Finance Abuse For The Upcoming 2016 Elections

Corporate advantage is often times very controversial in government, from funding candidates with money, to swaying the mind of the voters, to making PACs and superPACs; this topic is not at rest with the F.E.C. or other government programs or agencies. In this case we see “Citizens United” ,a special interest group, fight with the F.E.C. about this advantage and the right to set restrictions on spending money for the purpose of engaging in political speech. In a 5-4 decision, Some may think that the court ruled correctly on corporate expenditures ; yet lots of people think that this advantage is corrupt, here’s why.

In the UK, the 2010 election cost $75m, far less than America’s numbers which the two candidates combined can easily reach the billions. President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney spent a combined $30.33every second the election cycle in 2012, as a binge of campaign spending deluged voters with rallies, banners, and of course, TV ads.

Each of these committees would donate less than $100; therefore, avoiding the need to report the donation (Fuller). In the 1930s two acts were passed, the Public Utilities Holding Act in 1935 and the Hatch Act in 1939. The former of the two prohibits utility companies from making contributions in federal campaigns, while the latter bans most federal employees from making contributions to a candidate in national elections and from participating in political campaigns (Rowan). The Smith Connelly Act was passed in 1943, which bans labor unions from making direct contributions to federal campaigns. However, unions create political action committees, or PACs, to make campaign contributions. The Taft-Hartley Act was passed in 1947. This Act bans corporations and unions from making independent expenditures in federal political campaigns (Rowan).

In the 2016 election cycle, over 1.4 billion dollars was given to presidential candidates (Federal Election Commission 2016a). This is more than any other presidential election cycle in history (Price 2016). Another billion dollars was given to U.S. House of Representatives candidates, and about 600 million dollars was given to U.S. Senate candidates (Federal Election Commission 2016b). The majority of this money went to funding the candidates’ campaigns. This money controlled whose ads voter’s saw on television and which candidates were able to afford to travel the country campaigning for votes. In many cases, the candidate with the most money available won their election. Most campaigns are financed in large part by a small number

The Democratic and Republican presidential nominees for 1999 raised an astounding 126 million to finance their campaigns in the primaries (Godfrey). The U.S. national political parties raised a record 107.2 million dollars in soft money contributions in 1999 (Campaign Finance Reform). During the 1995-96 elections, public citizens estimated that an astounding 150 million dollars was spent on "phony" issue ads designed to support or oppose congressional and presidential candidates (Campaign Finance Reform). This outrageous influx of money into congressional and presidential campaigns has placed a blanket of corruption and injustice over our nation’s elections. With the rise of campaign corruption, many

The election of members to Congress in the United States of America is contingent on the financial muscles of the candidates and their supporters. It all starts with a deep pocket investment. The recently concluded election will yield a new administration with new cabinet members. The election of Donald Trump as the next U.S President is partly attributable to the synergy and efforts made by some of the most influential people in the Republican Convention. With Trump already appointing some of his chief strategists, it is necessary to conduct a deeper analysis of the financial input of other members of the Congress in an attempt to gain seats.

During local, state, or federal election there is a limited amount of time and information that a voter has to help him/her decide for which candidate he or she wants to vote. Before the ruling in Citizens United v FEC, private donations from voters were needed to provide candidates with financial means to create commercials, billboards, etc. In turn, this gave the voters a voice in who is to lead their government. Corporations were limited in the amount they could provide to their candidate of choice. After the ruling, corporations can now match every private donation and contribute an unlimited amount on top of that in order to support their candidate. This creates a problem because a corporation can potentially suffocate voters with campaign ads without the other candidates' ads being heard. Therefore creating an uneven debate and platform for Democracy to work.

Diving in the Citizen’s United Ruling case state that corporations and other independent groups have the right to raise unlimited campaign funds. This campaign fund, representing the corporation's freedom of speech, can be used for and against federal candidates. The ruling of Citizen United permitted groups to make “independent expenditures,” not affiliated with any candidate or party since they were not allowed to spend treasury funds in Federal elections (Citizens United). Corporations and unions can have a certain limited contribution to their political action committees, organizations that raise and spend money for specific candidates, that then contribute to the outcome of federal campaigns. Organizations, social welfare, and trade associations

These laws were the perfect way for the state to make sure that the system is stable in the future. Just recently on April 2nd, the Supreme Court of the United States turned down the overall cap on monetary political donations. This is a classic case of the state adopting policies to ensure the stability of the system. Coping the scheme of citizens united the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision allows an individual to donate as much money as they please to federal candidates in a two year election cycle. Although federal law bans direct contributions to campaigners by corporations and business, super pacs allow money to get to the politicians without direct contact. But this law still allows wealthy individuals to support the candidates that will represent their needs and wants in the national government. This creates an unfair system aimed at helping the elites because they will have more money to donate therefore will have more of the campaigners attention. Justice Breyer realized the importance of this decision being turned down and was recorded writing “Where enough money calls the tune,” he wrote, “the general public will not be heard.” (New York Times).

FEC) limiting campaign spending on the basis that PACs (generated by corporations) where in fact individuals in their own right. As such, all individuals/citizens of the US have a right to spend their money as they see fit, whether that is making a political speech by funding certain campaigns. Therefore, forbidding corporate spending on elections is a clear limitation on freedom of speech guaranteed in the First Amendment of the Constitution. Some argue that not limiting the amount of money into politics will inevitably lead to corruption. However, the First Amendment of the Constitution was not built to protect man against himself but against, the government he created. This topic also brings to light the dilemma over what we, (the people and government), consider a citizen. Webster’s dictionary defines determines that the legal definition of a citizen is “1: a native or naturalized individual who owes allegiance to a government (as of a state or nation) and is entitled to the enjoyment of governmental protection and to the exercise of civil rights” and “2: a resident of a town or state who is also a U.S. native or was naturalized in the U.S.” Based on what a corporation is in that definition; a corporation does appear to meet all the requirements: it is considered an entity in itself that can indeed be based in the US, but does it pledge an alliance to our government? Can a corporation

Buckley v. Valeo: Buckley v. Valeo was a court case where the judges held limits on how much could be spend on elections. This was unconstitutional to what the count case came out to be

All 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives were up for reelection in 2010. In the 2010 U.S. House election, the average amount spent by Super PACs in 87 districts was $242,580; see Table 1 and Figure 1 for average spending by outside entities and challengers. The maximum about Super PACs spent was $912,503 in Colorado’s Fourth Congressional District, where Cory Gardner (R) defeated incumbent Betsy Markey (D). The average independent expenditures by political parties in 94 districts was $1,238,897. The maximum outside party spending was $4,289,706 in Michigan’s Seventh Congressional District, where Tim Walberg (R) beat incumbent Mark Schauer (D). The average challenger spending was $704,692 in 366 districts. Figures 2, shows the

The debate would make it all the way to the Supreme Court, who would uphold the law saying the law maintained campaign integrity and prevented corruption. The Supreme Court did, however, remove spending limits as long as the money was spent to expressly endorse a candidate. In 1979, FECA is further amended to allow individuals, unions, and corporations to give unlimited funds for “party building.” The amendment created what was called “soft money” donations and was a large loophole in the system. In 2002, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act banned soft money, unlimited contributions, and prohibited political ads made by unions and corporations from airing within 30 days of a primary and 60 days of a general election. The law would be taken to the Supreme Court twice in 2003 and 2007. Despite both times resulting in a 5-4 vote in favor of the law, the 2007 case would remove the political ad ban. Finally, the 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court case would not only dismantle the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act but allow for the formation of Super PACs which they stated did not promote corruption (Rowen, n.d.). SuperPACs have launched campaign finance reform back into the spotlight and are crucial to any discussion on the subject today.

"Individuals and PACs in finance, insurance, and real estate have contributed over $2 billion to federal campaigns since 1990. Wall Street contributions increased from $60 million in 1990 to $311 million in 2005" (Wall online). "Electoral competition is achieved when qualified candidates have access to sufficient spending to become known to the voters" (Does online). Therefore the candidate must resort to any means necessary to have sufficient funds to run a successful campaign. Stricter campaign financing guidelines are needed to limit the amount of donations to candidates because interest money is a dominant factor in campaigns. It steers the ideological views of the candidate toward the Political Action Committee that donates the most

To combat too much political influence from advertising, the federal government passed a law called the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) or as it’s more commonly known, the McCain-Feingold Act. The BCRA sought to expand disclosure on soft money and changed some limits on hard money. The key piece of this legislation is the electioneering communications statute, or section 203. This piece of BCRA was intended to limit the influence of PACs by restricting their ability to air advertisements right before elections. McCain-Feingold prevented corporations and PACs from showing political commercials sixty days before an election and thirty days before a primary (FEC BCRA 90).