US Politics: 133 Days to Nov. 3, But Who's Counting?

[sologdin]

pursuant to 11 CFR § 110.20(h), am advising against these sort of transactions.

[IheartIheartTesla]

7 minutes ago, sologdin said:

am advising against these sort of transactions.

Yeah, I would second that. The risk outweighs the rewards, and there is already too much money in politics from PACS, SuperPACs, and even plain old campaigns even with the cap on donations.

An organization like the ACLU or something similar would be far more useful, be legal, and give you far more bang for the buck (for instance, getting Trump's tax returns out to the public, or stays on certain Trump edicts)

[Ran]

44 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Trump campaign claiming that 800,000 tickets have been claimed for the Tulsa rally. That seems...dubious, at best.

I liked Josh Marshall's remark on that:

In other polling news, Scott Rasmussen(!) has run a survey for John Solomon's website(!)  showing Biden up 12 over Trump.

https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2020-06/2020-06-15 JTN Poll CROSSTABS.pdf

[Paladin of Ice]

Other SCOTUS rulings of note include refusing to hear cases regarding California’s sanctuary laws (leaving them in place) and backing a lower court ruling that will tick off hardcore 2nd Amendment fans, especially those who endlessly repeat the “shall not be infringed” section.

They did punt on the issue of qualified immunity, however, which got Clarence Thomas upset enough that he called the court out for it.

Even still, this is a really good day at the court in my opinion. That said, my first reaction is to start worrying about when the other shoe will drop and this court will do something truly horrifying to balance it out.

[GrimTuesday]

1 hour ago, BigFatCoward said:

I know it's not technically allowed, but how would an interested foreigner make a contribution to the Biden campaign, if he was so inclined? 

A cop asking us to help them commit crimes, this feels like entrapment.

My favorite part about the SCOTUS decision is that conservatives are going ballistic on twitter about how Scalia totally would have argued against it and since Gorsuch succeeded him on the bench he should be just like Scalia. I hope he is spinning in his grave, scum like Scalia doesn't deserve to rest easy.

[Fez]

5 minutes ago, Paladin of Ice said:

That said, my first reaction is to start worrying about when the other shoe will drop and this court will do something truly horrifying to balance it out.

Plenty of time left. There's still a lot of big cases left to get announced over the next couple weeks. Good chance they'll do something terrible regarding DACA.

But with a 5-4 conservative majority, I'll take whatever victories show up.

[Ran]

1 hour ago, BigFatCoward said:

I know it's not technically allowed, but how would an interested foreigner make a contribution to the Biden campaign, if he was so inclined? 

I mean, you really can't do it legally at all. The laws are clear on this.

A foreign national might possibly be legally able to donate to non-partisan non-profits that advocate for fair elections and voters, such as Rock the Vote or the Brennan Center for Justice (I checked and both of those permit countries other than the U.S. to donate through their forms), under the theory that fair elections = pro-Democratic, but even there I think foreign donations would be routed towards some sort of educational arm rather than anything directly connected with the election.

 

[Rippounet]

2 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

I know it's not technically allowed, but how would an interested foreigner make a contribution to the Biden campaign, if he was so inclined? 

A student of mine used a VPN to buy a Bernie t-shirt. Why couldn't you do the same thing for Biden merchandise? It's less dodgy legally speaking, you're still contributing to the campaign, and you get t-shirts, caps, or mugs out of it.

Edit: on second thought, I really wouldn't want Putin to buy millions of MAGA hats so let's drop the whole idea, shall we?

[Kalbear]

Please don't advocate or ask about breaking US finance law on a public message board. This has legal ramifications for not only yourself and anyone you interact with but the owners of these boards.

[Hereward]

I get the concept of working around an obviously unjust law, but given that it’s pretty uncontroversial amongst reasonable people that injecting foreign money into domestic elections is a bad idea, despite the stakes, I really don’t think you should.

[GrimTuesday]

1 minute ago, Hereward said:

I get the concept of working around an obviously unjust law, but given that it’s pretty uncontroversial amongst reasonable people that injecting foreign money into a domestic election, despite the stakes, I really don’t think you should.

Wait, what's unjust about not allowing foreign nationals to make political contributions? There is nothing in federal law that prohibits Americans living overseas from making political contributions, though it can make it harder since often times depending on the amount being donated you are required to provide an address or for higher amounts even your employer information. I think a lot of campaigns and political committees choose to just restrict donations from non-American IP, but that is not a legal thing, that is so they can do their best to avoid the issue entirely.

[Rippounet]

Trump just tweeted "LAW & ORDER!"

[A Horse Named Stranger]

2 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

I know it's not technically allowed, but how would an interested foreigner make a contribution to the Biden campaign, if he was so inclined? 

Bad idea. And it's not like US presidential campaigns are actually cash starved. If you want to break the law to ifnluence the election, take a hint from the Russian/Trump playbook.

Talk to your geeks in the Cyber Crime division, or the the guys over at the SFO to take a good look at the incumbent and his business ventures, and put the stuff on the internet.*

*this was of course not a serious suggestion. As that could at the very least cost our Big Fat Copper his job.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Just now, Rippounet said:

Trump just tweeted "LAW & ORDER!"

Is there a relaunch, is he watching a rerun of Criminal Intent (which was probably the subtitle of every business venture of his), or is he watching the shitty SVU stuff.

[DMC]

1 hour ago, Ran said:

A foreign national might possibly be legally able to donate to non-partisan non-profits that advocate for fair elections and voters, such as Rock the Vote or the Brennan Center for Justice (I checked and both of those permit countries other than the U.S. to donate through their forms)

Aye those are both good recommendations.  Another I'd make is the National Popular Vote.  There are plenty of 501(c)(3) organizations where you're not even breaking the spirit of the law.  Enforcement of the law, currently, is a bit difficult with Trump's gutting of the FEC.  Anyway, dark money also finds it ways into many 501(c)(4), (5) and (6) groups, as explained here.

[Hereward]

5 minutes ago, GrimTuesday said:

Wait, what's unjust about not allowing foreign nationals to make political contributions? There is nothing in federal law that prohibits Americans living overseas from making political contributions, though it can make it harder since often times depending on the amount being donated you are required to provide an address or for higher amounts even your employer information. I think a lot of campaigns and political committees choose to just restrict donations from non-American IP, but that is not a legal thing, that is so they can do their best to avoid the issue entirely.

So you’re in favour of foreign contributions to US election campaigns, including the Russians to Trump in 2016? Cause we’re not discussing Americans living abroad, we’re discussing a foreign national. If you’re OK with that, then you’re OK with massive direct funding from Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, etc,.

[BigFatCoward]

38 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Please don't advocate or ask about breaking US finance law on a public message board. This has legal ramifications for not only yourself and anyone you interact with but the owners of these boards.

This makes me think America is fucked more than everything I've seen in the last month.

[GrimTuesday]

5 minutes ago, Hereward said:

So you’re in favour of foreign contributions to US election campaigns, including the Russians to Trump in 2016? Cause we’re not discussing Americans living abroad, we’re discussing a foreign national. If you’re OK with that, then you’re OK with massive direct funding from Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, etc,.

Whoops, I think we have a bit of a mix up here, I absolutely do not think that foreign nationals should be able to contribute to American elections, I think I implied as much in the first sentence. I thought that you were saying that it was an unjust law, and the idea of Americas living overseas potentially being caught up in overzealous aversion to donations coming from foreign IPs without knowing if it is an American, since that is the only potential injustice I could see.

Campaign finance is something I am pretty passionate and knowledgeable about, so I absolutely understand the importance of having strong regulations there.

[Fragile Bird]

The most amusing part of this is that Russians or Saudis will just rent entire floors in a Trump hotel or buy half a dozen condos in a building he owns, or Trump will sell a house to a Russian for twice as much as he bought it for and voila! The FEC fairy won't be able to touch the transaction!

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

42 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

This makes me think America is fucked more than everything I've seen in the last month.

Oh please. you've just gotten the teaser trailer. The western parts of Minneapolis are just splendid right now.