…ection ballot access. “So Florida and other states were very respectful of Americans Elects and went out of their way to ease ballot access … they didn’t want to get sued,” Winger, who edits Ballot Access News, told POLITICO Florida. “Now that the parties are suffering in Florida and are less powerful, the state feels it can change the rule with impunity.” When asked about the ruling, Beatrice, the department spokeswoman, pointed to a change made…
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…he Weekly Standard editor William Kristol to find a challenger to both Hillary Clintonand Donald J. Trump for a third-party line. His approach is similar to one used by a group, Americans Elect, in 1992, when it tried creating a ballot line unattached to a major party. Group’s website: BetterforAmerica.com….
Continue reading…n the United States runs deeply through its institutions, affects the ways Americans elect political leaders and how the institutions of government operate, and even puts in danger Americans’ deep-seated desire to serve their nation. Electoral System Reform View report section l View recommendations The commission is deeply concerned about the distrust that permeates the entire electoral process and that reverberates through both federal and state…
Continue reading…senfranchise No More, New York Times, Nov. 17, 2011 A Democracy Deficit at Americans Elect?, Politico, Nov. 9, 2011 Super-Soft Money: How Justice Kennedy paved the way for ‘SuperPACS’ and the return of soft money, Slate, Oct. 25, 2012 The Arizona Campaign Finance Law: The Surprisingly Good News in the Supreme Court’s New Decision, The New Republic (online), June 27, 2011 New York City as a Model?, New York Times Room for Debate, June 27, 2011 A Co…
Continue reading…e believe the cases are open and shut that the American Action Network and Americans Elect are not entitled to section 501(c)(4) tax status. For example, as we informed the IRS, an article from the Center for Public Integrity’s iWatch News (October 31, 2011) reported that American Action Network spent $30 million in 2010. According to the article and federal campaign finance reports, $26 million of the $30 million spent by American Action Network…
Continue reading…WSJ: “A nonpartisan group that’s planning to spend $1.75 million on TV ads supporting independent Angus King in Maine’s U.S. Senate race includes New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The first of two ads sponsored by Americans Elect went into rotation on Friday.”…
Continue reading…That’s the lead story in this month’s issue of Ballot Access News. This will eventually be on line, but there is a lag between the print and online version. But you want this news now, especially before the election. What to do? It’s easy. Subscribe!…
Continue reading…roups included Crossroads GPS, Priorities USA, American Action Network and Americans Elect. The letter sets forth recent published reports that show why the reform groups believe the overriding purpose of Crossroads GPS is to influence elections. The letter stated: Political operatives are using “social welfare” organizations as conduits for injecting secret money into federal elections by attempting to exploit what they claim to be purported ambi…
Continue readingABC News reports. WaPo has the group’s statement, which at least some opponents of AE thinks leaves wiggle room for something. After all, as Ken Vogel noted on Twitter, the group has a nice package of ballot access in a number of states. Richard Winger too notes the potential for the group’s ballot access use in the future. Meanwhile Lessig responds to Lumea on neutrality and AE, something which seems pretty moot. I expect Buddy Roemer will conti…
Continue reading…When is Tom Friedman’s column running when he explains why Americans Elect was not the next big thing? Weigel explains what went wrong….
Continue reading…“Tom Friedman said Americans Elect would be Amazon.com & an iPod wrapped up in the blogosphere. And now it’s Pets.com.” Peter Hart, via The Guardian….
Continue reading…Through the efforts of thousands of staffers, volunteers, and leadership, Americans Elect has achieved every stated operational goal. Despite these efforts, as of today, no candidate has reached the national support threshold required to enter the “Americans Elect Online Convention” this June. (Read a detailed summary of the AE process here and the full rules here.) Because of this, under the rules that AE delegates ratified, the primary process…
Continue readingSee here. “Though he says he’s in this race to win, if he became the Americans Elect candidate, he has now committed to a crucial promise: if at the end of the race, Roemer writes, ‘I discover I have no realistic chance of winning, I will ask my supporters to vote their conscience or for their second choice so the issue of spoiler can be dropped once and for all.’” I wonder how that will go down with the AE funders who decide which candidates get…
Continue reading…AE Transparency explains. See also With Failures Rapidly Mounting, What Is Americans Elect’s End-Game?…
Continue reading…He makes his case atThe Atlantic Wire. Earlier, Lessig and I had an exchange about the serious problems I have with Americans Elect’s transparency and its democracy deficit. I have also discussed Lessig’s campaign finance reform ideas in detail in a forthcoming Harvard Law Review book review (which also reviews a book by Jack Abramoff). …
Continue reading…ate enforcement action against Priorities USA, American Action Network and Americans Elect, other organizations which we believe are improperly claiming status under section 501(c)(4).” Priorities USA is a group that backs President Obama’s re-election, American Action Network is a group founded by former U.S. Senator Norm Coleman that supports Republican candidates, and Americans Elect is a group that has gained ballot access as a political party…
Continue reading…sing institutional corruption in a number of contexts at the EJ Safra Lab. Americans Elect has benefited from his insight and knowledge about corruption in our political institutions, as we challenge the traditional primary system by creating an online nominating process and achieving ballot access in all 50 states. “The Americans Elect’s effort to reform our political election system is a hard-fought and a worthy task. If we don’t reform our poli…
Continue reading…te in each election to contribute. The buying and selling of elections and public office must be stopped! John Lumea: “TOM FRIEDMAN might still be dreaming of a centrist “Third Party” — Bat Signal to Americans Elect — but it seems clear that Americans Elect itself is in the expectations-managing mode of scaling back and moving on from that ambition, at least for 2012.” …
Continue reading…The Guardian offers this report, with the subhead: “Group says their plan to take on America’s two-party system is on track – but a lack of engagement is hampering their cause.”…
Continue reading…“Not ignoring. We just won the People’s Choice Award at South by Southwest and on the road doing a tech tour. Perhaps we can catch up at another time.” –Americans Elect’s press secretary, responding to the Sacramento Bee‘s Dan Morain on AE’s flagging presidential campaign….
Continue readingNOLA: Meanwhile, there are four Feb. 29 postings on the Americans Elect site, under the heading “board decisions,” indicating changes to the bylaws and pre-convention rules that, it says, have been posted for delegates review. But it is not apparent what the changes are or where any more detailed explanation of the changes can be found for purposes of review. Next to each of the four items, it says, “this decision has been approved,” and if you r…
Continue reading…Part of the tour to restore Abramoff’s credibility (and continue to make money off lobbying, by talking about it, I suppose). It really strikes me a strange bedfellows, the three Musketeers of reform: Abramoff, Lessig, and Roemer. And the troubling internal democracy problems of Americans Elect….
Continue reading…Must-read John Lumea column on the continued internal democracy deficit at Americans Elect, and the serial violation of a neutrality pledge by Americans Elect’s leadership….
Continue reading…didates may be subject to reversal vote by the Delegates. I call for the specific reversal of the decision to add this clause. I am aggrieved by the clause because it takes away my ability as a delegate to choose who will be on the Americans Elect ballot, and instead places power in the hands of the Candidate Certification Committee, whose members are selected non-democratically by the Americans Elect Board of Directors, whose members in turn appo…
Continue reading…ate, declared or drafted, is on pace to actually meet the number of clicked supporters (10,000 for establishment candidates, 50,000 for outsiders) necessary to qualify for the ballot, which will almost certainly necessitate major rules changes. Americans Elect, then, is a high-profile third-party ballot access campaign without a candidate.” It is worth pointing out that if we had more reasonable ballot access rules for presidential candidates, the…
Continue reading…BuzzFeed reports, with the subhead: “After a quiet change to the bylaws, every penny the group brings in will be given to its rich backers, despite claims to the contrary. No wonder they’re not advertising it.”…
Continue reading…ing. Here’s my reply. Larry’s says he would like transparency of donors at Americans Elect, but he is not too troubled by the lack of transparency in this instance because, given AE’s structure, he does not believe that secret money could be used to corrupt a candidate (unlike Super PAC spending benefiting a candidate) in the AE process and it won’t affect the results of the AE candidate selection process. Further, Larry argues, maybe the concern…
Continue reading…Lessig responds to my query about his support for an organization which does not disclose his donors. His careful post merits a careful response. Stay tuned….
Continue reading…Americans Elect press release (via email): “We are giving all voters a serious third choice for president in 2012. We are unencumbered by special interest and Super PAC money. We’re not influenced by the political class of consultants or guided by Washington lobbyists.” The group does not disclose its donors….
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