[EL] ELB News and Commentary 11/6/14

[Sean Parnell]

I, at least, don’t recall saying corporations would never directly get involved in a race, only that it would be a rare occurrence and that it would likely involve some deeply parochial interest – GM in Detroit, Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis, something along those lines where the corporation isn’t seen as an ‘outsider’ but is a part of the community. Which does seem to describe the Chevron situation.

 

Don’t know if anyone else said it would never happen, though.

 

For those wondering why Chevron might be so interested in a city council race, I don’t know the details and don’t want to opine on who’s in the right or wrong, but they apparently want to upgrade their local refinery (a $1 billion investment) and have already promised about $90 million in ‘community investments,’ to Richmond, but it looks to me (on 5 minutes worth of research, so I could be wrong) that some on the city council want more, particularly to fund a community hospital – I’ve seen the number $27 million floated, which would be on top of the $90 million. So spending $3 million on a city council race might seem a good investment.

 

 

Sean Parnell

President

Impact Policy Management, LLC

6411 Caleb Court

Alexandria, VA  22315

571-289-1374 (c)

sean at impactpolicymanagement.com

 

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Lorraine Minnite
Sent: Thursday, November 06, 2014 1:06 AM
To: Rick Hasen
Cc: law-election at UCI.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] ELB News and Commentary 11/6/14

 

What does this example demonstrate about corporations openly sponsoring candidates in elections (other than the obvious point that money does not always determine the winner)?  As I recall much of the debate on this list in the aftermath of the Citizens' United decision, especially, opponents of campaign finance regulations argued that corporations would not do what Chevron has done here because direct sponsorship was too risky, it could damage the corporate brand.  Were they thinking that a city council race was too far under the radar for detection (or relevance)?  Call me naive but I am astonished at the fact that a huge, multi-international would feel so threatened by a city council race in an economically depressed city they'd throw $3 million at it.

 

Lori Minnite

 

 

Posted in  <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18> election administration,  <http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=23> pedagogy


 <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=68079> “Chevron Spends Big, And Loses Big, In A City Council Race”


Posted on  <http://electionlawblog.org/?p=68079> November 5, 2014 8:33 pm by  <http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3> Rick Hasen

 <http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/11/05/361875792/chevron-spends-big-and-loses-big-in-a-city-council-race?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=politics&utm_medium=social&utm_term=nprnews> NPR:

Early returns indicated the progressives’ grass roots strategy would be successful. By the end of election night, Butt had captured the mayor’s race with more than 51 percent of the votes cast, and the Chevron-backed candidate, City Councilman Nat Bates, garnered just over 35 percent.

As a distraught Bates told the  <http://richmondconfidential.org/2014/11/05/progressives-capture-city-hall-and-council-fending-off-chevron-money/> Richmond Confidential, “It’s a bloodbath, obviously. I think the citizens will suffer.”

Butt, who had accused Chevron of trying to  <http://www.tombutt.com/forum/2014/14-11-02a.html> buy the Richmond Council election, was ecstatic over his David versus Goliath victory.

“To take on a campaign that’s funded with $3 million and our modest campaign budget was about $50,000,” he said, “but we had a lot of grassroots help and we pulled it off.”

 

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