Gavin Aronsen

Reporter

Gavin is a Mother Jones reporter in the DC bureau.

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Gavin is an Iowa native, and covered the 2008 first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses for the Ames Tribune. He has also contributed to the Agence France-Presse, Daily Beast, Iowa Independent, Manhattan Media, and Village Voice.

This Week in Dark Money

—By Gavin Aronsen

| Fri Oct. 19, 2012 3:03 AM PDT

A quick look at the week that was in the world of political dark money...

the money shot

quote of the week

"The ability to pool money into a super PAC turns out to be very significant."
—Columbia Law School's Richard Briffault, explaining to ProPublica why he believes megadonors like Sheldon Adelson never independently financed political ads with the amounts of money they're now pouring into outside spending groups. Briffault is a campaign finance historian who has written extensively on super-PACs. (Also see Andy Kroll's must-read four-decade history of how super-PACs came to be.)

protest of the week

On Saturday, more than 1,000 people lay down on a San Francisco beach to create a human protest sign against Citizens United. Local cab driver Brad Newsham organized the event along with a host of activist groups, including Move to Amend and Public Citizen (both of which also support Ben & Jerry's cofounder Ben Cohen's effort to stamp money out of politics). Protesters also came out in support of Proposition G, which would make it official city policy to recognize that corporations aren't people.

Photo by John Montgomery

stat of the week

$13 million: The amount of money that super-PAC megadonors contributed toward expenses for the Republican National Convention in August, according to a report filed with the FEC on Wednesday. All told, more than $55 million was raised for the RNC, $32.6 million of it from corporations. The single largest donor, however, was casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, who has given at least $71 million to outside groups so far in this election. Democrats' hands weren't clean, either: $24 million was raised for the DNC (plus another $18 million from taxpayers) despite an earlier pledge to steer clear of corporate cash.

chart of the week

Here's a chart, in video form, from Northeastern University's Lazer Lab that shows super-PAC spending over time by partisan breakdown and whether the spending was positive or negative. Fair warning: There's lots of booing involved, and you might want to turn down your speakers before clicking play. (Or just check out the still version here.)

more mojo dark-money coverage

• Democrats Broke Pledge by Taking Corporate Convention Cash: The DNC vowed to hold the first convention in history that wasn't fueled by cash from corporations, lobbyists, and PACs. So much for that idea.
• 6 Must-Have Apps for Political Junkies: From fact-checking to donation tracking, data-mining the horse race has never been so easy.
• Following the Mystery Money Behind a Super-PAC's Attacks on Tammy Duckworth: The Now or Never super-PAC pocketed $1.95 million from a nonprofit that won't say who funds it.
• Who's Really Behind This Ad Scaring Seniors in Florida?: The dark-money group Defend my Dividend is more astroturf than grassroots.

more must-reads

• Gov. Tom Corbett (R-Penn.) received a mysterious $1.5 million contribution from Wisconsin in 2010 in a legal "money-laundering scheme." Center for Public Integrity
• With more than 73,000 political ads, Las Vegas has the dubious honor of being America's most ad-saturated media market this year. New York Times
• How annoyed are voters getting by political ads, and will it matter? Associated Press

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This Week in Dark Money

—By Gavin Aronsen

| Fri Oct. 12, 2012 3:00 AM PDT

A quick look at the week that was in the world of political dark money...

the money shot

quote of the week

"The difference in ad rates alone could end up being very important...It looks to be a huge benefit for Obama in the long run."
—Wesleyan Media Project codirector Michael Franz, on how the Obama campaign's cash advantage has given the president greater control over advertising than the more super-PAC-reliant Romney, by taking advantage of cheaper ad rates offered to candidates. An Ohio ad buy that cost a conservative super-PAC $900, for instance, cost the Obama campaign just $125 for a similar spot. As a result, more pro-Obama ads have aired in crucial swing states.

attack ad of the week

As the presidential race hits the home stretch, Karl Rove's American Crossroads super-PAC continues to hit Obama hard. A new ad claims that Obama will increase taxes on small businesses and add to the federal debt while costing more Americans their jobs. "Another four years focused on everything but jobs?" the ad asks. "No thanks." It's running in the battleground states of Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, and Ohio, a state that Obama has consistently held a small lead in and could be the deciding factor in the race to 270 electoral votes.

stat of the week

$1 million: You may have heard the allegations that the Obama campaign has been accepting illegal foreign donations, a story first debunked in 2008, then again this week. There's no evidence Obama has accepted donations from abroad, but the law is murkier when it comes to companies donating to outside groups, which may in fact have skirted the rules to accept foreign cash. Case in point: In August, the pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future received $1 million from Connecticut reinsurance company OddyseyRe, a "wholly owned subsidiary" of a Canadian insurance firm. While foreign nationals are prohibited from donating to any group influencing a US election, the law post-Citizens United isn't so clear when it comes to domestic subsidiaries of foreign companies.

race of the week

Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren is neck-and-neck in her race against Massachusetts Republican Sen. Scott Brown. The two are running fairly even in money spent for and against them by outside groups in 2012, which has been limited by a "people's pledge" between the two candidates meant to prohibit the groups from running ads. Over the past two years, however, two outside groups supporting Warren, the League for Conservation Voters and the League of Women voters, have spent more than $4 million on mailers and other get-out-the-vote efforts like door-hangers (below). That's more than double what Rove's Crossroads super-PAC/nonprofit network has spent on various ads including robocalls.

more Mojo dark-money coverage

• Why Did This Clean-Energy Group Fund a Pro-Coal, Pro-Oil Outfit?: The Energy Foundation sponsors the Sierra Club, Earthjustice…and a nonprofit that pushes fossil fuels and opposes environmental regulation.
• Scoop: Ben & Jerry's Cofounder Wants to Freeze Money in Politics: Ice cream magnate Ben Cohen wants to lick Citizens United, one dollar bill at a time.
• Would an Obama Win Hurt Campaign Finance Reform?: If the president raises $1 billion and beats the super-PACs, will it undermine efforts to roll back Citizens United?
• Can This Super-PAC Stop Tammy Duckworth's Surge?: The Now or Never super-PAC thinks millions of dollars can save Rep. Joe Walsh's seat. Is it right—or delusional?

more must-reads

• A look at the corporate lobbyists behind most of the pro-Romney super-PACs. The Nation
• 70 percent of the $174 million spent by Karl Rove's American Crossroads super-PAC and its affiliated Crossroads GPS 501(c)(4) has come from anonymous donors. Sunlight Foundation
• A new collaborative effort by the Sunlight Foundation and Free Press tracks political TV ads. Political Ad Sleuth

Scoop: Ben & Jerry's Cofounder Wants to Freeze Money in Politics

—By Gavin Aronsen

| Wed Oct. 10, 2012 3:00 AM PDT

Ben Cohen Gavin Aronsen Getting the dough out: Ben & Jerry's cofounder and campaign finance reformer Ben Cohen Gavin Aronsen

Shortly after I met Ben & Jerry's cofounder Ben Cohen in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park last Saturday, he removed a rubber stamper from his pocket, took a dollar bill from my wallet, and stamped it with the words "STAMP MONEY OUT OF POLITICS. AMEND THE CONSTITUTION."

"Money stamping is kind of like petitions on steroids," he explained as we sat on a lakeside bench. "You sign a petition and, let's face it, nobody really sees it. But stamping money is essentially monetary jiu jitsu. It's using the power of money to get money out of politics." The money stamp is part of Stamp Stampede, Cohen's effort to build popular support for a constitutional amendment to undo Citizens United, one greenback at a time.

Cohen hopes that thousands of marked bills soon will be circulating through cash registers around the country. Anyone can purchase a bill stamper on the group's website. Cohen also plans to spread the message via the Amend-o-Matic Stampmobile, a customized van mounted with a 10-foot-tall "Rube Goldberg-esque machine" that will stamp bills "in an entertaining and educational way." (The contraption was supposed to hit the streets of San Francisco last weekened, but Cohen cheerfully explained that his team was still "fine-tuning" it.) Ben & Jerry's, where Cohen is employed as a "pretty face" with "no authority or responsibilities," is one of Stamp Stampede's main supporters; Cohen promised "there will be times where ice cream is given away."

Stamp Stamp Stampede "Monetary jiu jitsu": A stamped dollar bill Stamp Stampede

Stamp Stampede, which launched in July, was inspired by two similar projects: the dollar bill-tracking site Where's George? and the 99-percent themed bill-stamping site Occupy George. It was also inspired by Occupy Wall Street itself. Last fall, Cohen and fellow ice cream magnate Jerry Greenfield stopped by Zuccotti Park and came away "impressed and inspired." The duo later returned to hand out ice cream. (They hid the company logo and used unmarked cups to appease corporate-wary occupiers.) The board of directors at Ben & Jerry's also endorsed the movement but stopped short of naming an ice cream flavor after it.

[Read more in the MoJo blog]

Would an Obama Win Hurt Campaign Finance Reform?

—By Gavin Aronsen

| Tue Oct. 9, 2012 3:00 AM PDT

President Barack Obama has always had a love-hate relationship with campaign finance reform. In 2008, he backtracked on a pledge to join John McCain in accepting public financing, remarking that "we face opponents who've become masters at gaming this broken system." He then went on to raise a record $745 million. When the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling came down in early 2010, Obama slammed it a week later in his State of the Union address, predicting that it would "open the floodgates for special interests."

More recently, Obama's campaign distanced itself from super-PACs, only to decide they're a necessary evil. Meanwhile, his campaign is on track to haul in $1 billion, even as it's claimed that Obama could be "the first president in modern history to be outspent."

Which raises the question: If Obama defeats Mitt Romney in November, will his victory weaken the opposition to Citizens United by undercutting the notion that a handful of megadonors pouring millions of dollars into super-PACs and shadowy nonprofits have the power to dictate the outcome of an election?

[Read more in the MoJo blog]

This Week in Dark Money

—By Gavin Aronsen

| Fri Oct. 5, 2012 3:00 AM PDT

A quick look at the week that was in the world of political dark money...

the money shot

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

"Throughout its existence, [our nonprofit] has regularly consulted with experienced tax counsel to ensure it is in full compliance with the federal tax laws."
—A statement to ProPublica from the Government Integrity Fund, defending its 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status despite spending more than $1 million favoring Republican Josh Mandel in his challenge against Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio). The Fund is a so-called "social welfare" group, which can't make politics its primary purpose. What that means, exactly, has been an ongoing discussion this year. The IRS is investigating potential violators of the rule, but it hardly ever audits nonprofits.

attack ad OF THE WEEK

At Wednesday night's debate, Mitt Romney declared, "I like PBS" and "I love Big Bird," but "I am not going to keep spending money on things [we have] to borrow money from China to pay for." (Just .00014 percent of last year's federal budget was spent on PBS.) After the debate, the liberal super-PAC American Bridge 21st Century released two web ads hammering Romney. The one below criticizes the candidate's offshore bank accounts, then switches to a scene showing Big Bird getting smashed by an anvil. American Bridge, which has spent more than $6 million supporting Democrats in the 2012 election, also rolled out a series of depressing images of Sesame Street characters bemoaning Romney's policy positions.

stat OF THE WEEK

$1.84: The reduced cost, per gallon, of gas that the Koch-affiliated 501(c)(4) Americans for Prosperity has been offering on a tour that has hit Nevada, Iowa, and Michigan. The reduced cost, offered to about 100 to 150 motorists per gas station, is meant to reflect the cost of gas when Bush left office (conveniently not mentioned is that the low cost was thanks to the economic crisis). Thus far, AFP has also spent more than $30 million on ads attacking Obama.

charts OF THE WEEK

The Sunlight Foundation has a series of eight charts exploring where the money is going to House races, organized by the Cook Report's likely victor ratings. Below, the first chart shows total amounts of money in House races; the second, which shows outside spending, suggests that while incumbents tend to have an overall cash advantage, super-PACs and nonprofits often favor their opponents. (Also: Don't miss Sunlight's Senate elections charts.)

MORE MUST-READS

• Ralph Reed's Group: An Obama Victory Means "He Can Complete America's Destruction": The nonprofit run by the ex-Christian Coalition leader blankets voters with grab bag of right-wing Obama hatred.
• Are Super-PACs Overhyped?: Sure, they're blowing rich donors' money. But don't write them off quite so fast.
• Are your dark-money donations tax-deductible? Wall Street Journal
• Suggestions from tax experts on how to remove dark money from the shadows. Roll Call
• Jonathan Alter explores the role of small money in Citizens United-era politics. Bloomberg