News Clips

Susan Lerner, the executive director of the civic watchdog group Common Cause New York and a proponent of all three initiatives, argued that the success of Republican and Conservative attacks highlighted the fragility of democracy itself. “There was a strong anti-democratic push and the pro-democracy folks stayed home,” she said. Finally, as written, the ballot questions, which required voters to flip their ballots over to weigh in, were hard to understand, according to Common Cause and like-minded groups. “The ballot language for 1, 3, and 4 was frankly impenetrable,” Ms. Lerner said of the three measures that went down to defeat.

Jennifer Parenti, Northern Colorado organizer for Colorado Common Cause, said, “Communities of color make up about 30% of the state’s population overall. But unfortunately, this proposed congressional map does not reflect that diversity. It, rather, splits our communities of color across multiple districts, while seemingly prioritizing municipal boundaries and protecting incumbents.”

Paul Ryan, vice president of policy and litigation at the campaign finance watchdog group Common Cause, agreed that the outstanding invoice could be considered an unreported debt. But he also offered a more pointed analysis. “Sounds as though Marjorie Taylor Greene has received and failed to report an illegal contribution,” Ryan said. In the campaign finance world, a “contribution” is not just money—it’s anything of value for the purpose of influencing an election. Goods and services, such as legal work, are considered “in-kind contributions,” and campaigns must either report receiving them or pay for them outright. In this case, Ryan observed, it appears neither of those things happened. “This could have gone a different way: A lawyer provides services, invoices the candidate for those services, and then the candidate pays for them,” Ryan said. “But it didn’t go that way here, and what we see is unpaid legal services that amount to an illegal contribution.” Ryan added that the bottom line was that, “if a candidate pays, it’s fine; if not, it’s an in-kind contribution.”

It’s time for congressional Republicans to learn from the states, listen to the voters and find their way back to the principle of a government “by the people.” Our generation has a responsibility to add our own chapter to the unfolding story of freedom. It’s beyond time for Senate Republicans to advance the Freedom to Vote Act. If they don’t, Senate Democrats must reform the filibuster to protect our sacred freedom to vote.

A group of advocacy organizations led by Common Cause has asked Facebook to revisit its policy of allowing Save America to advertise as long as it doesn’t use Trump’s voice, since it was established by Trump days after the 2020 election. Facebook has not yet made clear whether Trump will be able to operate a campaign under the same rules, possibly permitting him to advertise his 2024 effort on the site. “The response we got was we have no answer for you at the moment,” said Yosef Getachew, the director of Media and Democracy Program at Common Cause, of his conversations with the company. Facebook’s spokeswoman did not comment on the company’s discussions with Common Cause.

“By cynically ignoring the law, legislative leaders are crafting maps that would unconstitutionally deprive Black voters of a voice in choosing their representatives,” added Bob Phillips, executive director of Common Cause.