The Stifling Effects of Campaign Finance Law

Darpana Sheth from makenolaw.org explains why new campaign finance laws stifle democracy and discourage participation in the political process rather than level the playing field:

"Advocates of campaign finance “reform” often claim that the laws they promote will “protect” democracy.  But, in reality,   the opposite is true:  rather than fostering the political debate that is essential to the democratic process, the increasingly bewildering thickets of campaign finance regulations set endless traps for ordinary citizens and make retaining high-priced lawyers a necessity to participate in the political process.  Even with an army of specialized lawyers, however, navigating   the campaign finance jungle is far from easy.  Just ask Vice President Biden.

According to a recent report in The Hill, Joe Biden’s 2008 presidential campaign will have to pay the federal government more than $219,000 as a result of its violation of federal campaign finance laws.  By accepting a ride on a corporate jet and mistakenly paying only a first-class rate rather than a charter rate, Biden received an in-kind campaign contribution of $26,899 which he will have to repay.  Additionally, even though Biden’s campaign aides warned donors that they could not give amounts beyond FEC limits, the campaign neglected to keep sufficient documentation and records, which resulted in more than $106,000 in excessive campaign contributions from individual donors.  Although the Biden campaign tried to return some of the excessive contributions, under FEC rules it still owed $85,900 from stale checks that were never cashed by the donors."

Read the full post at makenolaw.org