Justice Alito Was Wrong;Foreign Entities Are Investing in Our Elections

Justice Alito Was Wrong;Foreign Entities Are Investing in Our Elections

And they are doing so anonymously, and without limit.

Think Progress reminded us yesterday of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s big moment during the State of the Union address in January.

When President Obama warned in last January’s State of the Union address that the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision “will open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our election[s],” right-wing Justice Samuel Alito infamously mouthed the words, “Not True.”

  

Earlier this week, our Citizen’s United update reported the money flowing from the Chamber, but what we did not know at that time was that foreign entities were contributing to the Chamber’s fund.

Thanks to the investigation conducted by Think Progress, we now know that to be the case.

A ThinkProgress investigation has found that the Chamber funds its political attack campaign out of its general account, which solicits foreign funding. And while the Chamber will likely assert it has internal controls, foreign money is fungible, permitting the Chamber to run its unprecedented attack campaign. According to legal experts consulted by ThinkProgress, the Chamber is likely skirting longstanding campaign finance law that bans the involvement of foreign corporations in American elections.

In recent years, the Chamber has become very aggressive with its fundraising, opening offices abroad and helping to found foreign chapters (known as Business Councils or “AmChams”). While many of these foreign operations include American businesses with interests overseas, the Chamber has also spearheaded an effort to raise money from foreign corporations, including ones controlled by foreign governments. These foreign members of the Chamber send money either directly to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, or the foreign members fund their local Chamber, which in turn, transfers dues payments back to the Chamber’s H Street office in Washington DC. These funds are commingled to the Chamber’s 501(c)(6) account which is the vehicle for the attack ads:

And so, President Obama was right, and Alito has now been proven wrong.

Adding….this is just the first of many years to come that we will be fighting against the aftermath of the Citizen’s United ruling.

VIDEO: Michelle Bachmann Claims That No Foreign Money is Being Used to Fund Candidates

VIDEO: Michelle Bachmann Claims That No Foreign Money is Being Used to Fund Candidates

Joining Karl Rove in his protests, the batshit crazy Bachmann [R-MN], was on Fox Business yesterday where she was all in a fury, railing at Democrats and the White House for asking the Chamber to disclose its donors. Bachmann said that the Chamber only funds candidates out of its political action pac, and that there are no foreign donors.

Bachman:

This is about as low as it goes. It’s more than just disingenious, it’s a flat-out, patent lie. The Chamber of Commerce, who has been accused of taking foreign contributions to spend on elections, is absolutely not doing that. They have a separate political action fund and they use that only from American donors.

  

Unfortunately for Bachmann, her claim is easily proven false.

The Chamber does indeed have a political action fund. However, its PAC has so far raised $161,000 and spent only $104,000. Yet, the Chamber itself has spent more than $12 million so far this election season (and plans to spend $75 million), largely helping Republican candidates.

See, the PAC is required to disclose donors and funds; thanks to the Citizen’s United ruling, corporations are not required to disclose, nor limited as to dollar amounts of contributions.

Prior to the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, the Chamber would have had to run its political ads out of its PAC, contributions to which are disclosed. But the Court’s decision allows large corporations — such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — to spend unlimited amounts of money on political campaigns without publicizing their donors. [......]