NYT editorial: In a delicious bit of irony, Mr. McConnell needs Democratic support to pass his rider, because the Tea Party mavericks are opposing him. They say the extra cash would chiefly benefit establishment candidates, not Tea Party members,… Continue reading

David Keating and Brad Smith WSJ oped: Fights over campaign-finance laws are, more than other political struggles, fights over power. When power changes hands, new regulations are often put in place to benefit the victors’ political fortunes. The temptation… Continue reading

Eliza Newlin Carney writes from her new perch at The American Prospect. I’m looking forward to lots of Eliza columns free of a paywall this election season!

CPI: In total, 33 outside groups poured more than $32 million into their own political ads this year, accounting for more than one-third of the estimated $86 million in broadcast TV ad spending in the seven states with major… Continue reading

Russ Choma for Mother Jones: In February, a limited liability company called TH Holdings LLC donated $100,000 to Right to Rise, the super-PAC supporting Jeb Bush’s bid for the GOP presidential nomination. That’s not extraordinary; quite a few LLCs have… Continue reading

Fredreka Schouten for USA Today: Despite the resistance from House conservatives and liberal watchdogs, the push to strengthen political parties is gaining traction from establishment Republicans and Democrats. The liberal-leaning Brennan Center for Justice recently released a report that proposed… Continue reading

NJ ELEC: A heavy dose of independent special interest spending drove the cost of this year’s legislative general election above $30 million, according to a new analysis of disclosure reports by the Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC). The spending,… Continue reading

Didn’t see this coming: House con­ser­vat­ives are de­cry­ing an at­tempt by Re­pub­lic­an lead­ers to loosen cam­paign spend­ing lim­its, band­ing Demo­crats to­geth­er with anti­es­tab­lish­ment Re­pub­lic­ans and open­ing up a rare in­tra-party split on an is­sue that usu­ally unites the GOP. The… Continue reading

LAT: Nearly $2.3 million in donations made by charter school supporters during this year’s Los Angeles school board races were shielded from disclosure until after the election was over, a review of records shows. Those contributions — from philanthropist… Continue reading