Campaign reporting needs review
Hearings to begin soon on clarifying New Mexico’s laws
The New Mexico secretary of state will be holding hearings soon on regulations that will clarify New Mexico’s campaign reporting requirements in light of a number of court decisions that have invalidated parts of New Mexico’s current law while leaving other parts standing. It is an effort that was begun in 2014 by Maggie Toulouse Oliver’s predecessor, Dianna Duran, who was also faced with the obligation to enforce an ambiguous law. That effort was suspended amid scandal in the Secretary of State’s Office, and the Legislature this year tried to solve the problem with the passage of SB 96.
The bill passed overwhelmingly with bipartisan majorities in both houses, but it was vetoed by the governor, mainly at the behest of the Koch brothers-backed group, Concerned Veterans for America, based in Virginia. The result is confusion for campaigns and darkness for voters.
At issue is the requirement that independent groups — like Concerned Veterans of America — report to the secretary of state if they engage in “electioneering” activities in the months right before an election or expressly advocate for the defeat or election of a candidate or ballot issue at any time during the year.
In the proposed regulations these groups must, if they spend more than $1,000 on their activities, report what they are spending their money on and the donors who gave more than $200 for that purpose. Actually, the reporting requirements are much less onerous for these groups than for regular PACs and candidates.
Currently in New Mexico, all candidates and PACs must report all contributions and expenditures, with the additional requirement that they must disclose the occupation of donors of more than $200. Not so for the out-of-state independent groups, who have hidden behind New Mexico’s ambiguous laws to avoid public scrutiny. Yet these large groups are dominating elections, running negative advertisements and spreading misinformation through phony phone banks. In the recent special Georgia House election over $28 million was spent by outside, dark-money groups. This big money is headed our way in the upcoming 2018 elections.
That’s why it’s important that the Secretary of State’s Office, which is the principal enforcement agency of the state’s campaign finance law, acts now. The 2018 election cycle begins in a just few months.
New Mexico voters and businesses overwhelmingly support the disclosure of “dark money” used to sway elections. In January, a poll taken by Research and Polling for Common Cause New Mexico indicated that nine in 10 voters supported requiring all independent groups who are spending money on campaigns to report who their donors are. In March of this year, 92 percent of business leaders weighed in to support disclosure.
The new regulations do not apply to nonpartisan groups not engaged in “electioneering” or advocating expressly for or against a specific candidate or ballot measures. They do not have to report anything and are of no interest to the secretary of state. But yes, groups who are spending big money to influence elections must report under the new regs. Why? Just as those groups have a right to spend as much as they want, the public has a right to know who they are. Accurate, complete information is the stuff that democracy is made of. It allows voters to hold elected officials to account, to determine real motivations and to not be misled. Without it, we are shooting in the dark.
We applaud the secretary of state for working to bring our law into conformance with the Caonstitution and recent case law. The new regulations clarify the rules, level the playing field for everyone who participates in the campaign reporting process and — most importantly — satisfy the public’s right to know who is advocating for candidates.