Josh Israel
12/08/22
(American Independent) Contrary to Republican leaders’ promises of a massive “red wave” in the November 2022 midterms, the party only gained a handful of seats in the House of Representatives and lost a Senate seat and two governorships. But a new analysis by End Citizens United, a group that works to elect Democrats who will reform the campaign finance and electoral systems, determined that without a massive influx of outside spending fueled by dark money, Republicans could have lost even more races. “This election showed that the corrupting influence of dark money is still growing and allowing wealthy corporations and billionaires to stack the deck in their favor, while the rest of us pay the price,” Arik Wolk, a spokesperson for End Citizens United told the American Independent Foundation. “Extremist Republican candidates ran weak, shell campaigns because they knew they were able to rely on millions in dark money, making their races competitive.” End Citizens United noted in its analysis that in many close races, Democratic candidates raised more money than their Republican opponents, but lost after outside groups poured millions of dollars into the ads to defeat them. “The huge amounts of dark money spent this cycle allowed for more extremist candidates, and will continue to do so in future elections,” Wolk said. “That’s why we need to pass the DISCLOSE Act to end dark money and fix our broken system.”