Bills address glaring gaps in election law exposed by Russia’s interference in 2016 election

WASHINGTON – Today, Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Mark Warner (D-VA) and John McCain (R-AZ) announced they are introducing the Honest Ads Act. The House is also introducing a bipartisan companion bill. These Acts are a forceful and timely response to the most pressing vulnerabilities of election law exposed by Russia’s cyber campaign in the 2016 presidential election. Campaign Legal Center (CLC) advised the offices of the Senators who are sponsoring this important legislation.

HONEST stands for “Holding Online National Electioneering ads to the Same Test.” Its purpose is to modernize the laws surrounding the ban on foreign election interference by ensuring that paid internet ads are subject to the same disclaimer and recordkeeping rules that currently apply to television ads and radio ads. If enacted, this bill would require major sellers of online advertising – like Google, Facebook and Twitter – to keep a publicly available database of significant political advertising, including the content of the ads and who paid for them.

“The 2016 elections exposed glaring holes in our ability to police foreign intervention in US elections, and these bills are an appropriate, bipartisan disclosure remedy,” said Trevor Potter, president of Campaign Legal Center (CLC), and a former Republican Chairman of the Federal Election Commission. “Voters have a right to be fully informed about who is trying to influence their vote, particularly foreign powers whose motives are contrary to American interests. The Honest Ads Act gives voters, journalists, and law enforcement officers important tools to help root out illegal foreign activity. The transparency this bill aims to provide in the 2018 elections and beyond will protect and enhance the integrity of our elections, which are the most fundamental component of American self-governance.”

“Political activity is increasingly moving online, so this bill is a necessary step to bring our election laws into the 21st century and safeguard against anonymous foreign interference,” said Adav Noti, senior director of trial litigation at CLC, who previously served as the FEC’s Associate General Counsel for Policy. “The FEC has failed to provide meaningful guidance as to how its 1970s-era rules apply to modern digital advertising. Congress should pass the Honest Ads Act to make sure that major sellers of online ads aren’t selling them to foreign interlopers, and to create strong disincentives against foreign actors targeting American voters with election-related messages.”

The introduction of the Honest Ads Act comes one week after CLC’s foreign interference event on Oct. 12, which brought together national security, cybersecurity, and campaign finance law experts to examine the vulnerabilities of our laws and discuss solutions about how to protect our democracy against foreign influence. 

CLC submits comments in opposition to regulatory rollback of conflict of interest law, challenges Secretary’s authority to issue ‘de facto’ repeal

WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) submitted comments to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in opposition to its plans to weaken a conflict of interest law that guards against abuses caused by entanglements between VA employees and for-profit education institutions. The VA is proposing to subvert the statute enacted by Congress, which prevented its employees from having financial connections to for-profit education companies. With the proposed waiver, all VA employees would be exempt from the statutory ban – and could receive small gifts from for-profit education companies, and can accept awards and gifts of travel to award ceremonies.

“The VA is wrong to propose scrapping an ethics law that protects veterans,” said Walter Shaub, Senior Director, Ethics, at CLC. “Congress determined this law was necessary in light of a documented history of abuses, and the VA has no authority to issue a blanket waiver eviscerating that law simply because it disagrees with Congress.”

In its comments, CLC contends that the Secretary does not have authority to issue a ‘de facto’ repeal of an Act of Congress. The law was enacted in 1966 by Congress, in the wake of scandals involving for-profit schools giving donations to state officials’ coffers, liquor, money, and other gifts. At the time, Congress deemed it necessary to protect against conflicts of interest posed by employees of the VA – who were targets of abuse from schools that had the ability to gain profits from veteran attendance at their institutions through GI funds.

Read the comments.

Urges Court to “strike a blow” against practice that “increasingly threatens our democracy”

WASHINGTON - Campaign Legal Center’s (CLC) Paul Smith urged the U.S. Supreme Court to strike a blow against extreme partisan gerrymandering during today’s oral arguments in the landmark case Gill v Whitford.

In the most significant partisan gerrymandering case in decades, 12 Wisconsin voters questioned the constitutionality of Wisconsin’s extreme partisan gerrymandering scheme, devised in 2011. The plan all but guarantees one party control of the State Assembly for the entire decade, irrespective of how the voters cast their ballots.

“Today we laid out for the Supreme Court how modern-day partisan gerrymandering undermines the promise of American democracy,” said Paul Smith, vice president of litigation and strategy at the Campaign Legal Center. “What happened in Wisconsin is exactly how most Americans think our political system operates: politicians met in secret, they manipulated district lines so they could choose their own voters, and they ensured that their party would stay in power for the next decade, regardless of what the voters did. And their plan worked. It is now up to the Supreme Court to ensure our democracy functions like it should by reining in the most extreme partisan gerrymandering. And we are hopeful it will rise to the occasion.”

Wisconsin’s partisan gerrymander – created in 2011 by legislative aides and hired consultants in a secret room in a private law office – employed the latest mapping technology and data analysis to create a district plan that is one of the most extremely gerrymandered state legislative plans in the last four decades. 

In the first election under the plan, Republicans won a supermajority of 60 out of 99 seats despite losing the statewide vote for the Assembly. In 2014 and 2016, Republicans extended their advantage to 63 and 64 seats, respectively, even though the statewide vote remained nearly tied.  Subsequently, for the first time in 31 years, a lower court—after a four-day trial—struck down the plan as an unconstitutional gerrymander. 

Appellees argue that Wisconsin's gerrymander violates both the Equal Protection Clause by diluting the electoral influence of a targeted group of voters, and the First Amendment, by penalizing these voters because of their political beliefs.

“Since 2011, I have truly felt that my state does not function as a democracy,” said named plaintiff Bill Whitford, a retired law professor who lives in Madison. “Today I am hopeful that the Supreme Court will put a stop to a system where instead of voters choosing their lawmakers, the lawmakers choose their voters.”

“Extreme gerrymandering has taken away my voice as a citizen and as a voter,” said Helen Harris of Milwaukee, a retired elementary school principal who is also a plaintiff in the case. “I hope the court heard and understood today how badly this practice has damaged our democracy.”

In today’s arguments, appellees highlighted that Wisconsin’s map was “crafted with an obsessive focus on partisan advantage.” The appellees also refuted the notion that there is any neutral justification for the map’s overwhelming partisan tilt.

Learn more about CLC’s efforts on behalf of the 12 plaintiffs in Whitford here.

Learn more about the redistricting process, how it works, and the everyday impacts of partisan gerrymandering on our democracy here.

Private counsel working with CLC in representing the appellees includes Douglas M. Poland of Rathje & Woodward, Peter G. Earle, Michele L. Odorizzi of Mayer Brown, Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos of the University of Chicago Law School and Jessica R. Amunson of Jenner & Block.

Omissions violate federal law and Senate rules

WASHINGTON - Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) asked for an investigation into Alabama U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama for failing to disclose as much as $150,000 in income on his personal financial disclosure report filed with the Senate Ethics Committee.

Moore told the Alabama Ethics Commission in April that he earned up to $150,000 in speaking fees in 2016, but in June failed to disclose these payments to the Senate Ethics Committee, nor did he disclose any proceeds raised for his own legal defense fund, following his suspension from the Alabama Supreme Court. Moore also may have omitted other compensation earned and liabilities owed.

“Personal financial disclosure reports provide the most basic means by which voters can keep tabs on officials and track and deter payoffs and conflicts of interest, ”said Brendan Fischer, director, federal and FEC reform at CLC. “By failing to accurately report his income and financial interests, Moore is disregarding his basic legal responsibilities as a candidate.”

Moore’s omissions were first reported by the Daily Beast.

On Sept. 21, 2017, CLC issued a complaint requesting an investigation by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) into Foundation for Moral Law (FML), a charity Moore founded that was using charitable resources to promote Moore’s run for Senate. 

Suffolk Construction Company pays $34,000 fine, following CLC-D21 complaint; Priorities USA Action refunds the contribution

WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) received notification that the Federal Election Commission (FEC) 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, and that the company agreed to pay a $34,000 fine. CLC and Democracy 21 (D21) filed a complaint on July 6, 2016 alleging Suffolk violated the longstanding ban on federal contractors making contributions. This appears to be the first time that the FEC has fined a contractor for contributing to a super PAC.

“We applaud the FEC for upholding the integrity of the contractor contribution ban,” said Brendan Fischer, director, federal and FEC reform at CLC. “The reason federal contractors have been banned for 75 years from making political contributions is to prevent pay-to-play in the contracting process. Hopefully this decision by the FEC deters companies with business before the government from attempting to buy influence in the future. And we look forward to the FEC taking action on our outstanding complaint against GEO Group for violating the contractor contribution ban with its contribution to a pro-Trump super PAC.”

The law clearly prohibits federal contractors from donating to a political committee while negotiating or performing a federal contract.

“The FEC has been notoriously lax about enforcing the campaign finance laws,” said Donald Simon, general counsel of Democracy 21, “So it is good to see the agency take action at least in the case of a clear violation. The ban on contributions by federal contractors is an important bright-line anti-corruption rule and the contractor here flagrantly violated it by contributing $200,000 to a Super PAC. We are pleased that the agency did not, as it too often does, ignore that violation.”

Suffolk Construction‘s contributions put it among Priorities USA’s top donors in 2015. The FEC found no reason to believe Priorities USA Action knowingly solicited contributions from Suffolk.

WASHINGTON – Campaign Legal Center (CLC) will host an event, “Examining Foreign Interference in U.S. Elections” on Oct. 12, 2017 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Pillsbury Building, 1200 17th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20036.

The event will feature a series of panels and bring together campaign finance, cybersecurity, foreign policy, and other experts to examine lessons learned from the 2016 election and to look towards solutions. Lunch will be served. 

The event is part of a series of events marking CLC’s 15 years of advancing democracy through law, and is sponsored by Democracy Fund. 

Press should RSVP online via this link. 

WHO:  
Campaign finance, cybersecurity, foreign policy, and other experts (full agenda and confirmed speakers listed below) 
 

WHAT: 
“Examining Foreign Interference and Vulnerabilities in U.S. Elections” 

WHERE:
Pillsbury Building, 1200 17th St. NW, Washington, DC 20036

WHEN: 
10 a.m. EST to 5 p.m. EST 

AGENDA

10:00 a.m. 

Welcome
Trevor Potter, President of the Campaign Legal Center and Former Republican Commissioner of the Federal Election Commission

10:15 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. 

Foreign Interference in the 2016 Elections: Russia and Beyond 

Panelists: 
Dana Priest, Investigative Reporter, Washington Post
Michael Isikoff, Chief Investigative Correspondent, Yahoo News 

Moderated by Sandhya Bathija, Director, Strategic Communications, Campaign Legal Center 

11:30 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. 
Foreign Interference in the 2016 Elections: The Vulnerabilities of the Law Exposed 

Panelists:
Adav Noti, Senior Director, Trial Litigation and Strategy, Campaign Legal Center 
Joe Lorenzo Hall, Chief Technologist and Director of the Internet Architecture project, Center for Democracy and Technology 
Daniel Petalas, former head of enforcement at FEC and DOJ Public Integrity Section prosecutor

Moderated by Tara Malloy, Senior Director, Appellate Litigation and Strategy, Campaign Legal Center 

12:45 p.m. – 1: 15 p.m. 
Lunch 

1:15 p.m. – 2: 30 p.m.
Addressing Foreign Interference: How Can Disciplines Other than Election Law Inform Our Approach? 

Panelists: 
Max Bergmann, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress
Dr. Andrew Kuchins, Senior Associate, Russia and Eurasia Program, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Laura Rosenberger, Director, Alliance for Securing Democracy, Senior Fellow, German-Marshall Fund

Moderated by Norman Ornstein, Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and contributing editor for The Atlantic

3:45 p.m. – 5 p.m.
The Way Forward: Fixes for 2018 and Beyond 

Panelists: 
David Kolker, Counsel, Campaign Legal Center, and former head of litigation at the Federal Election Commission 
Philippa Scarlett, former White House deputy intellectual property enforcement coordinator 
Douglas Guilbeault, Oxford Internet Institute and Annenberg School for Communication

Moderated by Larry Noble, Senior Director and General Counsel, Campaign Legal Center