[A donor secretly transferred $1.6bn to a Republican political
group. Because of America’s lax laws, the donation was never
disclosed in any public record or database ]
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BILLIONS IN ‘DARK MONEY’ IS INFLUENCING US POLITICS. WE NEED
DISCLOSURE LAWS  
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David Sirota and Joel Warner
August 29, 2022
The Guardian
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_ A donor secretly transferred $1.6bn to a Republican political
group. Because of America’s lax laws, the donation was never
disclosed in any public record or database _

‘A billionaire transferred $1.6bn to a political group controlled
by Republican operative Leonard Leo, who spearheaded the construction
of a conservative supreme court supermajority to end abortion, block
government regulations, stymie the fight against c, Carolyn Kaster/AP

 

This week, the Lever
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ProPublica
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and the New York Times
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discovered the largest known political advocacy donation in American
history. We exposed a reclusive billionaire’s secret transfer of
$1.6bn to a political group controlled by the Republican operative
Leonard Leo, who spearheaded the construction of a conservative
supreme court supermajority to end abortion
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block government regulations, stymie the fight against climate change
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and limit voting rights
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This anonymous donation – which flowed to a tax-exempt trust that
was never disclosed in any public record or database – was probably
completely legal.

Whether you support or abhor Leo’s crusade, we should be able to
agree on one larger non-partisan principle: such enormous sums of
money should not be able to influence elections, lawmakers, judicial
nominations and public policy in secret. And we should not have to
rely on a rare leak to learn basic campaign finance facts that should
be freely available to anyone.
 

Unfortunately, thanks to our outdated laws, those facts are now hidden
behind anonymity, shell companies and shadowy political groups.
America is long overdue for an overhaul of its political disclosure
laws – and news organizations in particular should be leading the
charge for reform.

In the early 1970s, leaks and shoe-leather reporting by news
organizations uncovered the Watergate scandal – the modern era’s
foundational dark money exposé. That debacle birthed
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the original federal disclosure laws and a golden age of journalism.
For a time, the new statutes allowed campaign finance reporting to
become systematic, methodical and based on required disclosures,
rather than sporadic, random and reliant on the goodwill of courageous
whistleblowers.

A half-century later, however, the dark money practices of 50 years
ago have again become normalized. In 2020 alone, more than $1bn
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worth of dark money flooded around weak disclosure rules and into
America’s elections, financing Super Pacs, ad blitzes, mailers and
door-knocking campaigns. As millions of votes were swayed, reporters
and the public had no knowledge of the money sources, or what policies
they were buying.

Heading into the 2022 election, the situation is getting worse
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The two parties’ major
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Senate
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and House
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Super Pacs
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are all being funded by anonymous dark money groups that are not
required to disclose their donors.

These problems aren’t unique to the campaign arena. Front groups are
also shaping public policy, leaving reporters unable to tell voters
who exactly is funding what. In the last few years, an anonymously
funded group used post-election ads
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to successfully pressure lawmakers to water down landmark healthcare
legislation designed to eliminate so-called “surprise” medical
bills.

Similarly, Leo’s anonymously funded network spent tens of millions
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to boost the nomination campaigns of three conservative supreme court
justices, after leading a campaign supporting Republicans’ refusal
to hold a vote on Barack Obama’s 2016 high court nominee, Merrick
Garland.

To be sure, news outlets can still cover the shrinking portion of the
political finance system that still discloses some money flows to
politicians, lobbyists and advocacy groups. And thankfully, there are
occasionally disclosures like the Leo leak, which provide a fleeting
glimpse into the real forces influencing sweeping policy decisions.

But for every sporadic leak, there are scores of secret donors
systematically funneling ever more dark money into elections and
legislative campaigns without ever being exposed – and they are
reaping the rewards of corrupted public policy.

That’s the bad news. The good news is there is already a legislative
blueprint for reform.

The Disclose Act
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sponsored by the Democratic senator Sheldon Whitehouse, would force
dark money groups to disclose any of their donors who give more than
$10,000, require shell companies spending money on elections to
disclose their owners, and mandate that election ads list their
sponsors’ major contributors. These requirements would extend not
only to election-related activity, but also to campaigns to influence
governmental decisions – including judicial nominations.

A separate Whitehouse bill
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would additionally require donor disclosure from shadowy groups
lobbying the supreme court through amicus briefs designed to tilt
judicial rulings without letting the public know which billionaire or
CEO’s thumb is on the scale. And other pending legislation
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would finally allow the Securities and Exchange Commission to require
major corporations to more fully disclose their political spending.

Journalists should proudly advocate for laws like these, which allow
us to tell the public what its government is doing. Our industry has
done
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that before
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in defending open records laws [[link removed]], and we
must do it now in advocating for new campaign finance disclosure
rules.

In practice, that means reporters elevating the transparency issue and
demanding answers from politicians about where they stand on
disclosure laws – rather than ignoring or downplaying the rising
tide of dark money now shaping every public policy in America.

It means newspaper editorial boards advocating for campaign finance
reform.

It means media organizations lobbying for stronger disclosure laws at
the federal, state and local levels.

It means the journalism industry participating in – and at times
leading – this fight, rather than using objectivity as a cop-out.

This battle to update campaign finance disclosure laws and bring
sunlight to the darkest of dark money already faces powerful
opponents. In recent years, the US Chamber of Commerce
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and Koch Industries
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– which represent some of America’s biggest dark money spenders
– have been
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lobbying
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against the Disclose Act, preventing it from advancing for more than a
decade.

The Koch network recently convinced
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the supreme court’s conservative bloc to strike down a California
law requiring non-profit dark money groups to at least disclose their
major donors to state tax regulators, after spending to back some of
those justices’ confirmations to the court.

Most recently, conservative groups and Republican state attorneys
general have been trying to block a proposal to force companies to
disclose greenhouse gas emissions by arguing
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is unlawful “compelled speech” – a preview of the argument they
might use against new campaign finance transparency legislation.

Just as alarming, segments of the journalism industry itself have
opposed transparency efforts. The National Association of Broadcasters
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(NAB) — which represents the major media outlets making huge profits
off of dark money ads — tried to block a rule at the Federal
Election Commission a decade ago to require TV and radio stations to
disclose ad buys from political groups, arguing
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it would cost them advertising revenue.

The NAB has recently
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successfully opposed
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the Federal Communications Commission’s requirements that
broadcasters disclose when foreign governments sponsor material. NAB
is right now lobbying
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on the Disclose Act.

But this week’s revelations about history’s largest dark-money
donation should be an alarm telling us that the status quo must change
– and indeed it can change, even within the confines of the supreme
court’s own precedents.

In the landmark Citizens United ruling that unleashed the modern era
of big money politics, the majority noted that while it was unwilling
to permit political spending restrictions, it still held that
“government may regulate corporate political speech through
disclaimer and disclosure requirements”.

Those requirements are so desperately needed now – for the free
press to play its vital role, and for voters to make informed
decisions when they go to the polls.

But the only chance it will happen is if news outlets and reporters
get off the sidelines and enter the battle to secure what they need to
do their jobs – and what we all need to preserve our democracy.

*
David Sirota is an award-winning journalist who founded the
investigative news outlet the Lever [[link removed]]

*
Joel Warner is the Lever’s managing editor

* Leonard Leo; Dark Money; The Disclose Act; Campaign Finance;
Citizens United;
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