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I broke a record. I have raised more money than any Democratic challenger ever for my state’s at-large U.S. House seat. Surely, then, my cup runneth over and my faith hath been restored, right? Yet, as I was riding home from an event the other day, I blurted, “The campaign finance system is completely (expletive) broken!” Oh me of little faith! Familiarity, it seems, has bred contempt.
My opponent, Julie Fedorchak, and her political-insider friends reserve their contempt for anyone who criticizes their sketchy behavior. It is completely unfair for me to talk about how she has taken campaign contributions from companies she regulates. After all, she got reelected, so it must follow that there is nothing to see here. But it does not follow. It is a non sequitur, an ad populum argument made even less logical by the fact that voters in those elections were unaware of those troublesome campaign contributions. Her political opponents had failed to point them out.
Someone pointed them out, though. In 2012, the Sierra Club and the Dakota Resource Council sued over the issue in Federal court. The decision was handed down in 2013, while Fedorchak was already a Public Service Commissioner. While the case was decided in favor of the PSC, the judge included a harsh rebuke of the Public Service Commissioners’ practice of accepting campaign contributions from PACs associated with the companies they regulate.
“This order should in no manner be construed as an endorsement,” the judge said of the PSC’s behavior. “Although the acceptance of campaign contributions from such entities may be lawful,” he added, “the decision to do so is ill-advised, devoid of common sense, and raises legitimate questions as to the appearance of impropriety.”
The Fargo Forum’s editorial board agreed, saying that they hoped that PSC members would stop accepting unethical campaign contributions from industries they regulate. They urged Fedorchak and the other Public Service Commissioners to listen to the judge’s advice and remain above the appearance of impropriety. Just because something is legal, they said, doesn’t mean that it’s right.
Most of us, warned by a Federal judge that something was ill-advised and devoid of common sense, and warned away from it by the media, would avoid doing that thing. Not my opponent. She went right ahead and accepted numerous donations from people and PACs closely associated with companies she regulated. There was no appearance of impropriety in her eyes when North American Coal Company PAC donated $10,000 to her campaign one month and the PSC approved North American Coal Company’s mining operation the next. Entitlement, it seems, can make it hard to see impropriety.
Perhaps she saw the judge as some liberal do-gooder not worthy of her attention. That would require some heavy-duty squinting, since the judge was a George W. Bush appointee who had worked in a Republican governor’s administration. Just last year, the same judge was praised by Governor Doug Burgum for his decision blocking the Biden Administration’s Waters of the U.S. rule. It seems the judge was unworthy of Fedorchak’s attention despite his ideology, not because of it.
The Forum Editorial Board was not a concern, of course. Fedorchak knew they could be ignored and might even come around to her way of thinking, which is exactly what happened. Kevin Cramer was one of the Public Service Commissioners whose acceptance of slippery campaign contributions inspired the Sierra Club and the Dakota Resource Council to sue. This year, the Forum endorsed both Cramer and Fedorchak, thereby also endorsing the behavior they once agreed was ill-advised and devoid of common sense. For them and for many well-connected Republicans in North Dakota, the bar for ethical behavior has been set at “not illegal,” and even that has recently presented a trip hazard.
Many pundits have blamed Donald Trump for the destruction of ethical norms in government, but North Dakota’s Republican nominees for Senate and the U.S. House were way ahead of him, and that has consequences far beyond state borders. If we continue to fill Congress with people who can’t or won’t discern between legal and ethical, we cannot be surprised when insider trading and self-enrichment takes priority over good legislation. When PACs and big donors get our representatives elected, we cannot be surprised, when they give working people short shrift.
My last quarterly fundraising report and my opponent’s could not be more opposite, though the overall total was almost exactly the same. My campaign brought in $279,093 in unitemized—$200 or less—contributions and hers brought in only $6,866. She received $192,750 from PACs compared to my $520. The overall totals from individual donors are shown below, and you can find more at https://www.fec.gov/data/elections/house/ND/00/2024/ .
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As you can imagine, gathering those small-dollar donations is a lot of work. It is also very gratifying. Notes of hope and encouragement have accompanied many of those small donations. I often carry a few of them with me and have others posted on my refrigerator and over my desk. My opponent has called hers a “grass-roots” campaign, but the numbers tell a different story. They tell the story of yet another candidate who would show up to the U.S. House beholden to PACs and big donors, a candidate with a proven record of setting the bar at “not illegal.” We can do better.
I am forever grateful to all who have contributed to my campaign, financially or otherwise. I have learned more about campaign finance than I ever wanted to know, and the system really is broken and stacked in favor of the already wealthy and powerful, but we can fix that. I have also learned more about the real struggles faced by regular Americans who just want to do their work and get by with a little left over at the end of the month.
Along the way, I have changed minds and had my own mind changed. I have learned to separate the individual from the ideology and find points of agreement and of agreeing to disagree. I have seen enthusiasm ebb and then explode. I have seen candidates enter races to challenge previously unopposed incumbents. I have seen people who were apathetic become engaged and folks who were hiding emerge defiant. I enter the final stretch more hopeful for the future of my state and our country, and I pledge to continue working toward a better America regardless of whether I win or lose this election. To do otherwise would be ill-advised and devoid of common sense.
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