Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Diane wrote me earlier this week about a WSJ article by former Oregon senatorial candidate James Huffman (now behind the paywall, but another copy here) about how having your campaign donors known to your opponents made it more difficult for challengers. That story does ring true to me. When I first decided to run for office I was challenging a well-liked incumbent whose personality covered for many votes he made that were more liberal than our district. (It's a blue district, but not THAT blue, I thought.) Knowing the business community from my work on regional economics, I had assumed they would be open to being approached. And many thought the incumbent was as I saw him, a nice guy who was too liberal. So, I asked, you will support me, right? Can you write a check for $250? More than a few gave me a nervous look at that moment.
Minnesota law requires any donation above $100 to be reported. The maximum donation I could receive was $500. So in order to be undetected, they would have to stay below the $100 threshold, which makes raising money difficult. I certainly ran a lower-visibility campaign than Mr. Huffman in the WSJ article, but there is a report that comes out in late-July that would have exposed my early supporters to scrutiny.
Now, lucky for me, the incumbent decided late the following month to retire from office. I'd like to think it was because of me, but I doubt it. We ended up running a well-funded campaign and, given I won against a non-incumbent by a razor-thin 13 votes (after recount), the combination would most likely have doomed me.
We have made it easy to search a database to look for who donated to whom. It seems good. But it is interesting to me that our Governor Mark Dayton has made it a priority to get quarterly reporting of donors. Now why would they want that? After Mr. Huffman's artlcle, we know why.
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Jun '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
That's why having your people run the bureaucracy, the nuts and bolts of government, is a great advantage. They can read donor lists too. And they have money and benefits at stake. In fact, we taxpayers are probably paying for some of their opposition research time.
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Thanks for writing about this topic, King! Would you then agree with Huffman that requiring transparency in campaign donations is actually harmful to democracy? In national elections, I've always believed that it's important to know where the money for a campaign is coming from so that everyone knows to whom a politician is beholden. But perhaps the law should protect anonymity for donors of such small amounts. After all, donating $250 to a campaign won't result in any special favors...
Apr '11
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
I'm even more concerned about individual donors. We've reached the point where the logic of the secret ballot should apply to small donations This is even more pressing today given the thuggery and intimidation we've seen the last few years, notably the harassment of small donors to the Prop. 8 campaign. Leftist groups now circulate donor lists to activists. Its bad enough that conservatives living in liberal areas have long known a political bumper sticker is likely result in a keyed car. After watching insane mobs ransack a state capital anyone with a family would be wise to consider that giving to a candidate means your name AND home address will be published online for the world to see. Also, that donation may come up when your name is googled. Better take that into consideration if you're looking for work.
For all they hysteria over Facebook privacy settings and Google earth images its sad that this issue isn't discussed more. On the other hand, its sad that it has to be discussed at all.
Sep '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Let me see if I understand this correctly. The right to donate is protected because money equals speech. Now the argument is being made that there might be a right to donate anonymously. Is this not arguing that we have a right to speech that is not heard? I always thought that freedom of speech had something to do with being heard. If potential donors don’t want their views known they can keep their mouths shut and their money in their pockets. Not having the courage of ones convictions has consequences.
May '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Lefty Jim: "Is this not arguing that we have a right to speech that is not heard?"
No. This is arguing that we have a right to speech that is heard, but not attributed. The non-attribution is to protect the speaker from the thuggish intimidation of leftists in the public and in the regulatory bureaucracy.
Dec '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Freedom of speech has nothing to do with being heard. I have the right to speak, you are not forced to listen.
Actually, the main issue is with liberal intimidation of donors. A perfect example is Dayton's opponent. A number of companies gave relatively small donations to a business group that supported Dayton's Republican opponent, Tom Emmer, based on the fact that he wouldn't be a thorn in the side of business.
The Left decided to make an issue of it because Emmer opposed gay marriage. So they went after the Target corporation for their donation. Their donation, of course, had nothing to do -- one way or the other -- with gay marriage.
But notice what they did: Instead of accusing Emmer of being in the pocket of big donors, the point of such sunshine laws, they used brownshirt tactics to go against the donors.
May '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Amish Dude: "Freedom of speech has nothing to do with being heard. I have the right to speak, you are not forced to listen."
I don't think anyone was talking about forcing anyone to listen. Speech that cannot be heard by a significant share of the electorate is not really speech. The issue raised by King Banaian, and which you provided further evident of, is the brownshirt tactics of the left. Lefty Jim has more than half a point about the practical necessity for enough brave people to stand up for their positions, but even lefties used to be very concerned about "chilling" free speech. Now, we see a person who calls himself "Liberal" saying things like, "If potential donors don’t want their views known they can keep their mouths shut..."
Dec '10
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Point(s) well taken, Functionary.
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
I think you are right to identify the size as being important. One thing to remember in MN is that our state House elections are not big affairs; an active campaign spends $25-$35k on its own; outside parties can spend a good bit more, but still someone putting $1000 in a campaign (a married couple can do that) has an important effect on the election, one could argue.
Maybe think of it this way: We do allow anonymous speech in this country (not true in all countries that say they have freedom of expression.) If money is speech, does that mean donations should be anonymous? The fact that we make the size of the donation important would seem to mean we don't believe in anonymity. And I agree. So while it does protect incumbents, the disclosure rules may be a second-best solution to prevent undue influence of our elected officials.
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
Let me add something to my previous comment, Jim. The right to free speech is a property right: You can say "King's a jerk" in the street in front of my house, but try to come in my house and say it and you're out on your ear. So the question is who owns elections and the campaign funds that finance them? Are those public squares? Does the state have a police power to limit speech for "time, place and manner"? The law says yes; what should the law be? That's the question.
Apr '11
Re: Funding Campaigns in the Limelight
liberal jim,
In the past this information was at least protected by a buffer of red tape. The ease of access via internet changes that.
Ensuring the freedom to participate in the process should be the primary goal of election law. The secret ballot was an essential step toward this end (one reform the progressives actually got right). Given that fundraising of a candidate or group is essential to its ability to get its message out, intimidation of small donors has the potential to swing election. If I intend to donate $100 to Candidate X, yet decline solely out of a reasonable concern for my safety, job security etc. that effectively gives a $100 advantage to Candidate Y.
These days such intimidation seems to come primarily from the left. But it could easily come from any side. What I don't want to see are extremists from both sides who feel they must resort to similar tactics just to compete.
This problem is easily solved by allowing small donors anonymity. What is the downside here? (and the question is not rhetorical. I want to know if I'm missing any huge unintended consequences).