dark money

Arizona Corporation Commission Debate

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The two-year long saga of secretive “dark money” and the GOP culture of corruption surrounding the Arizona Corporation Commission came to a head this week in the televised debate on Arizona Horizon (video).

CorpComm

Arizona Corporation Commission candidates Bill Mundell, Tom Chabin, Andy Tobin, Boyd Dunn and Bob Burns debate Tuesday night at KAET-TV with host Ted Simons. (Capitol Media Services photo by Howard Fischer)

The Arizona Capitol Times (subscription required) reported, Democratic Corp Comm candidates side with Burns, push for APS investigation:

The two Democrats running for the Arizona Corporation Commission showed solidarity with a current Republican commissioner over an outstanding investigation into a utility’s role in the 2014 commission election, telling voters electing the bipartisan trio the best way to push the investigation forward.

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LD 2 Senate Race: Dalessandro v. Kais

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dalessandro-kaisThe Legislative District 2 Senate seat is currently held by Democrat Andrea Dalessandro, who previously served in the Arizona House.

(Dalessandro is the one in glasses).

Her Tea-Publican opponent, Shelley Kais, is a business woman who served as a campaign volunteer for Martha McSally during her 2012 run for Congress. Kais challenged McSally for the GOP nomination in 2014, finishing in a distant third place with less than eight percent of the vote, behind McSally and Chuck Wooten. You may recall that the local Tea Party raised a stink about McSally and Kais pulling out of a scheduled debate with Chuck Wooten in 2014.

Kais is now running for the LD 2 Senate seat as a Clean Elections candidate against Senator Dalessandro, also a Clean Elections candidate. LD 2 is a Democratic voter registration district.

Kais is backed by the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC), which lists her in its “16 in ’16: Races to Watch,” Comprised of the RSLC’s Future Majority Project (FMP) and Right Women, Right Now (RWRN) candidates running for state-level office.

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John Nichols on Money in Politics: $10 Billion in Political ads in 2012 (video)

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John Nichols of "The Nation" speaking in Tucson in March 2015
John Nichols of “The Nation” speaking in Tucson in March 2015

One issue that unites millions of voters is  their disgust for big-money politics and their hatred of misleading, negative political advertising.

When I go door-to-door with my campaign flier, I introduce myself as a progressive Democrat (which usually gets a smile and a nod) and a Clean Elections candidate (which brightens their eyes and widens their smiles). Voters are fed up with big-money politics and lies.

Earlier today, I was looking for a video on my Tucson Progressive YouTube Channel and found this clip from a speech that John Nichols of “The Nation” gave in Tucson in March 2015 at a Progressive Democrats of America event.

In this clip (below), Nichols theorizes that the negative advertising itself suppresses voter turnout. He reports that $10 billion was spent on political advertising in 2012 and 90% of it was negative advertising to disparage candidates. In 2014, with continued negative advertising, the US had the lowest voter turnout since 1942– during World War II.

If $10 billion was wasted on political advertising in 2012, what will be spent in 2016? If we want to save our democracy, we must get money out of politics.

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Didn’t see that coming, but it’s not surprising

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dark money
Photo illustrating Laurie Roberts’ column. Dark, so dark!

While I was at the office this afternoon a friend dm’d me on Facebook with the news that the “Open and Honest Coalition”, the campaign spearheading two separate initiatives involving reining in dark money (good!) and changing the election system to one where a “jungle” primary would produce two, and only two, candidates for every spot in the general election (bad!), was suspending its paid signature-gathering operations due to funding drying up.

A possible explanation, per Laurie Roberts of the Arizona Republic, follows:

The dark money initiative and open primary initiative aren’t dead yet, supporters insist, but if not, they’re clinging to life by a thread.

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Evil GOP bastards vote to make ‘dark money’ even easier in Arizona

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The evil GOP bastards in the Arizona Senate are taking their marching orders from the “Kochtopus” the same as Arizona’s queen of voter suppression, Secretary of State Michele Reagan, the author of SB 1516 (.pdf) “Campaign Finance Amendments.” They voted on Tuesday to make dark money even easier in Arizona.

dark_moneyHoward Fischer reports, ‘Dark money’ rules eased in AZ Senate campaign finance bill:

Senate Republicans on Tuesday approved a series of changes in state campaign finance laws that foes say eases the flow of “dark money” and makes it harder for voters to know who is trying to affect the outcome of elections.

Among the changes being made, SB 1516:

  • Removes the authority of state election officials to subpoena records of candidates;
  • Reduces the penalties for candidates who overspend;
  • Permits candidates to divert money given to their campaigns to instead help others get elected;
  • Eases requirements for disclosure on campaign advertising of the major funding sources;
  • Allows unlimited spending by outside groups on social media sites with no requirement to say who is financing those efforts.

Perhaps the most notable change would eliminate existing laws that limit how much certain kinds of charities and nonprofits can spend to influence elections.

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