By Walter M. Shaub, Jr.
August 12, 2021
(POGO) – Before announcing his bid for the Senate, then-Governor Scott raised a fortune for a political organization called New Republican PAC. The organization then spent that fortune on his campaign for Senate. That’s not how things are supposed to work.
A so-called “soft-money ban” prohibits federal candidates from raising money for political organizations that will use the money to help get them elected. The ban exists because rules for some types of organizations are looser than the rules for campaigns. For example, corporations can’t give any money directly to campaigns. But the Supreme Court’s infamous Citizens United decision in 2010 freed corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to super political action committees (“super PACs”). As long as it doesn’t coordinate with a candidate, a super PAC can then buy advertising urging the public to vote for the candidate.
In 2016, Rick Scott became the leader of the super PAC New Republican PAC, declaring his goal of ensuring the Republican Party worked toward the Trump agenda. When he later quit this position and announced his campaign for Senate, the super PAC shifted its focus to supporting him. A group called End Citizens United filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that, while running the super PAC, Scott had actually been raising funds not for Trump’s agenda but for his own planned candidacy.
The complaint predictably died this summer in the FEC. The agency is hopelessly deadlocked, with its three Republicans and three Democrats consistently voting along party lines. “Once again, the FEC is betraying the American people by allowing massive election cheating to go unpunished,” wrote another watchdog, the Campaign Legal Center (CLC).
Undeterred, End Citizens United retained CLC to represent it in a new lawsuit filed Monday. The lawsuit seeks a court order compelling the FEC to investigate Scott and, if he’s found guilty, punish him for violating campaign finance law. If the two watchdogs win and the FEC still fails to act, they could then sue Scott directly.
All of this points to the urgent need for reform. The For the People Act (also called H.R. 1 in the House and S. 1 in the Senate), which has passed the House and is awaiting a vote in the Senate, would go far to solve the problem.
Among other things, it would break the deadlock by reducing the number of FEC commissioners from six to five, and it would increase turnover by barring commissioners from serving indefinitely beyond the end of their terms until replacements are appointed.