A lobbying battle is raging largely behind the scenes over a seemingly obscure executive order that could — if signed by President Obama — make public the political spending that many corporations can now keep secret.
Under the proposed order, all companies bidding for federal contracts would be required to disclose money spent on political campaign efforts, including dollars forwarded through associations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other private groups.
Election spending by such organizations soared to new heights in 2010, thanks in part to the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Citizens United case, which allowed corporations and unions to make direct political expenditures. The majority opinion endorsed disclosure of the new political spending, but many groups have formed as nonprofits, which do not have to reveal their funding sources.
Since then, campaign finance reform advocates and their Democratic allies have sought to unmask the secret contributions fueling the groups, arguing that such spending allows wealthy individuals, corporations and other special interests to have an outsized influence on elections without voters knowing who is behind the effort. [Read more]
WASHINGTON, April 26th — So much for détente.
After a brief truce of sorts between the White House and business leaders, the top lobbyist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce took aim at President Obama on Tuesday over an as-yet unannounced plan to force government contractors to disclose their political giving.
The lobbyist, R. Bruce Josten, said in an interview that the powerful business bloc “is not going to tolerate” what it saw as a “backdoor attempt” by the White House to silence private-sector opponents by disclosing their political spending.
“We will fight it through all available means,” Mr. Josten said. In a reference to the White House’s battle to depose Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, he said, “To quote what they say every day on Libya, all options are on the table.”
While no final decision has been announced, the White House has acknowledged that Mr. Obama is considering issuing an executive order requiring all would-be federal contractors to disclose direct and indirect political spending of more than $5,000.
The order could, for instance, force a military contractor or an energy company seeking federal work to report money it gave to the Chamber of Commerce or another advocacy group to help finance political ads and expenditures. [Read more]
But it’s not yet clear that the efforts could have a substantial effect on the 2012 election — or that Democrats won’t exceed Republicans in attracting undisclosed donations to their own newly formed organizations.
Even as Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and his pro-reform allies filed a lawsuit Thursday against the Federal Election Commission demanding donor disclosure, other Democrats were raising substantial contributions for 2012 campaign advertising. And two former White House aides have been talking of setting up their own independent group that could include a nonprofit arm to shield the identities of major donors.
The White House railed against independent campaign spending financed by secret donations in the 2008 and 2010 elections. President Obama has emphasized disclosed and limited donations of the sort he raised at events in San Francisco and Los Angeles this week.
But now there is a growing consensus that Democrats should begin their own efforts to collect large-dollar undisclosed donations, or risk defeat. [Read more]
The case: Citizens United. The decision: In a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional to limit in any way the amount of money corporations can spend on attack ads or other “electioneering communications” to sway a political race.
Before Citizens United, plenty of corporate money had found its way into political PACs and other avenues to influence elections. The court also did nothing to strike down the ban on direct corporate contributions to candidates or political parties.
But the decision opened a massive loophole in our country’s already-porous campaign finance system, giving corporations the green light to inject unlimited sums of cash into independent groups — 527s and 501c4s, references to their IRS tax status — that can intervene in elections.
After the January 2010 decision, many in the media reported that corporations may be skittish about fully exploiting Citizens United’s political windfall, but that proved premature. Millions of dollars began flooding into existing electioneering like Americans for Prosperity, backed by benefactors like the Koch brothers and North Carolina retail magnate Art Pope. New groups like Karl Rove’s American Crossroads andAmerican Crossroads GPS were quickly erected to funnel tens of millions of dollars into key congressional races. (READ MORE) [Read more]
Pity the campaign finance reform activist. For years he’s fought to wring big money out of politics and shine a spotlight on who’s funding campaigns. But less than a decade after that shining moment for the campaign finance reform movement, the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (known as McCain-Feingold after its two chief Senate sponsors, John McCain and Russ Feingold), its successes are unraveling and its prospects look dimmer by the day.
The 2010 elections will likely see more than $300 million spent by conservative independent groups who disclose little or nothing about their donors. (Pro-Democratic unions will spend perhaps half that, though their funds come from rank-and-file members, not outside donors.) That comes on the heels of a January 2010 Supreme Court ruling in the Citizens United case, which declared that corporations and unions are entitled to spend their money on direct electioneering — meaning to help or defeat candidates — as a function of their free speech. Campaign reformers say the Citizens United decision has effectively served as a green light for a new torrent of corporate cash that’s being funneled in the political system through intermediary groups, like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which take advantage of legal loopholes to keep their donors anonymous. [Read more]