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Citizen Koch Briefing Notes

Briefing Notes No 37
October 16, 2014 

After-screening discussion and Q and A via Skype with filmakrer Carl Deal

About the film:

From O’Sullivan’s  June 19 review in The Washington Post:

“If you have a shred of idealism left, it is hard to watch Citizen Koch without a mounting sense of despair and outrage over the  influence money has come to wield over modern elections.“

The film  draws an arresting picture of  the pivotal events surrounding the  Scott Walker recall campaign, and helps us  unpack the tactics and strategic  purposes of  the Kochs’ activities.

Yet, the  film also gives hope that both awareness of and activism around the  role of big and dark money in politics are  growing:   increasingly,  people are coming to recognise that at issue is the viability of our basic democratic processes.

Despite, the starkly partisan Senate vote (in which all Democrats voted for;  and all Republicans against ) to overturn the Citizens United ruling via a constitutional amendment, Citizen Koch  shows that , on the ground,  these can become non-partisan issues. 

Since we screened Bill Moyers’  2012 Dark Money,  the role of big money in SuperPACs and dark money deployed via 501cs has massively expanded. 

As Mark Trumball has noted, “the  key name  in US campaign funding is ‘anonymous’ . “

In Senate battleground states in thess mid-terms, the  role of big, dark money  from out –of state sources is unprecedented.  

And the Koch brothers’  network of groups (Americans for Prosperity is just one part of the right-wing infrastructure they have constructed)  is playing a major role, with a budget of  almost $300 million for mid-term campaigning. 

Senators such as Al Franken in Minnesota, Jeanne Shaheen, New Hampshire  and Mark Begich, Alaska are forefronting the issue of big and dark money  as major electoral issues.

While the scale of spending on campaigns, whether  on electoral contests or issue-based, escalates almost exponentially, the ranks of those fighting against ‘dark money’  

Big money:

The Citizens United ruling held that corporations (and unions) have the same rights to free speech as individuals; laws  limiting  their expenditure on  spending (if uncoordinated with campaigns) was unconstitutional . This unleashed massive spending by SuperPACs.

The recent McCutcheon ruling removes caps on an individual’s overall spending in an election—ie to an limited number of candidates,  but maintains a cap on donations to an individual candidate. So donors can spend

Dark Money

This is the term coined by Mother Jones to highlight the fact that political funding has become opaque.  While PACs and SuperPACs have to reveal donors, non-profits—501c(s)  such as the Kochs’ Americans for Prosperity do not.  People, corporations, etc. can donate to a 501© which then funnels this money to a SuperPAC and thereby retain anonymity. 


The information and sources provided as well as the views expressed here reflect
neither the views of DAUK  or the Democratic Party nor their endorsement of, or association with them.

Written by:
elaine
Published on:
September 11, 2020

Categories: Films Edited Final, Past DAUK Film NightsTags: campaign finance

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