{"id":391460,"date":"2017-07-21T12:00:35","date_gmt":"2017-07-21T18:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=391460"},"modified":"2017-07-25T17:17:06","modified_gmt":"2017-07-25T23:17:06","slug":"dark-money-threatens-democracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2017\/07\/dark-money-threatens-democracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Dark money threatens democracy"},"content":{"rendered":"

COMMENTARY:<\/strong>\u00a0The bright spot in the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s 2010 Citizens United decision was the upholding of transparency. The ruling opened the floodgates for the uber-wealthy to grab greater control<\/a> of our local, state and national elections \u2013 but it also made clear that you have a right to know they\u2019re doing it.<\/p>\n

\"Heath

Heath Haussamen<\/p><\/div>\n

Bringing political spending into the light \u201cenables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages,\u201d the Citizens United decision states<\/a>. In a ruling on another case<\/a> that year, the late Justice Antonin Scalia wrote, \u201cRequiring people to stand up in public for their political acts fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed.\u201d<\/p>\n

And yet, New Mexico has struggled for years to come up with laws or regulations to combat dark money. Parts of our Campaign Reporting Act were ruled unconstitutional years ago, and policymakers have failed to fix it.<\/p>\n

The Legislature finally sent a bill to Gov. Susana Martinez this year that would have required independent groups that spend more than $1,000 during a campaign to disclose their funding. She vetoed it<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver is trying to enact a new rule<\/a> to supplement the state\u2019s reporting law. Groups that spend more than $1,000 in an election cycle would have to report all donors who gave more than $200.<\/p>\n

Several right-leaning groups are fighting the proposal<\/a>. Some left-leaning groups that have fought against or been lukewarm about increased disclosure in the past have been largely silent about the proposal from Toulouse Oliver, a Democrat.<\/p>\n

Common Cause New Mexico, which voluntary discloses<\/a> donor and spending information, has been lobbying hard<\/a> for the secretary of state\u2019s new rule.<\/p>\n

Given that parts of the state\u2019s reporting law are unconstitutional, the secretary of state is likely to rely on case law and enforce her proposal regardless of whether it\u2019s enacted as a rule, an assistant attorney general said during a public hearing this week.<\/p>\n

Toulouse Oliver\u2019s proposal is an important step. I\u2019d rather disclosure be protected in state law so it can\u2019t be easily undone by a future secretary of state who doesn\u2019t favor transparency. But a rule is better than nothing.<\/p>\n

And it won\u2019t solve the problem of dark money. It would require disclosure when spending is expressly related to a race or issue on the ballot. But it wouldn\u2019t touch the massive spending by nonprofits on issue advocacy and criticism of government officials that shapes public opinion outside of an election season.<\/p>\n

You should get to know, for example, who\u2019s funding billboards and other media<\/a>\u00a0criticizing\u00a0U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, a Republican, that a coalition of left-leaning groups has spread across southern New Mexico. You should get to know when a wealthy individual from the left or right funds an attack on your public officials.<\/p>\n

Dark money has spread like a cancer throughout our system. Those of us who engage in the public debate \u2013 politicians, candidates, nonprofit and other activist groups, journalists \u2013 should be transparent about how our work is funded. We should, in Scalia\u2019s words, have the \u201ccivic courage\u201d to stand up in public.<\/p>\n

Courts have largely upheld donor privacy for spending that isn\u2019t explicitly election-related, and that\u2019s unfortunate. The degree of transparency I\u2019m seeking may not ever happen.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s needed to combat the United States\u2019 oligarchical trajectory<\/a>, to preserve our ability to participate in and influence the direction of our society.<\/p>\n

Heath Haussamen<\/a>\u00a0is NMPolitics.net\u2019s editor and publisher. Agree with his opinion? Disagree? We welcome your views. Learn about submitting your own commentary\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The secretary of state’s proposed rule is an important step. But it won\u2019t solve the problem of dark money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":383420,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,10],"tags":[3324,705,706],"class_list":["post-391460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-haussamen-columns","tag-maggie-toulouse-oliver","tag-money-in-politics","tag-transparency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=391460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/383420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=391460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=391460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=391460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}