Ohio Voters May Lower Limits

EDITORIAL

Derek Cressman

Former governor Don Siegelman was indicted on October 26 by a federal grand jury for accepting a $500,000 bribe from Richard Scrushy, the former CEO of now-bankrupt HealthSouth Corporation. As governor, Siegelman appointed Scrushy to the Need Review Board, a panel with regulatory oversight of hospital construction.

Along with his former chief of staff, Paul Hamrick, Siegelman was also indicted on RICO charges and wire and mail fraud charges, in addition to charges solely against Siegelman of bribery, extortion, and obstruction of justice. Siegelman has indicated that he plans to run for governor in 2006.

Also on October 26, Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard petitioned the Maricopa County Superior Court to remove Rep. David Burnell Smith from his seat in the Arizona House for Smith’s violations of the Arizona Clean Elections law. Prior to the petition, the Citizens Clean Elections Commission and an administrative judge had found that Rep. Smith, who signed on to Arizona’s voluntary program of public financing for candidates, had overspent the spending limit by 20% and had obscured some of that spending.

Arizona’s 1998 Clean Elections initiative requires candidates that overspend the program’s limit by ten percent or more to vacate office. Smith is scheduled to appear in court on October 31 to show cause why he should not be removed from office, although Attorney General Goddard has since filed a motion seeking dismissal of Smith’s appeal on procedural grounds.

Millions of dollars continued to pour into committees supporting or opposing the eight initiatives in the November 8 special election called by Governor Schwarzenegger. More than $230 million was spent on the special election as of the October 22 filing deadline for pre-election reports, much of which was spent on television advertising and political consultants. Pharmaceutical companies have contributed $80 million, a national record for a state ballot initiative committee. The California Teachers Association has contributed more than $50 million to defeat four initiatives backed by Governor Schwarzenegger, whose California Recovery Team has raised some $32 million to support those measures.
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Politicians continued their opposition to Proposition 77, an initiative that would transfer the job of drawing California’s congressional and legislative districts from the state legislature to an independent panel of retired judges.

Representatives Howard Berman and Nancy Pelosi led the charge for congressional Democrats. Berman, whose brother Michael got $20,000 a piece from congressional Democrats in 2001 to draw them bulletproof districts, got the Federal Elections Commission to reverse itself and allow federal officeholders to raise and solicit unlimited donations to support or oppose state ballot measures. Pelosi took that ball and ran with it, getting 527 mega-funder Steven Bing to kick in $4.25 million to the No on 77 effort. She also convinced more than forty members of her caucus to contribute money from their candidate accounts to a No on 77 committee.

Speaker Fabian Nuñez led the charge for state Democrats, kicking in more than $3 million from various Democratic committees.

Past and present members of the Forbes 400 richest Americans also played a prominent role in financing committees supporting or opposing Prop 77. Thirteen billionaires added to the $4.25 million from Bing to contribute a total of $6,378,278, a third of the $21 million raised overall by Prop 77 committees.

The state legislature went into a special session in late October to address a number of issues, including campaign finance reform. Despite high demand for reform in the wake of a scandal that caused the sitting governor to resign (he is now in jail), the state House and Senate had conspired to torpedo efforts to pass a campaign finance bill at the end of the regular session in June.

The legislature is now examining a number of reforms, including public financing of statewide and legislative offices, for which current Governor Rell has expressed support. However, some of the same politicians that killed reform efforts in June are again digging in their heels, demanding that contribution limits be raised for those politicians who don’t opt into the system of public financing.

Such an increase appears to make little sense from a policy standpoint. Candidates who opt into the new system would have no use for higher contributions because they would be receiving full public financing for their campaigns. Further, if contribution limits are increased, it will undermine the system of public financing by creating a disincentive for candidates to opt into the program. A compromise that undermines the policy benefits for which you make the compromise is puzzling. One plausible explanation would be to buy off the votes of anti-reform politicians who have no plans to participate in the voluntary clean money system but see something in it for them if they can raise twice the money from private interests as they can now. This would indicate a weakness in the movement and the need to further galvanize public support for real reform.

Most of the debate is focused on the red herring of banning contributions from lobbyists. The problem is not that lobbyists can make contributions, it’s that any wealthy interest can make contributions larger than ordinary citizens. A ban on lobbyist contributions, for example, would do nothing to curtail huge contributions from the corporations and other wealthy interests that hire the lobbyists in the first place.

Proponents of three redistricting initiatives moved forward with a legal challenge to the Secretary of State’s decision to decertify one of the initiatives because it exceeded the word limit for constitutional amendment initiatives.

Florida state and congressional politicians joined forces in a specious attempt to derail three redistricting initiatives being circulated for the 2006 ballot. Democrat and Republican politicians alike filed briefs with the state supreme court suggesting the initiatives be decertified for various reasons.

During the corruption trial of former governor George Ryan, his former chief of staff testified that Ryan used campaign funds to pay family members and friends that did no campaign work, in addition to using campaign funds to pay for personal expenses such as hotel rooms and restaurants, and for a $500,000 nest egg. Ryan is accused of a laundry list of corrupt actions while Governor and Secretary of State of Illinois.
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Three plans have emerged that generally address the issue of corruption and money in politics. Governor Blagojevich touted his plan to limit political contributions. Comptroller Dan Hynes proposed a plan to limit political contributions from people and entities that do business with the state. House Speaker Madigan also offered a plan focusing on state procurement policies, pension reform, naming rights, and ethics rules for state employees.

The state purchased optical scan voting machines for the forty-two counties which still count ballots by hand. The machines, produced by AutoMARK, will produce a paper trail and provide for disabled voters. By the May 2006 primary, the machines will be in place and used by the entire state.

A state court upheld New Hampshire’s law dictating that the party which received the most overall votes in the prior election receive the top spot on the ballot. The law was challenged by Democrats as providing a self-perpetuating “structural, systemic advantage.” Republicans have held the top spot for the last forty years. While the judge ruled against the claim, she did find that the top spot provided an advantage to the party which occupied it.

Gubernatorial candidates Doug Forrester and Jon Corzine poured millions of their personal fortunes into their campaigns, predominantly spending their loot on attack ads against each other. According to the campaigns, Forrester has spent $21 million of his own money on the race; Corzine has spent at least $24 million of his fortune on getting elected. The combined $45 million is more than three times the $13.1 million total raised by all 2001 gubernatorial candidates.
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Gubernatorial candidate Doug Forrester was cleared of any wrongdoing in connection with the millions of dollars in political contributions to his own and other campaigns he has made. New Jersey law prohibits political contributions from the majority owners of insurance companies and banking firms. Forrester owns a majority of Benecard, a prescription benefits management company, but avoided charges because Benecard is registered in the District of Columbia.

Voters in Albuquerque made it the first city in the U.S. to pass a clean elections law by initiative. On October 4, by a 2:1 margin, the voters of Albuquerque passed the Open and Ethical Elections Code referendum, which includes a program of voluntary public financing for candidates. To be eligible for public funds, a candidate must collect $5 contributions from 1% of the registered voters in their district and agree not to accept further private contributions. The candidate will then get $1 for every voter in their district from the clean elections fund.

Albuquerque has long been a beacon for reform. By a 9:1 margin, voters passed spending limits for city elections in 1974. The limits stood for more than twenty years, until a losing mayoral candidate named Rick Homans successfully sued to overturn the limits. The appeals process finally came to an end last year when the Supreme Court denied cert in the case, although the Court has recently agreed to hear a case challenging the state of Vermont’s spending limits. (See Vermont section for details.) When money once again started pouring into city elections, Albuquerque voters stood up and demanded reform.

Common Cause played a key role in helping reform-minded folks in Albuquerque, bringing in people from several states to help locals with the fight and raising some $30,000 for radio and television ads. Also helping the effort was city councilor and losing mayoral candidate Eric Griego, the Southwest Voter Project, the Sage Council, the League of Women Voters, New Mexico PIRG, and Public Campaign.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg continued his onslaught on campaign spending records, blanketing New York City airwaves, mailboxes, and television screens with ads promoting his re-election and attacking his opponent, Fernando Ferrer. As of early October, Bloomberg had spent $48 million of his fortune on his campaign, more than the $30 million he had spent at the same point in 2001, an election on which he spent $75 million of his own money. Bloomberg’s campaign spending is in addition to millions of dollars in ostensibly charitable donations to groups around the city – donations highly unlikely to sway voters against Bloomberg. Bloomberg’s ratings have risen in conjunction with his massive advertising campaign.

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Buoyed by a new raft of scandals relating to campaign contributors, Reform Ohio Now gathered more than half a million signatures from Ohio voters in placing three reform initiatives on the fall ballot, including Issue 3 to reform campaign finance laws.

Issue 3 stands in clearest rebuke to the politicians who cynically chose big bucks over serious reform. Issue 3 would:

n roll back contribution limits to $1,000 per election cycle for legislative candidates and $2,000 for statewide candidates;

ncreate small donor PACs that accept only $50 or less from regular folks and can give up to $10,000 to a candidate;

n tighten definitions of electioneering so that independent groups that act like PACs don’t play by different rules;

n reinstate the ban on corporate contributions.

In May of this year, investigators revealed that Tom Noe, a prolific Republican fundraiser and contributor to many a state and federal official, could not account for more than $10 million missing from the coin investment fund he ran for the state. As multiple state and federal agencies launched investigations into Noe, the politicians to whom he had given and guided money fled his association like rats a sinking ship. President Bush, Governor Taft, Secretary of State Blackwell, Attorney General Petro, and even California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger coughed up Noe’s contributions. While the outcome of many of the investigations is pending, Noe was indicted in October for laundering illegal contributions to President Bush’s 2004 election committee.

October polls showed Issue 3 leading by a roughly 3:2 margin. Should it pass, Issue 3 would send a clear signal to politicians about where the public stands when it comes to big money in politics.
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Ohio voters will have a chance to vote on three other reform initiatives on November 8, dealing with absentee balloting, redistricting, and elections administration. Issue 2 on the ballot would amend the state constitution to allow voters to vote by absentee ballot up to 35 days before an election. In an effort to short-circuit support for Issue 2 and the other reform initiatives, the Ohio House and Senate each passed a bill allowing absentee voting up to 35 days before an election. However, if Issue 2 wins, it will trump the cynical legislative effort. Issue 2 is leading by a greater than 2:1 margin in the polls.

Issue 4 would amend the state constitution to transfer the power of drawing districts away from the legislature, which draws congressional districts, and the Ohio Apportionment Board, which draws legislative districts, to an independent panel. For the last four decades under the current system, the party in control of redistricting has used the process to rig districts in their favor. An analysis by Research for the Rest of Us found that the party in control of redistricting has gained an average of eight seats in the state house and two in the state senate over the last four decades, despite often losing ground in national elections.

Issue 5 would create an elections administration board within the Secretary of State’s office, although independent from the Secretary of State. Ohio voters put Issue 5 on the ballot to remove the possibility that an official engaged in partisan participation in an election would be making administrative judgments that affected the outcome of that election, as has happened in the recent past.

A study by The Bliss Institute at the University of Akron found that Issues 2 and 3 leading among all voters, while Issues 4 and 5 trailed. However, the same study found that informed voters supported Issue 4 by a margin of ten percentage points, indicating that citizens and groups interested in a fair redistricting process have some significant educational opportunities on this topic.

Former Representative Dan Doyle went to jail on October 24 for filing false campaign reports which hid the misappropriation of some $146,000 of Doyle campaign funds for his personal use. Doyle was sentenced to ten months in jail, in addition to having to pay as much as $127,000 in fines and facing the probable revocation of his law license. Oregon legislators have responded to the scandal with a series of weak reform proposals that will do very little to reduce the influence of big money on Oregon’s elections and elected officials.

The Albuquerque City Council voted to send the Open and Ethical Elections Code referendum to the October 4 citywide ballot.  If successful, the referendum would create a system of publicly financed elections for local races. The need for the law is all the more apparent with the revelation that current mayor Martin Chavez has raised nearly $1 million for his re-election campaign, an enormous sum for a city of Albuquerque’s size.

The people of Albuquerque have already voted once to limit the influence of money in local elections. In 1974, the city’s voters approved mandatory spending limits for city campaigns. Those limits were successful until the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals invalidated the limits after a losing mayoral candidate filed suit against them. Public financing would be the easiest way for voters to re-establish spending limits, although they would be voluntary this time around.

Rep. Tom DeLay was indicted this October for his role in the illegal laundering of corporate campaign contributions through his Texans for a Republican Majority Political Action Committee (TRMPAC) and the Republican National Committee back to seven state legislative candidates in Texas. Texas law prohibits the use of corporate money on political campaigns. TRMPAC staffers and long-time DeLay aides John Colyandro and Jim Ellis have also been indicted for the scheme, as has fundraiser Warren Robold.

As long required by House rules, DeLay stepped down from his position as House Majority Leader upon being indicted. Around the beginning of the year, House leadership changed the rule in anticipation of a possible indictment against DeLay, but changed the rule back in response to public outcry.

The U.S. Supreme Court will review Vermont’s law limiting spending for state political campaigns in a case that may have a lasting impact on the way money influences elections in the United States. The constitutionality of spending limits was upheld by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year in examining Vermont’s law, although for procedural reasons the court did not get to the issue of whether Vermont’s spending limits are constitutional. TheRestofUs.org was the lead group on an amicus brief submitted by reform groups (including Public Campaign, Demos, Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, and USPIRG) joining the state of Vermont in asking the Court to hear this important case.

Buckley v. Valeo, the seminal Supreme Court case on campaign finance laws and the white whale for many a reformer interested in getting rid of big money in politics, may receive a fresh look with this case. In an infamously reasoned analysis, Buckley equated money with speech, but set different standards for campaign contributions and campaign spending: limiting the former was constitutionally permissible, while limiting the latter was a much thornier constitutional question.

If the Court rules that citizens interested in fair, truly representative government can constitutionally enact federal, state, or local spending limits in order to accomplish those ends, it will be a huge victory for democracy in America.

Gubernatorial candidates Tim Kaine and Jerry Kilgore have raised $15.3 million and $16.7 million respectively. Two weeks out from the November 8 election, each has about $5 million left in the kitty. Virginia has no limits on the size of campaign contributions, allowing wealthy donors enormous say in who runs and gets elected to office. Each candidate has benefited from this indulgence, receiving multiple six-figure contributions.

The former president of the Wisconsin State Senate pled guilty to one count of felony misconduct in office and one count of making illegal campaign contributions. Chuck Chvala was already under investigation for using public resources for campaigning when the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign obtained and released a confidential memo from a lobbyist detailing how Chvala was shaking down (“would not look favorably upon”) lobbyists and groups for campaign cash in return for not killing their bills. Chvala was eventually charged with 20 felony counts, including extortion and the aforementioned crimes.

Safe Seats, Endangered Democracy

The Back Page:

The Self-Perpetuating
Legislature
In most states, politicians are responsible for drawing legislative districts through the redistricting process. This inherent conflict of interest allows politicians to choose their voters before voters can chosse them.

Political gerrymandering can distort representation, break up local communities, and weaken competition between the major parties.

Some states have created independent commissions to draw political boundaries. Another option would be to create larger districts that are inherently harder to gerrymander and to elect multiple representatives from each district using voting systems that select candidates on the basis of their proportional strength in the electorate.

Cartoon by Rex Babin, Sacramento Bee