Today the Conservative Campaign Committee sent out two (here & here) peculiar, grammatically-challenged emails “supporting” Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, Mike Sullivan. Both emails included a copy of a “Patriots List” of donors to CCC’s campaign to support Mr. Sullivan’s candidacy:
PATRIOTS LIST: Have your name listed on our Patriots List! The following individuals have contributed $200 or more to our independent expenditure campaign for Michael Sullivan for U.S. Senate. To have your name added to this list, simply make a contribution of $200 or more – HERE
The thing about the list is that it’s comprised almost exclusively of out-of-state donors. Now, many candidates for U.S. Senate will get donations from people in other states, but no candidate ever draws attention to those contributions. It’s as if CCC, a California-based organization, is trying to leave readers with the impression that Mike Sullivan is bought and paid for by out-of-state interests.
Mr. Sullivan has already come under criticism by other Republicans for not repudiating the Tea Party-linked, homophobic CCC. “Anyone who wants to get out and help Mike is welcome to get out and help Mike,” was how the Sullivan campaign responded.
One wonders whether these emails still constitute “help” in the eyes of the Sullivan campaign.
Let’s not forget poor George of Sudbury, MA! But the rest of that list is out of state. I’m guessing Sullivan does not expect most voters to know about this, but you’re doing your part to change that. He needs whatever money he can get considering how badly he lags behind in fundraising overall (only $175K through April 10, far behind the other Republicans even if you don’t count the money Winslow and Gomez donated to themselves).
This is a trend in primaries in particular. Groups on the right and the left are being asked to donate to candidates that best reflect their values. Daily Kos and NARAL have raised money out of state for Markey, and they and Bloomberg did it for Robin Kelly in the Chicago congressional primary, because the front-runner was awful on gun control.
I live in that district and was subject to many of these ads. Debbie Halvorson was hardly the frontrunner, but she was the only white candidate in a 60-40 black/white district and would’ve got 40% of the vote from the portions of the district in Will and Kankakee county while the six black candidates split the vote. What Bloomberg did was arbitrarily pick one of those black candidates to be a Daddy Warbucks to and make her the frontrunner. In a low info, low turnout race, those negative ads, the only ads on the air I might add, won her that race.
Until Bloomberg starts going after pro-gun Senators and Republicans as hard, I will view this a progressive defeat not a victory. A true small d-democratic primary in a majority black district was stifled by a rich white outsider. Kelly will have this seat until she dies, resigns, or gets indicted (as her last three predecessors were) and the actual people in her district had little say. Banning out of state contributions on a state by state basis would go a long way to codifying the Brown-Warren gentleman’s agreement and would bypass Citizens United.
As long as Ms. Kelly gets to vote on legislation which affects the good people of the 49 non-Illinois states, there’s no reason why the folks in those 49 non-Illinois states shouldn’t have every right to exert as much free speech (as in voice and money) as the folks who live in Illinois.
… would almost certainly be quickly, and correctly, declared unconstitutional. I’m all for fixing Citizens United, but not by throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
It also would not happen. How would one coordinate something like that? Some states would try, others would not. If by some miracle it were not struck down, we’d have a mighty uneven system in place. No thanks. The check, for what it’s worth, is that the opponent can make hay about the out-of-state support and hope it resonates with voters.
I’ll also note that Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey got a lot of money from enthusiastic progressives outside Massachusetts. Jconway, if you were to list Chicago as your legal address, you couldn’t give to a Massachusetts candidate even if you have a passionate interest in what happens in Massachusetts. That doesn’t strike me as right.