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Ethical Officials and Disclosure Rules
Thursday, September 16th, 2010
Robert Wechsler
The Supreme Court has been nibbling away at campaign finance laws for
years now, but the one thing all but one of the justices agree on is
that requiring the disclosure of contributions does not infringe on
first amendment speech rights.
Then why, as stated in the Washington Post yesterday, have organizations sponsoring issue ads failed to list the sources of their funding 85% of the time this year, when in 2004 they only failed to do this 29% of the time?
If you ask the lawyers involved, it's all about interpreting a 2007 regulation that only the donations made "for the purpose of furthering electioneering communications" need be disclosed.
Federal Election Commission member Ellen Weintraub, a Democrat, said, "This is an unprecedented narrow reading of the regulation. It's certainly not what I intended when I voted for that regulation."
According to the Post article, "the Republican commissioners said they interpreted the regulations to mean that a donation only needed to be reported if it was for the specific advertisement included on the disclosure form. That means that even if [a donor] had given money to run advertisements generally, his name wouldn't be required to be disclosed unless he directed his money toward specific ads."
In other words, when they looked at the regulation, they saw a big loophole that would gut the regulation and the spirit of the law, and they chose not to put the loophole into writing, because it would be extremely embarrassing.
When a complaint was filed on this issue, the three Republican commissioners (the six-member board is evenly divided) voted for dismissal, and four votes are needed to go ahead with a complaint. One of the Republican commissioners, who admitted he wasn't sure how to read the requirement, said, "The enforcement process is not the place to determine what the rule means." But he doesn't appear to be seeking to determine it in the proper place, by spelling it out in the regulation.
What all these attorneys are failing to say is that ethics laws are minimum requirements. If it is not absolutely clear that an organization disclose its donors in a particular situation, that does not mean that the organization should not disclose its donors. An ethical organization will always put transparency before a doubtful interpretation of an ethics law. An ethical organization will always do what's right, not only what is absolutely and clearly required.
An unethical organization, and the elected officials it supports, hide behind doubtful interpretations of ethics laws, and refuse to take responsibility for the freedoms given to them by the constitution, while crowing about their constitutional rights. An ethical official can insist that any organization that supports his or her campaign make full disclosure of its donors, which is clearly what the spirit of the law requires.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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Then why, as stated in the Washington Post yesterday, have organizations sponsoring issue ads failed to list the sources of their funding 85% of the time this year, when in 2004 they only failed to do this 29% of the time?
If you ask the lawyers involved, it's all about interpreting a 2007 regulation that only the donations made "for the purpose of furthering electioneering communications" need be disclosed.
Federal Election Commission member Ellen Weintraub, a Democrat, said, "This is an unprecedented narrow reading of the regulation. It's certainly not what I intended when I voted for that regulation."
According to the Post article, "the Republican commissioners said they interpreted the regulations to mean that a donation only needed to be reported if it was for the specific advertisement included on the disclosure form. That means that even if [a donor] had given money to run advertisements generally, his name wouldn't be required to be disclosed unless he directed his money toward specific ads."
In other words, when they looked at the regulation, they saw a big loophole that would gut the regulation and the spirit of the law, and they chose not to put the loophole into writing, because it would be extremely embarrassing.
When a complaint was filed on this issue, the three Republican commissioners (the six-member board is evenly divided) voted for dismissal, and four votes are needed to go ahead with a complaint. One of the Republican commissioners, who admitted he wasn't sure how to read the requirement, said, "The enforcement process is not the place to determine what the rule means." But he doesn't appear to be seeking to determine it in the proper place, by spelling it out in the regulation.
What all these attorneys are failing to say is that ethics laws are minimum requirements. If it is not absolutely clear that an organization disclose its donors in a particular situation, that does not mean that the organization should not disclose its donors. An ethical organization will always put transparency before a doubtful interpretation of an ethics law. An ethical organization will always do what's right, not only what is absolutely and clearly required.
An unethical organization, and the elected officials it supports, hide behind doubtful interpretations of ethics laws, and refuse to take responsibility for the freedoms given to them by the constitution, while crowing about their constitutional rights. An ethical official can insist that any organization that supports his or her campaign make full disclosure of its donors, which is clearly what the spirit of the law requires.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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