civil Rights Clinic. The report, ‘Can’t Pay, Can’t Vote: A National Survey on the Modern Day Poll Tax’, is one of the first comprehensive studies of how voting rights restoration schemes deny the right to vote to those who cannot afford to pay legal debt.

Millions Owe Fines and Fees

Many citizens struggle under the restrictive conditions of voting rights restoration because they are unable to pay off their financial obligations in a timely manner, as demonstrated by stories from the report of citizens like Bonnie Raysor of Florida.

Although almost two-thirds of voters supported an amendment last fall to restore voting rights to people with past convictions, the state passed a new law this year that redefines “all terms of sentence” to include the payment of legal financial obligations. As such, Florida remains one of 30 states that can effectively extend the period of disenfranchisement for many years. An estimated 10 million Americans owe more than $50 billion in fines and fees related to criminal convictions.

“Wealth should never be a determining factor in an American’s ability to participate in the electoral process,” said Danielle Lang, co-director of voting rights and redistricting at CLC, which launched RestoreYourVote.org, so people in all 50 states can learn about the path to rights restoration. “But for far too many individuals, access to the ballot is determined by their ability to pay – a modern day poll tax. In order to ensure that legal debt does not disenfranchise American citizens, states should adopt policies that either eliminate felony disenfranchisement entirely or restore the right to vote upon release from incarceration.”

Relics of Jim Crow

Felony disenfranchisement laws and poll taxes, both relics of the Jim Crow era, emerged as ways to disenfranchise African Americans. Today, like when they were created, the hurdles created by these policies disproportionately disenfranchise communities of color, poor whites, Native Americans and other marginalized communities.

Unlike felony disenfranchisement laws, poll taxes were abolished nationwide in the 1960s. In 1966 the U.S. Supreme Court held that the use of poll taxes in state elections violated the Fourteenth Amendment and that wealth should not be a factor in determining an individual’s ability to vote. However, debt associated with the criminal justice system continues to act as a modern poll tax.

"When millions of people can't vote in an election because they can't pay, that election doesn't deserve to be called fair and free,” said Professor Aderson Francois, who directs Georgetown Law’s Civil Rights Clinic. “And when a country tolerates this level of disenfranchisement, it doesn't deserve to be called democratic."

According to the new report:

• 8 states explicitly condition voting rights restoration of formerly incarcerated individuals on the payments of fines and fees: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and Washington.
• 20 states do so implicitly: Alaska, California, Delaware, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
• 2 states permanently disenfranchise convicted individuals require payment of fines and fees for clemency eligibility: Iowa and Kentucky.
• 20 states and the District of Columbia do not condition the right to vote on the payment of fines and fees.