Election Money - Supreme Court Ruling

What are we talking about?

The discussion focuses around the January decision by the Supreme Court to render parts of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act -- a.k.a. “The McCain-Feingold” law -- unconstitutional.

What was the ruling?
Basically, the Supreme Court ruled that there should be no restrictions on corporations spending money out of their general treasury on political advertising.

It’s important to understand that this is not about corporations donating money directly to campaigns. This is about corporations and unions spending their own money on their own political ads.
“Government may not suppress political speech on the basis of the speaker’s corporate identity,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the 57-page majority opinion. “No sufficient governmental interest justifies limits on the political speech of nonprofit or for-profit corporations.”

In a 90-page dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens denounced the majority opinion as a dangerous rejection of common sense. “While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics,” he wrote, “The court’s ruling threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions across the nation,” he said.

It’s also important to note that the Supreme Court upheld (8-1) the part of McCain-Feingold that says that corporate disclosure is still required. In other words, the company spending the money has to identify itself in the ad.
Here’s the catch – In bell-weather state Michigan – The Chamber wanted to know whether it could now form a political action committee for the purpose of making independent expenditures for “express advocacy” ads that directly endorse a candidate, whether it could solicit funds from others to pay for those ads, and whether it would have to disclose which companies or individuals had contributed to the new committee.

In a final ruling on the Chamber’s question issued May 21, Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land said that the Chamber can spend any amount it wishes on independent expenditures for express advocacy, but it cannot collect money from other groups for the purpose of funding these ads.

“A corporation’s political speech,” Land wrote, “must be funded exclusively by that corporation.”

In practical terms, what does this mean?

This ruling means that if Coca-Cola wants spend $12-million on spots that say “Coke supports gay marriage” or “Coke encourages you to vote for Rand Paul,” they have the constitutional right to do so.
They have to spend their own money doing it AND they can’t raise money to do so (in other words, they can’t solicit donations for the express purpose of supporting their political advertising).

So what’s the hubbub?

If you’ll recall pundits (including me) said that this will mean that we will see more money than ever being poured into elections – And as you know from talking to me, I believe money is the great evil in elections AND that when you all elect me to be president, I will propose that we do away with all political advertising (since presumably, I won’t be running an branding and advertising agency anymore so I won’t need the work ☺)

How much of this is HYPE?

When it comes to companies like Coca-Cola or Ford, all of this is just hype.
Corporations like these are not going to spend any of their money advocating for candidates or issue.
The free market is more than powerful enough to curb free speech!

Here’s why:

Anytime a company that sells stuff to the masses takes a political stand or chooses a side, it alienates all those potential customers/clients that disagree with them. There aren’t too many companies of size that are willing pay that much and take that big of a chance.

I can’t imagine a political candidate that is so attractive that I would advise one of my clients to openly piss off half of their potential customers.

In fact, we go out of our way to make sure our clients (and the people who are easily recognized as working for them) stay apolitical at all cost.

This is a bit different when you’re talking about unions and associations, groups like the NEA and the NRA. But these guys already spend gazillions of dollars on political ads – now they will just try to spend a little more.

So what’s the real solution?

Well, I alluded to this in many reports on Sirius/XM's POTUS channel – the real solution is the voters.

There’re things that the people who consume ads should understand as we get closer to election time:

1. Nobody is really going to make political advertising illegal (even though I think they should)

2. AND – there is substantial evidence to suggest political advertising works – it rallies the loyalists and persuades those on the fence to vote.

3. This means that candidates and political issues folk will always try to find a way to get MORE advertising on the air (in other words, politicians of one political party will always want to encourage an environment that allows more their party to run more ads while ensuring that their opponents can’t run as many.

NOW HERE ARE THE BIGGIES

4. Political advertising is considered a form of “political speech”. That means that it does not fall under the jurisdiction of “Truth In Advertising” laws.

5. Next to ad time, candidates spend a ton of money on polling – they do this so that they know what you – the voter – want to hear them say. They then use this polling data to craft their commercials (I know, my company works very closely with polling companies for political spots).

6. The result of this is that candidates can and will say whatever it is they believe you want them to say in order to get you to vote for them.

Basically political ads are one of the few places candidates can outright lie about themselves and their opponents – unchallenged and uninterrupted for the duration of that commercial.
In that commercial, however, the voter has the responsibility to research the claims as to what is factual and not (go hang out at politifact.com).

The voter should also understand the messaging and the branding of the spot to understand what the candidate is trying to make them think – and more importantly – feel.

There is going to be a lot of money spent to try to get you to vote one way or the other. (I will be receiving some of that money and my job is going to be to get you to vote one way or the other.) Trust me. I’m good at my job – so are all the other guys.

Wanna avoid having some guy like me shape your opinion? Do your research. As things heat up, tap into non-biased resources to help.