Without a doubt, the United State Presidential Election has dominated the most recent news cycle. With stories such as Hillary Clinton's emails and Donald Trump's firebrand speech, it is easy to see why. The media storm has caused many high-profile billionaires to open their checkbooks to ensure the safety of their interests by investing in their favorite candidate. In contrast, Democratic billionaire George Soros has been pouring funds into the American justice system.
In the past year, George Soros has donated over $3 million to local district attorneys who are seeking spots in the judicial system. This total exceeds the donations of almost everyone. This includes those individuals who have donated to presidential campaigns. Many of his funds have gone towards African American, Hispanic, and other minority candidates. These individuals are supporting ideas such as reform in sentencing disparities, prison sentences for drug offenses, and disparate violence against minority citizens. While local elections don't garner much attention from the national media, Soros's donations are
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Soros believes that prosecutors have done so in ways that discriminate against the poor and against minority populations. With the recent attention that law enforcement offices have achieved, the public has woken up to the inequalities that exist in today's justice system. Soros has decided to use his influence to put a stop to this. He has donated large sums of money to campaigns in Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, Illinois, and New Mexico. These funds have gone through Super PACs and other unlimited money groups. For many campaigns, the funds from Soros are the only source of money available. Funds are important for travel expenses and advertising slots. It is a challenge to garner support if the public does not know a candidate is
Kenneth Vogel’s Big Money explores the invasion of money into our political system. In the novel, Vogel explains one of the most important important events that is currently happening in today’s elections: donors. This, according to Vogel, has been brought on by a ruling in the case Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission. The result of this case destroyed finance restrictions, giving Corporations and Unions the same laws of freedom of speech as individual Americans. The novel opens in February of 2012 where Vogel sneaks into a donor banquet. As our current president, Barack Obama, gives his speech, Vogel makes a note of the President’s words. In particular, Vogel focuses on one line “You now have the potential
In January of 2010, the United States Supreme Court, in the spirit of free speech absolutism, issued its landmark Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, marking a radical shift in campaign finance law. This ruling—or what some rightfully deem a display of judicial activism on the part of the Roberts Court and what President Obama warned would “open the floodgates for special interests—including foreign corporations—to spend without limit in…elections” —effectively and surreptitiously overturned Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce and portions of McConnell v. Federal Election Commission, struck down the corporate spending limits imposed by Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, and extended free speech rights to corporations. The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief historical overview of campaign finance law in the United States, outline the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling, and to examine the post-Citizens United political landscape.
Sberna, Robert. House of Horrors: The Shocking True Story of Anthony Sowell, the Cleveland Strangler. Kent, Ohio: Black Squirrel Books, 2012. Print.
The oldest currently serving US Senator, Dianne Feinstein, has done her share of leading our Senators and fighting to keep our country safe and free of crime. Feinstein is a member of the Democratic Party, as well as the former thirty-eighth mayor of San Francisco. Eight years after being elected into the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1970, Feinstein served as the board’s first female president. The assassinations of Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk caused Feinstein to succeed as mayor of San Francisco in 1978. While Feinstein served as San Francisco’s first female mayor she renovated the cable car system and oversaw the 1984 Democratic National Convention.
The current use of soft money in the US Governmental elections is phenomenal. The majority of candidates funding comes from soft money donations. Congress has attempted to close these funding loop holes; however they have had little success. Soft money violates standards set by congress by utilizing the loop hole found in the Federal Election Commission’s laws of Federal Campaigns. This practice of campaign funding should be eliminated from all governmental elections.
Campaign finance refers to all funds raised to help increase candidates, political parties, or policy attempts and public votes. When it comes to political parties, generous organizations, and political action groups in the United States are used to collect money toward keep campaigns alive. Campaign finance always has problems when it comes to these involvements. These involvements include donating to candidate, parties and other political organization. Matthew J. Streb stated “instead of placing further restrictions on campaign donations to candidates, parties, and other political organizations, we should consider eliminating contribution restrictions entirely (Rethinking American Electoral Democracy)”. In other words, instead of allowing
Campaign finance reform has a broad history in America. In particular, campaign finance has developed extensively in the past forty years, as the courts have attempted to create federal elections that best sustain the ideals of a representative democracy. In the most recent Supreme Court decision concerning campaign finance, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Court essentially decided to treat corporations like individuals by allowing corporations to spend money on federal elections through unlimited independent expenditures. In order to understand how the Supreme Court justified this decision, however, the history of campaign finance in regards to individuals must be examined. At the crux of these campaign finance laws is the balancing of two democratic ideals: the ability of individuals to exercise their right to free speech, and the avoidance of corrupt practices by contributors and candidates. An examination of these ideals, as well as the effectiveness of the current campaign finance system in upholding these ideas, will provide a basic framework for the decision of Citizens United v. FEC.
The issue of campaign financing has been discussed for a long time. Running for office especially a higher office is not a cheap event. Candidates must spend much for hiring staff, renting office space, buying ads etc. Where does the money come from? It cannot officially come from corporations or national banks because that has been forbidden since 1907 by Congress. So if the candidate is not extremely rich himself the funding must come from donations from individuals, party committees, and PACs. PACs are political action committees, which raise funds from different sources and can be set up by corporations, labor unions or other organizations. In 1974, the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) requires full disclosure of any federal campaign contributions and expenditures and limits contributions to all federal candidates and political committees influencing federal elections. In 1976 the case Buckley v. Valeo upheld the contribution limits as a measure against bribery. But the Court did not rule against limits on independent expenditures, support which is not coordinated with the candidate. In the newest development, the McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission ruling from April 2014 the supreme court struck down the aggregate limits on the amount an individual may contribute during a two-year period to all federal candidates, parties and political action committees combined. Striking down the restrictions on campaign funding creates a shift in influence and power in politics and therefore endangers democracy. Unlimited campaign funding increases the influence of few rich people on election and politics. On the other side it diminishes the influence of the majority, ordinary (poor) people, the people.
There have been laws put into place to reform the campaign finance system in the United States. It is apparent that money greatly influences American elections and it has massive effects upon the outcome of recent elections. The laws encourage citizens to participate in elections. Although it may be unknown to many, money greatly influenced the outcome of the 2012 presidential election.
We all heard of 9/11. I mean who hasn’t heard of 9/11, do you guys know who planned and attacked the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and try to hit the U.S Capitol. It is Osama Bin Laden the dead terrorist and the leader of Al Qaeda. Osama Bin Laden is a terrorist that bombed the U.S and the western philosophy by attacking U.S embassies, the Oklahoma city suicide attack and a lot more suicide attacks that are really dangerous. He was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1957 or 1958.
the winner will rule, not with the consent of the people, but at the bidding of Wall Street, which, with the rest of corporate America, is financing their $3 billion presidential campaigns.
Soros, Jonathan. "It's Time to Junk the Electoral College." Wall Street Journal - Eastern Edition
The advocacy explosion is strongly linked to the decline of the American political party and the role of the political parties in elections. As interest groups have gained more power and had a larger control over politics and political goods the power that is exerted by political parties has dwindled. The power of the interest group has grown larger with the amount of members and the financial rewards that have come with the new members. In elections interest groups do not usually participate directly with the candidate or the election. Berry points out that “Groups often try to leverage their endorsement to obtain support for one of their priorities” (Berry, 53). With interest groups spreading their resources around the actual election can be affected very minimally by the many interest groups that contribute money to the election. However, the candidates who obtain political office through the help of special interest money still owe some sort of loyalty to the interest group regardless of which party wins the election. This loyalty and the promise of more money in the future gives the elected of...
I’ve loved politics since I was in 6th grade, I didn’t always have the best understanding of it all when I was younger but I was able to recognize that there were a lot of citizens who were disgruntled with their government’s progress. For example, as of August 2014, congresses’ approval rating is only 14% (Riffkin, 2014). As I’ve aged I realized that the recent Supreme Court decisions regarding corporate money and personal spending limits have made the government a less effective tool for the American citizens and that is why I’ve chosen to write on the influence of money in politics. I believe this is the most important political issue that we currently face because we are unable to pass the bills that reflect the views of the American people
Over the past few years, a number of occurrences have displayed the growing economic and political inequality of the United States. The currently dissipated Occupy Movement did draw the general public’s attention to the ridiculous strides made by the rich, whose incomes have skyrocketed within the past four decades. Those pertaining to the middle-income and poor have sadly had their incomes stagnate. According to Caroline Fairchild from the Huffington Post the middle class incomes steadily is on the decline. In 1968 the middle class earned about 53.2 percent of national income in 1968. This number has now fallen to 45.7 percent. Super PACs became a concern as more individual donors willingly wrote up enormous checks to support their particular candidates. As a result, this gave prominence to the growing political inequality, as well as highlighting the rich’s ability to have their words have much more weight over the average citizen in America.