Houston Democrats

It was interesting listening to Patrick's talk Tuesday, but I keep wondering, doesn't the Democratic Party also get massive amounts of corporate contributions? Don't we have as much, if not more, to lose than the Republicans? Maybe that's on the national, not state level ... in which case, Texas ethics reform might not hurt us. Does anyone know enough about this subject to shed some light on these questions?

I don't presume to know the complete workings of the Democratic Party's finances, but HB 1348 does not eliminate corporate or union funding from a political party's budget. The bill specifies the exact uses for which such many can be used. Corporations and unions will still be allowed to solicit money from their employees up to two times per year that can be contributed to any political party. The political party can then use that money for specifically defined administrative purposes outlined in HB 1348. Additionally, in 1905 the Texas legislature voted to ban the use of corporate and union money for political activities. However, the law is now being abused to an extent never before seen. Certain groups are seeking to call what are really electioneering expenses as administrative costs. HB 1348 seeks to clarify uses of corporate and union donations to prevent them being used on nonadministrative uses.

In the case of the Texas Association of Business, $1.9 million from corporate sources was spent on television advertisements and another $453,815 was spent on direct mail to voters that the Republican Party classified as administrative costs. These uses of the money are already against the law in Texas, so HB 1348 will make it clear what constitutes proper and improper use of the money. The Republican Party is getting a lot of attention for such misuses of its corporate money, but I sincerely hope that the Democratic Party ensures that it follows the law. I hope that helps to clarify your question. If anyone else can add information, please do so.

Marc - Thanks for posting so much detailed info from this week's brown bag lunch! A couple clarifications:

1. There was over $6 million in corporate $$ in the Texas 2002 elections. These were not direct contributions to candidates, but funds used to influence the outcome of the elections via PACs, parties and "independent" expenditures.

2. According to the "bright line" test, an ad is "electioneering" and must be paid for with fully-disclosed individual contributions (i.e. NOT corporate or union money) if all of the following are true: a) it is aired within 60 days of a general election b) it refers to a candidate c) it targets the candidate's constituents and d) it is either a tv ad, radio ad, direct mail piece, or phone bank message. Ads which meet these criteria may still be aired, but cannot be paid for with corporate or union money.

Dale, you raise a good question. Under HB1348, the parties will still be able to raise and spend corporate and union money. HB1348 does require, however, that the parties keep these funds separate from funds that are use for political activities. Under HB1348, parties can spend corporate and union funds for: administrative expenses (which the bill explicitly defines), to administer a primary, to administer a convention, and to cover the costs of redistricting.

HB1348 doesn't try to impose new restrictions on the parties, but to clarify existing laws to make them enforceable. HB1348 seeks to uphold the 100-year-old Texas tradition of keeping corporate and union money out of our elections. At least until 2002, that was an expectation that both Democrats and Republicans could live with.

Patrick, your clarification about HB 1348 was deeply disturbing. You basically said that Texas politicians will continue to collect and spend corporate money legally, with little real change in the law. A "clarification" of the law, to the average person, means "no change at all".

Your words were deeply disgenuous, to quote: "HB1348 seeks to uphold the 100-year-old Texas tradition of keeping corporate and union money out of our elections." You say that, but at the brown bag the other day, all you did was complain about how Republicans spent corporate money in the election. Both can't be true!

"Clean" elections"? "Ethics"? To continue to allow any corporate participation in our elections, means that Democrats have done nothing to improve the process. Most independents I know would conclude that is because Democrats and Republicans equally benefit from this loophole, and do so eagerly. Efforts to show miniscule differences between the parties on this matter just make things worse.

Is there a single Democrat in the Legislature today who has introduced legislation to truly remove corporate buyouts from Texas elections? If not, we have nothing to complain about until we elect some ethical representatives of our own.

As much as I would like to see corporate and union money totally eliminated from political activities, I don't really think that will in reality ever happen. I'm not saying that people should give up the fight to eliminate such funding, but these types of contributions have a rather insidious way of finding holes in the system. Some of the 527s of the recent presidential elections are an example of disguising campaign donations that would otherwise have been illegal. However, I do believe that HB 1348 is a significant step to bringing the current abuse of the interpretation of 'administrative costs' back in line with the intention of the 1905 law passed by the Texas legislature. It is true that Republicans and Democrats, and realistically some third parties, have benefited from the use of corporate donations, but I believe this bill to be at least a step in the in the right direction, and approve of the efforts of Representatives Eiland and Smith for creating this bill. It takes some courage to write a bill that could turn you into a lightning rod for corporations and unions who would rather not see a tightening in the use of their donations, especially since these representatives may have benefited from such funding in the past. We clearly have a problem with extreme abuse of the current hundered-year-old law that needs to be clarified to make it easier to enforce in the today's environment of political financing. I'm not seeking to draw differences between Democrats and Republicans on this issue. I profoundly hope that both parties will stand united to pass HB 1348 to help rein the abuse of corporate and union contributions for clearly non-administrative purposes.