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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has affirmed the dismissal of the plaintiffs’ case, upholding Michigan’s independent redistricting commission as consistent with the First Amendment.
Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint asking the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) to investigate possible violations of House rules by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy appears to have paid below market rate for a luxury apartment, an improper gift in violation of House gift rules; in the alternative, he may have used leadership political action committee (PAC) funds to offset the cost of rent, which would be a violation of the personal use ban.
On May 20, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) and Issue One (IO) submitted a letter to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) Commissioner Sean Cooksey urging his support for a rulemaking petition to ban lawmakers from using leadership PAC funds for personal expenses.
The Census Bureau produced a briefing memo for former Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross about the Census Bureau’s plan for estimating the undocumented immigrant population in response to Campaign Legal Center's (CLC) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the bureau. The memo includes strategic analysis on three options that the bureau considered using to carry out the Trump administration’s plan to exclude undocumented immigrants from the apportionment count.
CLC filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) alleging that the Democratic dark money group Big Tent Project Fund, which spent nearly $5 million in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary and appears to have a major purpose of influencing federal elections, violated the law by failing to register as a political committee and publicly disclose its donors.
On May 19, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed suit against the Federal Election Commission (FEC) for failing to act on our administrative complaint demonstrating that the Big Tent Project Fund, a nonprofit 501(c)(4) corporation, violated federal campaign finance law by failing to register as a political committee, to publicly disclose its donors, and to report all of its independent expenditures exceeding $250. CLC's administrative complaint has been pending with the FEC for more than a year.
On May 12, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) alleging that unknown donors secretly gave $75,000 to the Democratic super political action committee (PAC) Lone Star Forward in the name of "Tomfoolery LLC," which does not appear to exist.
This issue brief examines how the Census Bureau’s decision to use differential privacy to protect the confidentiality of the 2020 Census data will impact redistricting and voting rights.
On May 3, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a motion for summary judgment on behalf of plaintiffs Evangelina Aguilar, Candy Gutierrez, Rogelio Montes, Susan Soto Palmer and OneAmerica in the first case challenging a method of elections in Washington under the Washington Voting Rights Act.
Paul Smith, Campaign Legal Center's (CLC) vice president of litigation & strategy, testified on the Supreme Court's approach to deciding constitutional issues and the importance of fact-finding. He discusses two Supreme Court decisions, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and Shelby County v. Holder, to show how the Supreme Court made factual misjudgments in deciding those cases.
On April 25, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) submitted this statement to the Maine legislature in support of L.D. 1417, a bill that seeks to protect Maine elections from the potential for corruption and the appearance of corruption by banning direct corporate contributions to candidates. CLC supports this bill, with suggested amendments, because it aims to ensure that candidates and elected officials answer to their constituents and not just to the influence of wealthy special interests.
On April 23, 2021, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) posted messaging guidance for this case, advising that a case about the constitutionality of California’s confidential tax reporting law should not be permitted to dilute the Court’s well-established precedents upholding transparency laws. Permitting the wealthy and powerful to exempt themselves from disclosure to avoid a critical public response would harm political transparency laws and undercut the free flow of information and robust debate the First Amendment is meant to protect.