WASHINGTON – Today at 10am ET, the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary will hold a hearing on HR 1, For the People Act, a sweeping package of reforms that offers some of the most comprehensive advances our democracy has seen in decades.

Adav Noti, senior director of trial litigation and chief of staff at Campaign Legal Center (CLC), released his congressional testimony to congressional staff before his appearance before the Committee as a witness.

His testimony focuses on four parts of HR 1 that are within the Committee’s jurisdiction: (1) legislative findings regarding the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. FEC; (2) enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA); (3) closing loopholes in lobbying registration laws; and (4) recusal of Presidential appointees.

Adav said: “These provisions independently and collectively advance the right of every American citizen to a government that is responsible and accountable to voters.”

“Campaign finance laws protect the First Amendment rights of ordinary citizens by ensuring they can participate in the political process without having their voices drowned out by wealthy corporations and individuals that hold special interests. And disclosure of campaign spending provides the public with essential information about the sources of financial support for candidates seeking public office. Ethics and lobbying disclosure laws promote responsiveness by ensuring that government officials, whether elected or appointed, act in the interests of the public rather than the officials’ own private interests. More broadly, disclosure laws in each of these contexts give citizens, journalists, watchdog groups, and law enforcement agencies the information and tools needed to detect and deter governmental misconduct, undue influence, and corruption.”

The Campaign Legal Center (CLC) has fought for each of these reforms, along with many others in HR 1, to ensure every voter has a voice in the political process.

Nearly three-quarters of voters support the U.S. Supreme Court establishing clear rules for when gerrymandering violates the Constitution, with broad support extending across partisan and racial lines

WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) released a poll that finds strong opposition to gerrymandering among likely 2020 general election voters and broad, bipartisan support for the U.S. Supreme Court to set clear rules for when gerrymandering violates the Constriction. The poll, commissioned by CLC, was conducted by a Democratic firm, ALG Research, and a Republican firm, GS Strategy Group.

The poll also reveals that voters strongly support the creation of independent redistricting commissions and overwhelmingly prefer congressional districts with no partisan bias, even if it means fewer seats for their own party.

“The results of this poll confirm that we have overwhelming support from the public for the argument we will be making before the Supreme Court in March,” said Paul Smith, vice president of CLC. “Voters hold deeply negative views towards gerrymandering. In addition to the strong desire to see the Supreme Court act to limit gerrymandering, people have expressed a clear preference for the creation of independent redistricting commissions, which voters supported in all five states where it was put to a vote in the 2018 cycle. Removing partisanship from the redistricting process will help ensure that every voice is heard in our democracy.”

Findings include:

• Nearly three-quarters of voters support the U.S. Supreme Court establishing clear rules for when gerrymandering violates the Constitution, with broad support extending across partisan and racial lines.
  • Support is especially intense among Latinos, 55 percent of whom strongly support the Supreme Court setting such rules.
• At least 60 percent of Democrats, Independents and Republicans support the creation of independent redistricting commissions.
• When asked to choose whether boundaries for legislative and congressional districts should be drawn by state legislatures or by an independent redistricting commission, voters favor the latter by a nearly three-to-one margin.

The U.S. Supreme Court announced Friday that arguments for the North Carolina and Maryland partisan gerrymandering challenges will be heard on March 26, 2019.

Individual voters across the country continue to express frustration about the impact of gerrymandering on democracy in their state. Read the story of CLC’s plaintiff, Faulkner Fox, who said, “I want to live in a state where voters know that their vote matters. I love North Carolina, and it breaks my heart that it’s not that kind of place right now.” The case, which CLC is arguing with its co-counsel the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, is called League of Women Voters of North Carolina v. Rucho. A companion case is Common Cause v. Rucho.

Today, Campaign Legal Center’s (CLC) released a new Race in Politics Catalog, a collection of political communications, campaign materials and comments that make racial appeals to voters. Compiled over the 2017-2018 election cycle, the Catalog gathers – in one place for the first time – many different types of race-based appeals from political campaigns across the country.

After Barack Obama’s election to the presidency in 2008, some suggested that it was the beginning of a new, post-racial age of American politics. The racism and bias that had characterized so much of the nation’s political discourse, they argued, was now in the past. But a look into the political campaigns of recent years makes abundantly clear the pernicious and continuing role of racism in the United States.

Campaigns across the country have consistently made appeals – both explicitly and implicitly – to voters on the basis of race. Many campaigns continue to employ racist stereotypes or exclusionary rhetoric to attack their opponents and generate support for themselves. These tactics are startlingly common, and their impact immense.

These messages sow division, cultivate harmful stereotypes, and disempower marginalized communities, and often, messages like these are closely linked to efforts at voter suppression.

Individual racist ads or comments are often dismissed as fringe outliers. By compiling these ads, CLC hopes to stimulate and foster a discussion about the ways political candidates or their surrogates continue to use race to sow division, cultivate harmful stereotypes, and disempower minority communities. We hope this catalog will inform our ongoing and necessary debate about race in our politics.