[EL] Why campaign spending is protected - in action

Sat Oct 10 13:10:44 PDT 2015

>From NYT:

"In marshaling their financial resources chiefly behind Republican candidates, the donors are also serving as a kind of financial check on demographic forces that have been nudging the electorate toward support for the Democratic Party and its economic policies."

And on the media, such as the New York Times, that provide millions in in-kind contributions to the Democratic Party and its economic (and campaign finance) policies.

They are overwhelmingly white, rich, older and male,

They are also more likely to have made their money in the private sector, more likely to work in the private sector, less likely to work in academia, Hollywood, or the press. They are more likely to have management experience, more likely to understand the impact of regulation on business, and more likely to have thought seriously about policy than the public at large.

And in the end, they voice their opinions, and voters decide how to vote.

No matter how you slice it, in the end campaign finance always comes down to the same thing-- a desire to silence views one doesn't agree with.

Here the idea is that we should silence the views of rich old white guys - at least the conservative (on economic policy) ones.

Wah!

Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] on behalf of Rick Hasen [rhasen at law.uci.edu]
Sent: Saturday, October 10, 2015 2:58 PM
To: law-election at UCI.edu
Subject: [EL] ELB News and Commentary 10/10/15

Breaking News: Automatic Voter Registration Coming to CA<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76585>
Posted on October 10, 2015 11:55 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76585> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

So tweets<https://twitter.com/melmason/status/652919923337920513> LAT’s Melanie Mason that Gov Brown has signed the bill automatically registering eligible CA voters from DMV offices (unless voters object). (More details on the new law.<http://www.projectvote.org/news/governor-brown-signs-padilla-bill-to-expand-voter-registration/>)

More on this later. This is a huge deal.

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Posted in Uncategorized<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=1>
Nick Confessore’s Deep Dive into America’s Plutocracy<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76583>
Posted on October 10, 2015 11:50 am<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76583> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Drop everything and read this<http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/11/us/politics/2016-presidential-election-super-pac-donors.html?_r=0> (online, because the graphics are fantastic):

Just 158 families have provided nearly half of the early money for efforts to capture the White House….

They are overwhelmingly white, rich, older and male, in a nation that is being remade by the young, by women, and by black and brown voters. Across a sprawling country, they reside in an archipelago of wealth, exclusive neighborhoods dotting a handful of cities and towns. And in an economy that has minted billionaires in a dizzying array of industries, most made their fortunes in just two: finance and energy.

Now they are deploying their vast wealth in the political arena, providing almost half of all the seed money raised to support Democratic and Republican presidential candidates. Just 158 families<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/11/us/politics/wealthy-families-presidential-candidates.html>, along with companies they own or control, contributed $176 million in the first phase of the campaign, a New York Times investigation found. Not since before Watergate have so few people and businesses provided so much early money in a campaign, most of it through channels legalized by the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision five years ago….

But regardless of industry, the families investing the most in presidential politics overwhelmingly lean right, contributing tens of millions of dollars to support Republican candidates who have pledged to pare regulations; cut taxes on income, capital gains and inheritances; and shrink entitlements. While such measures would help protect their own wealth, the donors describe their embrace of them more broadly, as the surest means of promoting economic growth and preserving a system that would allow others to prosper, too….

In marshaling their financial resources chiefly behind Republican candidates, the donors are also serving as a kind of financial check on demographic forces that have been nudging the electorate toward support for the Democratic Party and its economic policies. Two-thirds of Americans support higher taxes on those earning $1 million or more a year, according to a June New York Times/CBS News poll, while six in 10 favor more government intervention to reduce the gap between the rich and the poor. According to the Pew Research Center, nearly seven in 10 favor preserving Social Security and Medicare benefits as they are.

This is exactly the problem I talk about which needs to be fixed in my upcoming Plutocrats Unitedbook.<http://www.amazon.com/Plutocrats-United-Campaign-Distortion-Elections/dp/0300212453/ref=la_B0089NJCR2_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1430416698&sr=1-7>

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Posted in campaign finance<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, Plutocrats United<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=104>
“Menendez appeals judge’s ruling in corruption case”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76581>
Posted on October 9, 2015 3:32 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76581> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Jonathan Salant <http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/10/menendez_files_appeal_of_judges_ruling_in_corrupti.html> for NJ.com:

Lawyers for U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez on Friday asked an appeals court to throw out an indictment <http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/04/sen_bob_menendez_indicted_on_federal_corruption_ch.html> charging him with intervening with federal agencies in exchange for gifts and campaign contributions.

Menendez’s lawyers appealed to the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals a decision by U.S. District Judge William H. Walls on Sept. 28 to let the trial proceed<http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/09/judge_refuses_to_throw_out_menendez_indictment.html> against the Democratic senator and his friend and campaign donor, Dr. Salomon Melgen, a West Palm Beach, Fla., ophthalmologist.

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Posted in bribery<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=54>, campaign finance<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>, chicanery<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=12>
“Racially Polarized Voting”<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76579>
Posted on October 9, 2015 2:46 pm<http://electionlawblog.org/?p=76579> by Rick Hasen<http://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Chris Elmendorf, Kevin Quinn and Marisa Abrajano have posted this draft<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2668889> on SSRN (forthcoming, University of Chicago Law Review).  Here is the abstract:

Whether voting is racially polarized has for the last generation been the linchpin question in vote dilution cases under the core, nationally applicable provision of the Voting Rights Act. The polarization test is supposed to be clear-cut (“manageable”), diagnostic of liability, and free of strong racial assumptions. Using evidence from a random sample of vote dilution cases, we argue that these objectives have not been realized in practice, and, further, that they cannot be realized under current conditions. The roots of the problem are twofold: (1) the widely shared belief that polarization determinations should be grounded on votes cast in actual elections, and (2) normative disagreement, often covert, about the meaning of racial vote dilution. We argue that the principal normative theories of vote dilution have conflicting implications for the racial polarization test. We also show that votes are only contingently related to the political preferences that the polarization inquiry is supposed to reveal, and, further, that the estimation of candidates’ vote shares by racial group from ballots cast in actual elections depends on racial homogeneity assumptions similar to those the Supreme Court has disavowed. Our analysis casts serious doubt on the notion — promoted in dicta by the Supreme Court and supported by prominent commentators — that courts should establish bright-line, vote-share cutoffs for “legally significant” racial polarization. The courts would do better to screen vote dilution claims using evidence of preference polarization derived from surveys, or non-preference evidence of minority political incorporation.

Looking forward to reading this!

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Posted in Voting Rights Act<http://electionlawblog.org/?cat=15>

--
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
949.824.0495 - fax
rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>
http://www.law.uci.edu/faculty/full-time/hasen/
http://electionlawblog.org
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