Political Donations - Disclose or Conceal?

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
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Staff Member
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So inspired by this article on National Review:
In deciding to tweet out the names and occupations of max-level donors to the Trump campaign, Representative Joaquin Castro (D., Texas), the brother of Democratic presidential candidate Julián Castro, simply made the dangerous logic of our modern campaign-finance laws more explicit.

The donors singled out by Representative Castro are mostly ordinary people — realtors, retirees, store owners, the owner of a barbecue restaurant. These private citizens were singled out by Castro, who accused them of “fueling a campaign of hate that labels Hispanic immigrants as invaders.” Set aside the truth value of the statement, which predictably and dishonestly ignores the difference between legal and illegal immigration, Castro’s ability to harass random donors to his political opponents is not a bug of our current campaign-finance laws but a feature. We can fix that “feature” only if America reforms its donor-privacy laws.

The 1974 amendments to the Federal Election Campaign Act force every candidate for public office to publicly disclose not just the names but also the addresses and employment information of donors who give more than $200 to his or her campaign. In many states, the dollar amount is even lower. The purported purpose of this measure was to identify those people who might use their money to exert undue influence on the democratic process. Whatever the wisdom of such an act might have been in 1974, its authors didn’t contemplate a world where such information would be publicly available to anyone with the click of a mouse.

I figured this would be an interesting policy discussion on if all political donations should be public knowledge, and if so, why and what limits, and if not, why and why not?
 

FriedCFour

PunishedCFour
Founder
So inspired by this article on National Review:


I figured this would be an interesting policy discussion on if all political donations should be public knowledge, and if so, why and what limits, and if not, why and why not?
There is value to having them be public. You should know where the money is coming from to politicians. Politicians using it to name and shame and get public harassment against average citizens who donated to an opponent though? Pretty messed up.
 

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
Administrator
Staff Member
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There is value to having them be public. You should know where the money is coming from to politicians. Politicians using it to name and shame and get public harassment against average citizens who donated to an opponent though? Pretty messed up.
Like I said, where should that cut off point be?

The original idea, in the original law, was that it would prevent corruption by making it more obvious when influence was bought. The article goes into more detail, but that level was set at $200 in the 70s, which is now around $1000... but the cost of campaigning has actually outpaced the rise in inflation, so even if you indexed the reporting requirements to inflation, that amount of money would still represent less "influence" than it did when the current laws were passed.
 

FriedCFour

PunishedCFour
Founder
ke I said, where should that cut off point be?

The original idea, in the original law, was that it would prevent corruption by making it more obvious when influence was bought. The article goes into more detail, but that level was set at $200 in the 70s, which is now around $1000... but the cost of campaigning has actually outpaced the rise in inflation, so even if you indexed the reporting requirements to inflation, that amount of money would still represent less "influence" than it did when the current laws were passed.
I dont know in all honesty, its a hard line to draw. I think PACs should absolutely be open but when you are donating the $5,000 max I think that should be undisclosed given you arent coming even close to having influence over a congressperson at 5k. Like the article pointed out, $200 back then is worth less than 5k now.
 

Hlaalu Agent

Nerevar going to let you down
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There is value to having them be public. You should know where the money is coming from to politicians. Politicians using it to name and shame and get public harassment against average citizens who donated to an opponent though? Pretty messed up.

There is value, and yes it is messed up. So the question is what sort of cap should be set, and for whom. I think organizations should definitely be listed, but even then I'd say small organizations probably should be exempt for the same reason I'd say small donors should. And I'd say anyone donating a small amount ought to be hidden, because they are likely not going to be able to defend themselves from retaliation, while those who can afford large amounts, should be able to afford this.
 

Marduk

Well-known member
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By common sense 200$ or 1000$ is not going to buy one influence with any national level politician in the US, nevermind the president.

Another issue is that back in the time when this law was established, the problem illustrated here did not exist, due to a rather different political climate and also information dissemination environment, very much before IT revolution era.

Raising the cap to reach only donors probably rich enough to have lawyers and security on standby anyway to deal with this sort of stuff is one obvious solution. Which would be what, 20k? 100k? 200k? No idea, but probably something within that region.
Another is for the other side to take this escalation as it stands and retaliate in kind by Trump doing precisely the same thing to Castro's donors in hope of creating a kind of a standoff with any who would consider such tactics, but that would not be healthy for civil political discourse, if such a thing can still be considered to exist. Also it may not even work, just contribute to the drama.
 

FriedCFour

PunishedCFour
Founder
By common sense 200$ or 1000$ is not going to buy one influence with any national level politician in the US, nevermind the president.

Another issue is that back in the time when this law was established, the problem illustrated here did not exist, due to a rather different political climate and also information dissemination environment, very much before IT revolution era.

Raising the cap to reach only donors probably rich enough to have lawyers and security on standby anyway to deal with this sort of stuff is one obvious solution. Which would be what, 20k? 100k? 200k? No idea, but probably something within that region.
Another is for the other side to take this escalation as it stands and retaliate in kind by Trump doing precisely the same thing to Castro's donors in hope of creating a kind of a standoff with any who would consider such tactics, but that would not be healthy for civil political discourse, if such a thing can still be considered to exist. Also it may not even work, just contribute to the drama.
These tactics arent exactly new either. The founder of Mozilla resigned because his donation of 1k to Prop 8 was used against him even though that had nothing to do with the company. This is I think the first time its been used against a bunch of retirees and small business owners though.
 

Hlaalu Agent

Nerevar going to let you down
Founder
These tactics arent exactly new either. The founder of Mozilla resigned because his donation of 1k to Prop 8 was used against him even though that had nothing to do with the company. This is I think the first time its been used against a bunch of retirees and small business owners though.

I was actually thinking about that too, the latter of which is why when I spoke of organization size I was talking about listing them.
 

prinCZess

Warrior, Writer, Performer, Perv
On one hand, I feel like political donations should be open and available. Seeing what candidates draw their support from who (and in what amounts) does seem like a measure that acts against corruption by exposing that entire field to the light of day, and it is a field where the US has had some dramatically negative history and consequences before attempts were made to combat things (the Montana 'copper kings', or Carnegie steel and Trusts in general as dramatic examples).

On the other hand, there is point to be made that such support should be anonymous information for much the same reason as voting choices themselves are anonymous. Even ignoring that, it's clearly counter to the spirit and purpose of these laws to use donation lists by small individuals as something to target boycotts or ostracization by their city and neighbors. Castro's act very much was a case of 'punching down', to use the colloquial, and the purpose of these laws should be to cast a light on major donors and organizations who could or do conceivably buy influence--not every Tom, Dick or Harry who threw whatever amount of dollars to a political campaign that spent hundreds of millions of dollars. There's a question of proportionality at the very least. PACs and superPACs would be MUCH better targets for Castro's ire in this regard since, as I understand it, their oversight is looser to begin with (and they don't have limits so there's more opportunity for back-scratching, favor-making deals!),
 

Emperor Tippy

Merchant of Death
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I'm firmly on the conceal side of the ledger. Forcing small donors (and every personal donation to a campaign is small today when the limits are so low relative to the cost of a campaign) to disclose does nothing positive. I mean if a politician could be bought for a few thousand bucks in campaign funds then you have much bigger problems.

And that ignores all the ways to work around the relevant laws. And that those laws are only debatably constitutional.

I mean why does the "Right to Privacy" protect abortions and anal sex but not political activity?
 

bullethead

Part-time fanfic writer
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I could see a case for making individual donations completely anonymous, while having PAC donations be part of the public record. With individuals being capped at a few thousand dollars, PACs have way more influence on politicians due to their greater financial resources, and when multiple PACs donate to a candidate, it concentrates a great deal of power and influence in the hands of a few people.
 

Emperor Tippy

Merchant of Death
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Staff Member
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Forcing PAC donations to be public is even more of a problem Constitutionally speaking. If you did then you should force all donations to charities and tax free organizations to become public.

No more private tithes at your church, for example.
 

Hlaalu Agent

Nerevar going to let you down
Founder
Forcing PAC donations to be public is even more of a problem Constitutionally speaking. If you did then you should force all donations to charities and tax free organizations to become public.

No more private tithes at your church, for example.

Indeed, unless people want such things to be public, they ought to be private. They are the business of the giver and recipient.
 

Es Arcanum

Princeps Terra
Founder
For personal donations below a reasonable amount (say $10,000 or something, you could have lower thresholds for local positions) have the details recorded and filed with the FEC or State Election Board or whatever and have them considered privileged and private information not available to the general public.

For bigger donations and PAC's have them publicly listed.

Bam. Problem solved.
 

Hlaalu Agent

Nerevar going to let you down
Founder
Individuals no because assholes can and will send people to harass you this has already happened.

PACs, unions, corperations and groups yes.

But with smaller groups we run into the same problem then, because they cannot "tank" the attacks so to speak.
 

lloyd007

Well-known member
I used to be in favor of public disclosure of campaign donations, but I turned from that position a long time ago thanks to garbage like this. If someone is donating big bucks and getting political payback in the form of no bid deals and etc. that is political corruption and a crime, but none of what the people doxxed by Castro is in any way criminal and what he did should frankly be made criminal.
 

Cherico

Well-known member
I used to be in favor of public disclosure of campaign donations, but I turned from that position a long time ago thanks to garbage like this. If someone is donating big bucks and getting political payback in the form of no bid deals and etc. that is political corruption and a crime, but none of what the people doxxed by Castro is in any way criminal and what he did should frankly be made criminal.

What Castro did was a clear ethics violation and he's currently in the process of being punished for that because sending outrage mobs after home makers is a shitty thing to do and is one of those things that leads to civil wars if its not nipped in the bud.
 

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