Category Archives: campaign finance

ELB Book Corner: Karen Sebold: “Make the Federal Election Commission Great Again”

campaign finance, ELB Book Corner, federal election commission

I am pleased to welcome Karen Sebold to ELB Book Corner, writing about her new book, Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission. (Use that link with code LXFANDF30 for a 30 percent discount). Here is the third of three posts:

I want to thank Rick Hasen for the opportunity to post about my new book, “Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission.” My posts discuss the main themes of the book using edited excerpts from the book.

Today’s post examines one of the book’s primary themes: how to improve the Federal Election Commission (FEC). President Trump pledged to rid the political system of corruption during the 2016 presidential election, but by 2017, many Americans perceived the situation as worse than before he entered the White House (Norris, Cameron, and Wynter 2019). Instead, Trump and the Republican led Senate kept the FEC shut down for most of Trump’s first term by refusing to appoint commissioners to lead the agency. As of May 2025, it remains shut down again due to a lack of a quorum (four commissioners out of six must be present), following the exit of two Republican commissioners, Sean Cooksey and Allen Dickerson, and the firing of a Democratic commissioner, Ellen Weintraub, by Trump. The only silver lining of the FEC shutting down again is that it stops the Republican commissioners from killing the investigations against Trump. According to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the GOP commissioners blocked 29 investigations or taking action against President Trump (https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/gop-commissioners-have-single-handedly-blocked-fec-action-against-trump-29-times/).

The exploitation of the campaign finance system and the FEC’s failure to hold violators accountable are evident in the frequent news stories of improper use of campaign funds by politicians recently, and make it clear that campaign finance laws and rules are not self-executing and require a functioning agency. Yet, the agency is hobbled by a lack of resources, and the process of appointing commissioners has become politicized. The budget and full-time employees have not kept up with the astronomical growth of election finance activities. The rate of campaign spending doubles with each passing election cycle, resulting in a corresponding increase in the workload of the FEC. From processing the campaign finance reports to serving the number of filers of these reports, the work of the FEC is increasing tremendously as campaign finance activities increase at a phenomenal pace. In my new book, I illustrate how a decrease in full-time staff and budget at the FEC corresponds with a decline in fines and penalties. To effectively oversee the significant amount of campaign finance activities in the U.S., the FEC requires additional resources and the timely appointment of commissioners. Lastly, the political gridlock at the FEC must also be reduced.

One possible solution to achieving this goal is to increase the number of commissioners on the panel to seven while retaining the same requirement of four commissioners for quorum decision-making. Given the immense workload of the FEC, there is a legitimate case for adding more commissioners. Increasing the number of commissioners allows the panel to absorb the loss of a commissioner due to an untimely appointment or recusal. The extra commissioner could also be an independent to help reduce polarization. Adding one more commissioner to the panel makes this proposed reform to the FEC one of the politically easiest to pass. It requires little cost and does not change how decisions are made. It would allow the commissioner panel to proceed with agency business more flexibly when one or more commissioners are unable to vote or unwilling to agree with a decision. Additionally, if the president and Congress are unable to replace an FEC commissioner in a timely manner, perhaps the FEC could appoint an interim commissioner to serve until a commissioner is confirmed. However, given that the president and Congress are the primary targets of FEC investigations, it is unlikely that they will fulfill their responsibilities and repair the FEC.

References:

Norris, Pippa, Cameron, Sarah, and Thomas Wynter. 2019. Electoral Integrity in America:           Securing Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.  

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ELB Book Corner: Karen Sebold: “The Foxes Are Guarding the Henhouse: How Elected Officials Weakened the Federal Election Commission”

campaign finance, ELB Book Corner, federal election commission

I am pleased to welcome Karen Sebold to ELB Book Corner, writing about her new book, Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission. (Use that link with code LXFANDF30 for a 30 percent discount). Here is the second of three posts:

I want to thank Rick Hasen for the opportunity to post about my new book, “Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission.” My posts explore the book’s main themes using edited excerpts from the text.

Today’s post examines one of the primary themes of the book: campaign finance laws are only effective if the Federal Election Commission (FEC) is effective. In the U.S., the FEC is the primary agency enforcing campaign finance law. The FEC regulates and oversees the campaign finances of presidential candidates and members of Congress. These elected officials are the primary fundraisers and spenders of campaign contributions in U.S. elections; therefore, they, or their surrogates, are also the primary focus of FEC investigations. These officials could easily exploit the agency, as they control its administrative resources. This leads many observers to believe that the foxes are guarding the henhouse (Oldaker 1986; La Forge 1996; Sheppard 2007).

In my book, I illustrate how the agency’s resources do not match the major increases in election spending. Since 2000, most election cycles have surpassed the previous cycle’s spending level, with over $5 billion spent in the 2000 election and more than $18 billion by the 2020 election (https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/cost-of-election). Yet, the FEC’s budget and staff have minimally increased, if not stagnated, over the last two decades. The structure of the agency and legal requirements for decision-making exacerbate the issues at the agency. The agency is led by a panel of six partisan commissioners, with up to three Democrats and up to three Republicans. Four commissioners must agree on a decision when enforcing campaign finance law.  The requirement that four commissioners agree to an enforcement decision, while only three are allowed from one party, is challenging, especially given that the commissioners are deciding on claims of potential violations against their parties, candidates, or the independent political committees and nonprofit groups that support them. If an investigation is blocked or an enforcement action is stopped because four of the commissioners can not agree, that is as good as getting a case dismissed for the alleged violator. According to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the GOP commissioners employed this tactic 29 times as of March 2024 to block the FEC from investigating or taking action against President Trump (https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/gop-commissioners-have-single-handedly-blocked-fec-action-against-trump-29-times/).

The appointment of commissioners has been notoriously a slow process that often leaves the FEC without a quorum (i.e., four commissioners). This leads to a partisan imbalance from the appointment of too few commissioners (especially Democratic commissioners), as the Republicans have dominated the commissioner panel for years. I found these Republican commissioners were more likely to vote against enforcing the law. Critics of the agency (La Forge 1996; Skahan 2018) argue that the commissioner panel is structurally flawed, and as a result, alleged violators often go unchecked. The past few years do not inspire hope that it will improve, as the foxes in charge of the agency continue to undermine it. The FEC was essentially shut down during the majority of Trump’s first administration, and as of May 2025, it is now shut down again due to a lack of a quorum. In December 2024, Republican Sean Cooksey left before his term expired. In February 2025, Trump fired Democratic Commissioner Weintraub. Weintraub was serving well past the expiration of her term, but President Trump has given no indication that he will be appointing her replacement anytime soon. Republican Commissioner Allen Dickerson left in April 2025 before his term expired. The numerous shutdowns at the FEC lead me to believe the easiest way for the foxes to guard the henhouse is to keep the hens out of it.

UPDATE: “Dickerson and Cooksey did not exit early as mistakenly stated in the post but left when their terms expired.”

References:

La Forge, Amanda S. 1996. “The Toothless Tiger – Structural, Political and Legal Barriers to        Effective FEC Enforcement: An Overview and Recommendations.” The Administrative        Law Journal 10, 1: 351- 384. 

Oldaker, William, C. 1986. “Of Philosophers, Foxes, and Finances: Can the Federal Election        Commission Ever Do an Adequate Job?” The Annals of the American Academy of Political            and Social Science 486, 1: 132-145. 

Sheppard, Maurice C. 2007. The Federal Election Commission: Policy, Politics, and        Administration. Lanham, MD.: University of America Press Inc. 

Skahan, Kelly Ann. 2018. “Ineffective by Design: A Critique of Campaign Finance Law   Enforcement in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom.” Washington          International Law Journal 27, 2: 577-607. 

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ELB Book Corner: Karen Sebold: “Why Elon Musk Got Away with His $1 Million Give-Away: Loose Campaign Finance Laws and Even Looser Enforcement”

campaign finance, ELB Book Corner, federal election commission

I am pleased to welcome Karen Sebold to ELB Book Corner, writing about her new book, Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission. (Use that link with code LXFANDF30 for a 30 percent discount). Here is the first of three posts:

I want to thank Rick Hasen for the opportunity to post about my new book, “Evaluating Campaign Finance Oversight: An Assessment of the Federal Election Commission.” My posts discuss the main themes of the book, using edited excerpts from the text.

Today’s post explores one of the primary themes of the book: loose campaign finance laws and even laxer enforcement. Campaign finance is a complicated issue that involves a trade-off between the collective good of fair and honest elections and the constitutional right to participate freely in the political system. Congress struggles with what the law should restrict and what it should protect, and the Supreme Court and federal courts have made it challenging to limit political campaign finance activity, as they often uphold the constitutional right to participate freely in the political system when making decisions on campaign finance. This has led the U.S. to develop a loose campaign finance system that allows various entities to raise and spend money for electoral purposes, including political candidates, political parties, interest groups, wealthy donors, non-profits, and businesses, to influence the outcomes of elections. There is now a regime of outside groups that galvanize vast resources for electioneering activities to shape the outcomes of elections. In the 2024 election cycle, these groups spent over $4 billion on the federal races (https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/by_group). There are also numerous legal “gray areas” in campaign finance law that give rise to disputes about what can and cannot be done regarding campaign spending.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (FEC) in 2010 is often cited as a significant reason for loosening the campaign finance laws, as it removed prior spending restrictions on independent groups funded by corporations, labor unions, and wealthy donors as long as there was no coordination with the electoral candidates or political parties. Of course, most ELB Book Corner readers may be aware that this legal decision has been loosely adhered to, as electoral candidates are now increasingly relying on independent groups for campaign messaging and get-out-the-vote efforts. The Brennan Center for Justice highlighted how, during the 2024 election, when Donald Trump was trailing Kamala Harris in the money race, he “was able to compensate for this disadvantage by outsourcing much of his campaign to his super PACs and other outside groups funded by a handful of wealthy donors” (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/fifteen-years-later-citizens-united-defined-2024-election). Of course, who can forget the notorious $1 million a day giveaway to voters sponsored by Elon Musk’s America PAC in the swing states, aimed at encouraging citizens to register to vote.  Some election administration experts believe it is tricky to say this was a violation of the law because, technically, Musk was not paying people to vote or register to vote, but instead asked people to sign a petition promising to register to vote (https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/musk-1-million-voter-petition-lottery-falls-legal-gray-area-experts-s-rcna176362).

Other than a warning from the U.S. Justice Department that the sweepstakes may violate federal law (https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/23/politics/elon-musk-justice-department-letter). Musk has faced no other consequences for this brazen and potentially illegal violation of federal campaign finance law. It is unlikely that the FEC, the primary agency for overseeing and enforcing campaign finance law, will hold Musk accountable, given the loose legal framework under which the agency operates and the structure of the agency’s decision-making panel. My new book examines the FEC’s structure and how it operates, illustrating how campaign finance oversight is challenging due to the loosening of campaign finance laws, limited resources, and the hyper-partisanship at the FEC. The FEC is led by a panel of six partisan commissioners, with up to three Democrats and up to three Republicans. At least four commissioners must agree when making a decision on most agency decisions, making it easier to block a decision than to agree to one.

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“The D.N.C.’s New Leader Seeks to Curb Dark Money Influence in 2028 Primaries”

campaign finance, campaigns

NYT:

Ken Martin, the Democratic National Committee chairman, is taking a symbolic step toward curbing the influence of undisclosed and corporate funds in his party’s 2028 presidential primary, a move that is likely to instigate a broader conversation about the role of big money in Democratic politics.

Mr. Martin’s proposal, which was included in a packet of documents to be sent to D.N.C. members that was obtained by The New York Times, seeks to have a new reforms committee propose “real, enforceable steps the D.N.C. can take to eliminate unlimited corporate and dark money in its 2028 presidential primary process” by the summer of 2026.

The move is the first significant maneuver from Mr. Martin to shape the party’s next presidential nominating process. How much bite the effort has will be determined in large part by the enforcement mechanism the party seeks to implement.

Efforts to curb the influence of super PACs, which can take in unlimited contributions but must disclose their donors, in the 2020 Democratic primaries failed when the party’s leading candidates — from Joseph R. Biden Jr. to Elizabeth Warren — accepted and encouraged support from such outside groups….

It is unclear how the D.N.C. could enforce possible penalties against candidates who have support from outside groups with whom they may not be coordinating. Or whether, as President Trump and Republicans are moving to curb Democrats’ ability to regain power in 2026 and beyond, the party is willing to repel progressive donors who are willing to give unlimited amounts of money….

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“The Mothership Vortex: An Investigation Into the Firm at the Heart of the Democratic Spam Machine; How a single consulting firm extracted $282 million from a network of spam PACs while delivering just $11 million to actual campaigns.”

campaign finance, campaigns, chicanery

Must-read from Adam Bonica:

The digital deluge is a familiar annoyance for anyone on a Democratic fundraising list. It’s a relentless cacophony of bizarre texts and emails, each one more urgent than the last, promising that your immediate $15 donation is the only thing standing between democracy and the abyss.

The main rationale offered for this fundraising frenzy is that it’s a necessary evil—that the tactics, while unpleasant, are brutally effective at raising the money needed to win. But an analysis of the official FEC filings tells a very different story. The fundraising model is not a brutally effective tool for the party; it is a financial vortex that consumes the vast majority of every dollar it raises.

We all have that one obscure skill we’ve inadvertently maxed out. Mine happens to be navigating the labyrinth of campaign finance data. So, after documenting the spam tactics in a previous article, I told myself I’d just take a quick look to see who was behind them and where the money was going.

That “quick look” immediately pulled me in. The illusion of a sprawling grassroots movement, with its dozens of different PAC names, quickly gave way to a much simpler and more alarming reality. It only required pulling on a single thread—tracing who a few of the most aggressive PACs were paying—to watch their entire manufactured world unravel. What emerged was not a diverse network of activists, but a concentrated ecosystem built to serve the firm at its center: Mothership Strategies.…

The core defense of these aggressive fundraising tactics rests on a single claim: they are brutally effective. The FEC data proves this is a fallacy. An examination of the money flowing through the Mothership network reveals a system designed not for political impact, but for enriching the consultants who operate it.

To understand the scale of this operation, consider the total amount raised. Since 2018, this core network of Mothership-linked PACs has raised approximately $678 million from individual donors. (This number excludes money raised by the firm’s other clients, like candidate campaigns, focusing specifically on the interconnected PACs at the heart of this system.) Of that total fundraising haul, $159 million was paid directly to Mothership Strategies for consulting fees, accounting for the majority of the $282 million Mothership has been paid by all its clients combined.

But the firm’s direct cut is only part of the story. The “churn and burn” fundraising model is immensely expensive to operate. Sending millions of texts and emails requires massive spending on digital infrastructure. For instance, FEC filings show this network paid $22.5 million to a single vendor, Message Digital LLC, a firm that specializes in text message delivery.

The remaining hundreds of millions disappeared into a maze of self-reported categories: $150 million to consulting/fundraising, $70 million to salaries and payroll. There are some disbursements to what seem to be legitimate advocacy and organizing–for instance Progressive Turnout Project reports paying Shawmut Services $19 million for canvassing. However, most of the unclassifiable expenditures appear to be administrative costs or media buys that feed back into the fundraising machine itself.

After subtracting these massive operational costs—the payments to Mothership, the fees for texting services, the cost of digital ads and list rentals—the final sum delivered to candidates and committees is vanishingly small. My analysis of the network’s FEC disbursements reveals that, at most, $11 million of the $678 million raised from individuals has made its way to candidates, campaigns, or the national party committees.

But here’s the number that should end all debate:

This represents a fundraising efficiency rate of just 1.6 percent.

Here’s what that number means: for every dollar a grandmother in Iowa donates believing she’s saving democracy, 98 cents goes to consultants and operational costs. Just pennies reach actual campaigns….

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“Revealed: Elon Musk’s $1 Million Gift to Trump Inauguration”

campaign finance

Influence Brief:

A Jan. 15 in-kind contribution from X Corp., the social media company previously known as Twitter and owned by Musk, never appeared in any of the Trump inaugural committee’s original disclosure or in multiple amendments.

The donation only appeared in a supplemental FEC filing on July 18 — just days before a key federal lobbying deadline when lobbyists are legally required to report political contributions from their clients.

On July 30, a new lobbying disclosure filed by X Corp. confirmed the $1 million contribution.

Despite announcing plans to step back from political spending in May, new campaign finance reports filed July 31 reveal Musk kept making political contributions into at least June — even as his tension with Trump escalated.

Musk gave $45 million to his own pro-Trump super PAC, America PAC, with contributions into at least late June.

But Musk didn’t just give to his own super PAC.

Despite a dramatic falling out with Trump after his departure from DOGE, Musk gave $5 million to Trump’s main super PAC, Make America Great Again Inc., on June 27, according to new FEC filings first reported by Politico.

That same day, Musk poured another $10 million to the main super PACs backing House and Senate Republicans — with $5 million of that to Congressional Leadership Fund, which is aligned with House Republican leadership, and another $5 million to the allied Senate Leadership Fund.

Musk’s multimillion-dollar contributions made him the largest individual donor to both super PACs allied with congressional leadership during the first six months of 2025….

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“Donor List Suggests Scale of Trump’s Pay-for-Access Operation”

campaign finance, campaigns, lobbying

NYT:

When the cryptocurrency entrepreneur Eric Schiermeyer heard that President Trump was holding small group dinners with major donors, he saw opportunity.

Mr. Schiermeyer reached out to a lobbyist with connections in Mr. Trump’s orbit, who arranged for him to attend a dinner with the president at his private Mar-a-Lago club on March 1 in exchange for donations to a pro-Trump PAC called MAGA Inc. totaling $1 million.

The personal and corporate donations were among dozens of seven- and eight-figure contributions to MAGA Inc. from crypto and other interests revealed in a campaign finance filing on Thursday night that hinted at the access Mr. Trump accords those willing to pay.

At the dinner, Mr. Schiermeyer, who had never given a federal political donation before, presented an idea for a cryptocurrency called “U.S.A. Token” that would be distributed to every citizen, according to interviews and a flier he distributed to attendees that sets out details of the proposal. He hoped it could be supported through a federal contract with his company.

“I don’t usually put time and attention on politics,” Mr. Schiermeyer said in a text exchange with The New York Times. But, he added, “I was able to say my piece, and the idea is clearly making the rounds, so mission accomplished from my view.”

While the Trump administration has not given Mr. Schiermeyer any indication it is pursuing the U.S.A. Token idea, the episode underscores the face time that Mr. Trump has been willing to grant to deep-pocketed interests seeking business, preferential treatment or protection from him and his administration.

It also reveals how lobbyists, political consultants and others in the influence industry have capitalized on Mr. Trump’s aggressive fund-raising while in office to deliver for clients and earn chits with a president who keeps close tabs on who is delivering cash and listens to their appeals. It is a cycle that has helped Mr. Trump fill the coffers of his political groups, defying the gravity that sometimes drags down the fund-raising of term-limited presidents….

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“The Great Political Money Gap; When it comes to attracting mega-donors, Republicans are crushing Democrats.”

campaign finance, campaigns

NYT:

There are many signs that the Democratic and Republican Parties are in different places. Here’s one: The main Republican presidential super PAC controls almost $200 million. The main Democratic presidential super PAC is still repaying millions of dollars it accepted from someone who is now a convicted felon.

Such is the state of big-dollar political fund-raising, as last night’s filings with the Federal Election Commission made clear. When it comes to attracting mega-donors, Republicans are crushing Democrats. That could mean a lot more ads for conservatives than for liberals in next year’s midterm elections.

MAGA Inc., President Trump’s super PAC, collected about $177 million in the first half of 2025, in large part from cryptocurrency interests eager to curry favor with Trump.

The corresponding group for Democrats, Future Forward, had a slightly different tie to crypto: It spent the last six months disbursing $3.4 million to what is known as the FTX Recovery Trust, repaying money it had accepted during the 2022 election cycle from crypto-exchange executives like Sam Bankman-Fried. (Last year, Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison after being convicted of stealing billions of dollars from his customers.)…

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“Elon Musk gave Trump and the GOP $15M even as he was fighting with the president”

campaign finance, campaigns

Politico:

Elon Musk gave $5 million to Donald Trump’s super PAC during a dramatic and bitter falling out with the president, new filings show.

The donation to MAGA Inc. was made a month after Musk said he had “done enough” political spending, and he also gave $10 million that same day to help Republicans keep control of Congress.

The contributions came weeks into Musk’s public feud with Trump, as the tech billionaire was slamming Republicans for voting for the megabill that he argued would blow up the deficit. Still, the SpaceX CEO donated $5 million each to the Congressional Leadership Fund, the Senate Leadership Fund and MAGA Inc. on June 27, according to the groups’ filings with the Federal Election Commission on Thursday. Those are the top super PACs supporting the House and Senate Republicans and the Trump political operation.

The next week, the world’s richest man said he would start his own political party.

Musk, who spent $290 million of his own money to boost Trump and other Republicans last year, led the cost-cutting efforts of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency in the first few months of the Trump administration. When he left that role in May, he also suggested he was done with political giving for the time being: “If I see a reason to do political spending in the future, I will do it. I don’t currently see a reason,” he said at the Qatar Economic Forum.

The $5 million donation to the Trump-linked super PAC MAGA Inc. came weeks after Musk had torched Trump on social media, first over policy differences surrounding the president’s megabill, but also in escalating personal attacks. Musk later deleted some posts, but resumed his criticism of Trump, including his administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, in July….

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“Trump, Term-Limited, Amasses $200 Million War Chest for Political Ambitions”

authoritarian threats in US, campaign finance, campaigns

NYT:

President Trump’s super PAC is sitting on about $200 million that it can spend against his rivals, giving a term-limited president a never-before-seen amount of power in his party’s finances and future.

In the first half of 2025, Mr. Trump’s group, MAGA Inc., collected about $177 million from the likes of Elon Musk, Mr. Trump’s erstwhile ally, the TikTok investor Jeffrey Yass and the Silicon Valley executives Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreessen, according to a filing on Thursday with the Federal Election Commission.

Mr. Trump has been able to capitalize on a thirst from corporate America to get into his good graces. He held a half-dozen fund-raisers for his super PAC this year with tickets costing seven figures a seat. At the dinners, often held at one of Mr. Trump’s properties, executives and lobbyists had the chance to tell the president about their businesses.

The super PAC’s exact cash on hand is $196.1 million, according to the filing.

There is no precedent for politicians so aggressively raising money for their own entities when they do not have a campaign to use it for. In the first half of 2013, a similar political group supporting a term-limited Barack Obama, Priorities USA, raised just $356,000. As of that June, it held $3.4 million, less than 2 percent of the cash on hand of Mr. Trump’s super PAC.

The money raised by MAGA Inc. during the first six months of the year is almost twice the amount collected by the Republican National Committee, which is subject to contribution limits. Mr. Yass donated $16 million to the super PAC and Mr. Horowitz and Mr. Andreessen combined to donate an additional $11 million. His group also collected several seven-figure contributions from crypto companies, an industry that Mr. Trump has embraced, and $5 million from a crypto entity co-founded by the OpenAI chief Sam Altman.

That Mr. Trump is raising so much money for his group has confounded some Republicans.

Some of Mr. Trump’s most loyal supporters have argued that he should try to run for a third term, despite it being unconstitutional. Mr. Trump’s aides have argued that he would be foolish not to accept money that is essentially for the taking, and that the assets can be used to target Mr. Trump’s rivals, beginning with Representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican whom MAGA Inc. is attacking. Mr. Massie broke with Mr. Trump on the president’s decision to bomb Iran and on his domestic bill.

With a $200 million war chest, MAGA Inc. figures to be a big part of Republican primaries, making Mr. Trump’s endorsements in those races all the more important. The money is sure to be spent on advertising to back Mr. Trump’s endorsed candidates….

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“Old money: Campaign finance and gerontocracy in the United States”

campaign finance, campaigns

Adam Bonica and Jacob Grumbach have written this article for the Journal of Public Economics. Here is the abstract:

Politicians in the United States rank among the oldest globally. This study examines how money in politics contributes to age inequality in political representation. Using record-linkage to construct a novel data set combining the ages of voters, donors, and candidates, we find that the median dollar in US elections comes from a 66-year-old — significantly older than the median voter, candidate, or elected official. Results from within-district and within-donor analyses confirm that age proximity with candidates increases contributions on the extensive and intensive margins. Finally, we simulate candidate fundraising by age under a hypothetical campaign finance voucher policy.

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“[County Executive] Sam Page indicted on election and theft charges over St. Louis County proposition mailer”

campaign finance, direct democracy

STLPR reports:

A St. Louis County grand jury on Wednesday indicted County Executive Sam Page on charges involving the use of public money to campaign against Proposition B ahead of the April election.

The measure would have allowed the St. Louis County Council to fire certain department heads with five of seven votes. Six of the council’s seven members are generally combative with Page.

The county sent out a mailer in the weeks leading up to the election outlining consequences of the issue. The front of the mailer listed groups that opposed Proposition B and included wording from a court ruling ordering a change in the language appearing on the ballot. The “paid for” line said St. Louis County.

…

State law forbids any elected official to spend public funds to campaign for or against a ballot measure. Page faces two misdemeanor election offenses and two counts of felony theft “by deceit” over the spending of county money.

Page has said the mailer was informational only and did not advocate a position.

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“PG investigation: How dark money flooded the race for Pittsburgh mayor”

campaign finance

Post-Gazette:


With just weeks left in a grueling Democratic primary election that could shape Pittsburgh’s future, mayoral challenger Corey O’Connor’s dominant lead was slipping away as the incumbent seized the momentum.

With help from progressive supporters, Mayor Ed Gainey ramped up his campaign.

He launched a high-profile tour that showcased affordable housing projects carried out during his administration that had become a defining issue in the historic race.

His supporters also began leveling accusations of racism against Mr. O’Connor after an outside group supporting him — a PAC called Common Sense Change — mailed flyers to voters across the city saying Mr. Gainey was wasting public money by hiring his cronies.

As part of the push, Mr. Gainey’s campaign even released an internal poll in late April that claimed he had amassed a 7-point lead over Mr. O’Connor.

Then came the dark money.

A super PAC housed in a nondescript, eight-story office building that towers over historic townhomes in Washington, D.C., moved $90,000 into Common Sense Change.

Three days later, the same group, Democracy Wins, sent another $60,000.

In just a few weeks, the group would funnel a total of $366,000 into the race — a massive infusion that fueled an ad blitz to defeat Mr. Gainey and put Mr. O’Connor on a nearly certain path to victory in November.

For voters, there was no way to know who was behind the last-minute flood of cash — or what they might want from the people who run city government.

It was the second time in two years that deep-pocketed donors had concealed their identities behind a network of groups created largely to move vast amounts of money into Western Pennsylvania without anyone knowing the individual contributors.

At a time when Americans are demanding greater transparency in elections, the movement of dark money into the region underscores just how pervasive this new form of campaign spending has become and how it’s impacting the most critical races in local government….

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“Montana Initiative to File Bold Blueprint to Challenge Citizens United; New Amendment Would Use Corporate Law to Ban Political Spending”

campaign finance, Plutocrats United, Supreme Court

Press release via email:

 The Transparent Election Initiative, a Montana organization, today released the public draft of a historic constitutional amendment that takes direct aim at Citizens United—and the corporate and dark money it unleashed into Montana’s politics. The amendment will be officially filed with the Montana Secretary of State’s office on Friday, August 1. 

The 1,000-word amendment takes an innovative new approach by using Montana’s corporate chartering authority to no longer grant its corporations and similar entities the power to use money to influence candidate campaigns or ballot measures. By redefining the powers granted to corporations under Montana law, the measure aims to undo the practical effects of Citizens United within the state. 

“This is the first step in a process to place this amendment on the November 3, 2026 general election ballot,” said Jeff Mangan, former Commissioner of Political Practices and leader of the initiative effort. “Montana has a history of ensuring that citizens lead its elections, not corporations. With The Montana Plan, we continue that tradition.” 

The amendment’s legal structure, reviewed extensively by legal scholars and government leaders and crafted to withstand judicial scrutiny, uses a “reset and re-grant” framework that reaffirms only those powers necessary for legitimate business or charitable activity—explicitly excluding political spending. 

Rather than regulating political conduct, The Montana Plan redefines corporate powers at their source. Mangan explained that corporations only have the powers the state gives them—and Montana is choosing not to give them the power to spend in politics. This principle applies equally to out-of-state corporations, which under Montana law may only exercise powers that in-state corporations may exercise. As a result, Montana’s politics would be free of all corporate electioneering—whether by in-state or out-of-state entities. 

The measure would also eliminate “dark money” in Montana’s politics by no longer granting political-spending power to 501(c)(4) nonprofit corporations. Political committees organized exclusively for electioneering would still be allowed, but only if they claim no special privileges other than limited liability. …

You can find the text of the proposed initiative here.

Count me as highly skeptical that this approach around Citizens United would be accepted at the current Supreme Court.

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