[EL] James v FEC

Wed Apr 2 15:11:48 PDT 2014

I will not predict the procedural vote for James (Remanded in light of
McCutcheon...?)

But the issues in James are wholly subsumed and mooted by McCutcheon v. FEC.

Steve
 On Apr 2, 2014 6:07 PM, "Richard Winger" <richardwinger at yahoo.com> wrote:

> John Tanner's e-mail reminded me to check on the status of Virginia James
> v FEC, 12-683.  It has its conference on April 4.  This is the plaintiff
> who accepts the $117,000 (which I guess is now really $123,200) but who
> wants to distribute her giving in violation of the subcategories of limits.
>
> Richard Winger
> 415-922-9779415-922-9779
> PO Box 470296, San Francisco Ca 94147
>
>   ------------------------------
>  *From:* John Tanner <john.k.tanner at gmail.com>
> *To:* "Beckel, Michael" <mbeckel at publicintegrity.org>
> *Cc:* Election Law <law-election at department-lists.uci.edu>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, April 2, 2014 2:19 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [EL] McCutcheon
>
> add it all together and it still won't get you an ambassadorship
>
>
> On Wed, Apr 2, 2014 at 5:13 PM, Beckel, Michael <
> mbeckel at publicintegrity.org> wrote:
>
>  It's also worth noting that there are effectively 4 different aggregate
> limits:
> 1)      $48,600 to all federal candidates
> 2)      $48,600 to all state and local party committees and PACs
> 3)      $74,600 to all PACs and party committees
> 4)      $123,200 to all candidates, PACs and party committees
>
> According to data from the Center for Responsive Politics, about 600
> people hit the candidate-only contribution limit during the 2012 election
> cycle, and about 1,700 people hit the party/PAC ceiling that cycle with
> their giving to national party committees, as we wrote about<http://www.publicintegrity.org/2013/10/07/13510/supreme-court-mccutcheon-case-could-aid-gop>at the Center for Public Integrity.
>
> The Center for Responsive Politics has more on this here:
> http://www.opensecrets.org/overview/mccutcheon.php
>
> Regards,
> Michael Beckel
> Reporter
> Center for Public Integrity
>
> *From:* law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:
> law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] *On Behalf Of *Paul
> Blumenthal
> *Sent:* Wednesday, April 02, 2014 5:07 PM
> *To:* Tyler Culberson
> *Cc:* Election Law
> *Subject:* Re: [EL] McCutcheon
>
>  I found 49 donors to have broken the aggregate limits in the 2012 cycle:
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/campaign-contribution-limits_n_3132474.html
>
>  The FEC doesn't do this kind of digging themselves. They don't ascribe
> unique identifiers, which makes it very hard to trace. I believe Adam
> Bonica has a paper on the FEC and unique identifiers that related to
> aggregate limits. That is now something the FEC doesn't have to worry about
> not dealing with.
>
>  On Wed, Apr 2, 2014 at 5:00 PM, Tyler Culberson <tylerculberson at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>  "I'm also curious how many donors have run up against the aggregate
> limit in the last decade."
>
>   I might check with Paul Blumenthal who had written an article in
> Huffington Post about donors crossing the biennial limit threshold last May
> in Huffington Post. I'd also note that this law had not been meaningfully
> enforced since 1990, when the FEC actually fined a small number of donors
> who exceeded the biennial limits.
>
>   On Wed, Apr 2, 2014 at 4:46 PM, Doug Spencer <dougspencer at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>    I have two questions for the list about today's "Battle of Competing
> Hypotheticals" also known as the *McCutcheon* opinion:
>
>  (1) Despite the "civility<http://www.scotusblog.com/2014/04/a-civil-day-on-the-bench-for-opinions-on-the-impolite-world-of-campaign-finance/>"
> in today's announcement, Roberts and Breyer are clearly frustrated with
> each other. Breyer, channeling his inner Oscar Wilde, even went so far to
> say that it's nearly impossible to read the majority opinion without
> laughing. But I don't read the majority and dissent as mutually exclusive,
> at least on the point of circumvention. Breyer describes what is
> *possible* and Roberts argues what is *plausible*. Can somebody offer
> some context on this point? Roberts argues that circumvention is unlikely
> because of the various anti-earmarking provisions that have been added over
> the years. But certainly these provisions have been added because of actual
> (or feared) circumvention. For those with a working knowledge of
> contribution bundling and earmarking, is it true as Roberts argues that the
> 100 PAC scenario (or other of Breyer's hypos) is "highly implausible"? I'm
> also curious how many donors have run up against the aggregate limit in the
> last decade. This fact is missing from the opinion and party briefs (I
> didn't read the amicus briefs), but it seems like a relevant piece of
> information, even if it could cut both ways.
>
>  (2) In footnote 7, the majority notes that just 8 of the 38 states with
> base limits also have an aggregate limit. What is the status of these state
> laws? Would state-specific evidence of circumvention be enough to preserve
> them? The *Citizens United* experience suggests that it wouldn't<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/supreme-courts-montana-decision-strengthens-citizens-united/2012/06/25/gJQA8Vln1V_blog.html>.
> But the holding in *McCutcheon* seems to be more fact-oriented than in *Citizens
> United *so perhaps individual state histories and campaign finance
> regimes will make a difference.
>
>  Thanks for any thoughts.
>  Doug
>
>  -----
>  *Douglas M. Spencer*
>  *Associate Professor of Law and Public Policy*
>  University of Connecticut
>  65 Elizabeth Street
>  Hartford, CT 06105
>  (860) 570-5437
>  http://www.dougspencer.org
>
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>  --
> Paul Blumenthal
> Huffington Post
> o: (202) 624-9384
> c: (202) 714-8545
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>
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