[EL] Sen. Sanders and Citizens United

[Rick Hasen]

I have found that many reformers are sloppy (or worse) about these details. I talk about that in my book, and here’s Lee Drutman taking on Sanders’ talk of “a corrupt campaign finance system”

http://www.vox.com/polyarchy/2016/2/5/10908722/hasen-plutocrats-united

Rick


From: <law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> on behalf of Mark Scarberry <mark.scarberry at pepperdine.edu>
Date: Tuesday, July 26, 2016 at 9:42 AM
To: Election Law Listserv <law-election at uci.edu>
Subject: Re: [EL] Sen. Sanders and Citizens United

I realize that he could argue that Citizens United led to SpeechNow, so that overruling of Citizens United might allow contribution limits on PACs. It wouldn't prevent the super-rich from spending individually. The super-rich could still spend their own money.

Is it too much to expect Sen. Sanders to draw that distinction?

Mark Scarberry
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On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 8:56 AM -0700, "Mark Scarberry" <mark.scarberry at pepperdine.edu<mailto:mark.scarberry at pepperdine.edu>> wrote:
Didn't Sen. Sanders make the usual mistake in saying that Citizens United opened the door to unlimited campaign spending by the rich?

From the prepared text of the speech he gave yesterday:

"This election is about overturning Citizens United, one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in the history of our country. That decision allows the wealthiest people in America, like the billionaire Koch brothers, to spend hundreds of millions of dollars buying elections and, in the process, undermine American democracy."

Is it likely that this is an honest mistake? That's a genuine question. I don't know how sophisticated he and his advisors may be. Would it have been as politically effective if he instead had said that Buckley should be partially overruled? (Obviously, the answer to that second question is "no.")

I'm also curious whether any of the campaign spending this cycle has been by corporations controlled by the extremely rich (other than some media corporations that would have claimed refuge under Austin)?

Mark Scarberry
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