Campaign Finance

Question 1

What was the Federal Election Campaign Act 1974?

Answer 1

Limits hard money to candidates hoping it would reduce candidate’s reliance on a very few wealthy donors

Question 2

Which two congress cases weakened the Federal Campaign Reform Act 1974

Answer 2

Buckley V Valeo 1976 - ruled that it infringed on the 1st amendment
1979 - Congress allowed parties to raise soft money

Question 3

How were candidates mainly funded between 1976 and 2008?

Answer 3

Matching funds

Question 4

When did matching funds stop being used leading to the death of public financing?

Answer 4

In 2008, Obama opted out of matching funds, leaving him free of limitations and raising $745m compared to McCain’s matching funds of $84.1m. In 2012, both candidates opted out of matching funds which seemed to lead to the death of public financing

Question 5

What did the McCain - Feingold Act 2002 do? Also known as the bipartisan Campaign Reform Act

Answer 5

-ban on national party committees raising soft money
- unions and corporations banned from directly funding issue advertisement
- Limits donations to $2,300 per candidate or committee
- contributes from foreign nationals are banned

Question 6

What was created out of the Bipartisan Campaign reform Act 2002?

Answer 6

527 groups - they can accept limited funds, but must disclose donors. They are not regulated as they focus on issue advocacy, rather than explicitly supporting candidates

501(c)4 groups - spend majority of time on non political activities

Question 7

What was Citizens V FEC 2010?

Answer 7

Citizens United wanted to broadcast Hilary: The Movie just before the election (which would have breached the 2002 act). In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of Citizens United, finding the 2002 act breached 1st amendment rights

Question 8

What were the impacts of the ruling of Citizens United V FEC 2010?

Answer 8

• setting up of Super PACs, who could accept unlimited donations as long as they didn’t give them directly to federal candidates
• granted corporations and unions the same political rights as individuals
• to the most part overturned the 2002 act and saw spending rising sharply

Question 9

What was the ruling of McCutcheon V FEC 2014?

Answer 9

Individuals can now donate the capped amount of $2,800 to as many candidates as they like, rather than having an overall individual cap of $117,000

Question 10

How many Super PACs were registered with the FEC in 2020?

Answer 10

2,197

Question 11

Which PACs supported Biden in 2020 and how much did they give?

Answer 11

Future Forward USA spent $114m, both supporting Biden and attacking Republicans

House Majority PAC spent $138m attacking Republican candidates and just $5m supporting Democrat ones

Question 12

Which PACs supported Trump in 2020?

Answer 12

Senate Leadership Fund PAC raised about $309 million, which was mostly spent on attack ads of the Democrats. It poured $90m into just North Carolina and Georgia. $63m came from allied dark money group One Nation

NRA and Victory Fund Super Pac spent over $16m supporting Trump and attacking Biden

Question 13

Example of big political donors?

Answer 13

Koch brothers - Republicans
Michael Bloomberg - spent over $1bn in 2020 - Democrats

Question 14

How much was spent during the 2020 election cycle?

Answer 14

$14 billion

Question 15

What’s an example to show that wealth is coming from wealthy individuals?

Answer 15

1/5th of total campaign donations came from less than 1/1000th of the population

Question 16

What is dark money and what’s the concern with it?

Answer 16

Donations where the identity of the donor is a secret. In 2020, only 30% of donations came from groups that fully disclosed their donors identity

Question 17

What are the arguments that money influences election outcomes?

Answer 17

• In 2020, Biden outspent Trump and won
• In 2020 Senate race for Arizona, Martha McSally was outspent by challenger Mark Kelly by $30m and lost
• Few are willing to neglect campaign finance
• allows advertisement and to employ more campaign staff

Question 18

What are the arguments that money does not influence outcomes?

Answer 18

• Clinton outspent Trump in 2016 and lost
• In 2020, South Carolina Senate Race, Republican incumbent Lindsay Graham was outspent by $40m but was safely re-elected
  -arguably money follows a strong candidates rather than creates them
• spending between the two candidates is relatively even
• this is only one factor in determining the final result e.g. the incumbency factor

Question 18

What shows that UK funding is becoming increasingly like the US?

Answer 18

In 2019, UK parties received the highest ever number of donations at over $113m
Lord Sainsbury’s record donation of 8m to the Liberal Democrats

Question 19

What’s a clear example of a political donor trying to gain influence?

Answer 19

The Koch Brothers promised they would fund any Republican who voted against Trump’s American Health Care Act because they wanted more radical action. The AHCA failed.

Question 20

What’s an example to show the incumbency factor is important?

Answer 20

Of the last 32 presidents that have gone for re-election, 22 have won

Question 21

What are the advantages of incumbency for the president?

Answer 21

• name recognition
• fundraising - they face no serious challenger in the primary; they are the single candidate
• they can announce popular measures for certain states before the election
• experience of campaigning

Question 22

Similarities in campaign finance between US and UK?

Answer 22

• both allowed high levels of donations - either through super PACs or to the party directly
• bother are increasingly coming from wealthy donors
• rise over concerns of dark money
• neither use state funding

Question 23

Differences in campaign finance between UK and US?

Answer 23

Funding in the US often goes into the billions
- more emphasis on freedom of speech in America
- In the UK it’s against the law for pressure groups to pay for adverts endorsing a candidate
- pressure groups don’t fund election campaigns