Tempe aims to ban ‘dark money’; will Ducey hear?
An astounding 91 percent of Tempe voters on Tuesday approved a charter amendment that would require disclosure of “dark money” in city elections.
They don’t like the dark money that increasingly is buying Arizona’s elections — the secret interests that state leaders have bent over backward to protect.
Are you listening, Gov. Doug Ducey? Did you hear them, Arizona Legislature?
Meanwhile, Phoenix is working on a similar proposal.
And a bipartisan group called Outlaw Dirty Money is gathering signatures to put an initiative on the November ballot.
Tempe’s Sunshine Ordinance would require non-profit groups making independent expenditures of more than $1,000 to disclose their organization’s name and source of their campaign funding in city elections.
I say “would” because the charter change must be approved by Ducey before it can take effect.
Sure. That’ll happen.
Ducey was elected in 2014 with $5.2 million in support from six darkmoney groups set up as non-profit corporations. We would later find out from Internal Revenue Service records that five of those dark-money nonprofits in turn got funds that year from the sixth — American Encore, part of the Charles and David Koch network of conservative and libertarian billionaires.
And you wonder why Ducey has pushed for private prisons, school vouchers and corporate tax cuts even as our roads crumble and our poorly paid public-school teachers depart? And, oh, yeah, a new state law that will actually allow more dark-money spending in this year’s elections.
In all, anonymous interests spent more than $15 million getting the governor, Corporation Commission and Legislature they wanted in 2014, and hundreds of thousands of dollars more in the 2016 legislative races.
And what was our leaders’ response? In 2017, they passed a law that will allow even more dark-money spending in this year’s elections.
Lest you think cities, at least, have found a way to let the sun shine in, think again.
There’s a move in the Legislature to outflank them. House Bill 2153 would stop cities from requiring dark-money campaigns to disclose the source of their funding in city elections. The bill has passed the House and is awaiting action in the Senate.
Thus, the need for a citizen’s initiative.
Under the Stop Political Dirty Money constitutional amendment, any group spending more than $10,000 on a state or local campaign would have to disclose donors who contribute
$2,500 or more. (The group would be responsible for identifying the original source of the money, rather than just the last non-profit “social welfare” group through which it was laundered.)
The group has until July 5 to collect the signatures of 225,963 voters to get on the November ballot. So here comes the hard part — the inspiring part. This will be a grass-roots effort.
Not so long ago, conventional wisdom said you had to pay circulators to get an initiative or referendum on the ballot, given the number of signatures required. Then along came Save Our Schools Arizona, a group of average citizens who decided to fight our leaders, and their dark-money backers, who brought us universal school vouchers.
These citizen volunteers launched a referendum petition drive and managed to put Arizona’s new expanded voucher law on hold, giving voters the final say in November. These same citizens are now pitching in on the Outlaw Dirty Money initiative. (If you’d like to get involved, email info@outlawdirtymoney.com or call 602-633-5146.)
Look for heavy pushback wrapped in a phony First Amendment narrative, as if little old ladies will be afraid to donate $100 to a cause they believe in for fear of retribution. Ducey already has signaled his opposition, saying disclosure would subject donors to harassment.
On Tuesday, nine out of 10 Tempe voters saw through that argument. Nine out of 10 proclaimed loudly that Arizonans have a right to know who it is lurking in the shadows, trying to influence their vote.
Can you hear them now, Governor? Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizona republic.com or 602-444-8635.