Campaign Finance

Nonprofit government reform group Common Cause supports citizen-funded elections, too, including campaign funding vouchers. Common Cause said it would prefer to see the current presidential public financing system modernized rather than see the fund emptied. “The disclosure laws and regulations have not kept pace at all with outside spending,” said Stephen Spaulding, vice president of policy and external affairs at Common Cause. “A significant percentage of money comes through ‘dark money’ groups that don't have to disclose where the money is coming from, and so voters are left in the dark, and this sort of secret spending is really dangerous for democracy because it means that you're no longer able to follow the money.”

Common Cause is pleased to announce that two Common Cause veterans have stepped into the role of vice president at the government watchdog. Longtime Common Cause leader Kathay Feng will step into the role of Vice President for Programs and Stephen Spaulding is returning to Common Cause from his role as Policy Director of the U.S. Senate Rules Committee and will serve as Vice President for Policy & External Affairs. Together the two will help lead Common Cause’s national efforts to reduce barriers to a more representative democracy. They will also support efforts for the organization’s 30 state operations working to create a 21st Century democracy that works for everyone.

Just days after the story came out, Common Cause, a Washington-based watchdog group, filed complaints with the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Election Commission alleging the $130,000 payment to Daniels amounted to an unreported, illegal in-kind contribution to the Trump campaign for the purpose of influencing the outcome of the 2016 presidential election, made in coordination with Cohen. At the time Common Cause did not know it was Cohen himself who had made the in-kind payment, but later amended the complaints to account for Cohen's claims, which the group noted exceeded the legal limit for campaign gifts by $127,000. No charges would be filed against Trump while he was still a sitting president, as is the custom rather than settled law, though Cohen did go to prison after pleading guilty to tax evasion and violating campaign-finance laws.

Senate Bill 1543 is the most significant public financing bill currently being considered throughout the nation. There are only a few days left in the legislative session for it to be scheduled for a hearing in the House Finance Committee. If that does not happen this very important bill dies. And that would be a serious blow to efforts to get big money out of politics.

“When the Republicans rewrote the laws in 2015 … they did it with the expectation that it would advantage them. They felt that the sources of money they could rely on, both outside groups and big contributors, would mean they would always have financial advantages in races like this. Just the opposite has happened,” said Jay Heck, the executive director of the Wisconsin chapter of Common Cause, a watchdog group. “That is the reason why [Wisconsin Democratic party chair] Ben Wikler and the Democrats have been able to be such a powerhouse.”

At the height of the Watergate crisis, the Department of Justice determined that the indictment or criminal prosecution of a sitting president “would unconstitutionally undermine the capacity of the executive branch to perform its constitutionally assigned functions.” That policy has not changed, but that is not the policy for candidates for the nation’s highest office. Running for president cannot and must not serve as a shield to allow criminal conduct to go unpunished.