Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Steven Law, president of Crossroads GPS
About 40% of the campaign ads related to the 2012 election so far have been funded by secret donors whose identity may never be known.
By declaring themselves to be “social welfare” groups concerned with policies rather than politics, these groups are allowed to spend up to half of their funds on election activities without disclosing their donors.
The Washington Post reports that conservative groups opposing President Barack Obama have spent the “bulk” of the anonymous funds to date—more than $24 million. These Republican-oriented organizations include the Karl Rove-created Crossroads GPS, and Americans for Prosperity, a Washington-based group connected to the conservative brothers who run the Koch Industries oil-and-gas conglomerate.
“I don’t think we’ve seen these kind of groups acting so aggressively in election-related activity as we see now,” Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California at Irvine, told the Post. “This is pure secret money. . . . The goal is to avoid disclosure.”
-Noel Brinkerhoff
To Learn More:
Secret Money Is Funding More Election Ads (by Dan Eggan, Washington Post)
Introducing the Mega Super Hybrid PAC (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
Comments