A crowdfunding website is trying to strong-arm Senator Susan Collins, the Republican from Maine, by giving more than $1 million to her 2020 opponent--unless she opposes Judge Kavanaugh. Donors are asked to make a financial pledge and then enter their credit-card information. As of Tuesday afternoon, 37,425 people had put down $1,041,878.
The fine print makes clear the quid pro quo: "Your card will only be charged if Senator Susan Collins votes for Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court." To avoid the money bomb, all Ms. Collins must do is vote "no."
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"I have had three attorneys tell me that they think it is a clear violation of the federal law on bribery," Ms. Collins says. "Actually, two told me that; one told me it's extortion."
If the opponent takes the money, would he or she be a party to a crime?
But wait, there's more.
Another pressure tactic, one Ms. Collins says she finds "incredibly offensive," is "the out-of-state voicemails being left on the answering machines of my state offices." Many of the messages are profane. "In one case--and we are going to turn this over to the police, but unfortunately, of course, the person didn't leave a name or number--but they actually threatened to rape one of my young female staffers."
Sorry, but this neither bribery nor extortion. Telling a politician "vote the way I like to I will support your opponent" (including financially) is an essential element of representative democracy -- and justly protected by the freedoms of speech, press and association.
Threatening violence is another matter entirely.
And that is different from the NRA threatening that politicians who support gun control will "pay a price" how exactly? Does anyone not understand that they mean they will fund their opponents in the next election?
Was it bribery when GOP donors threatened to stop contributing if the tax cuts were not passed. That is an actually quid pro quo? https://nypost.com/2017/11/06/gops-big-donors-threaten-to-close-wallets-if-tax-reform-isnt-passed/
I don't know the answer to the question posed in the OP. The question marks are literal, not rhetorical. But I think it is considerably closer than the above comments imply.
Can you explain the difference between the examples I gave and this? Or do you think those examples were also criminal?
Seems to me that the First Amendment should come into play here. You vote X, and we will avail ourselves of the ability to money bomb you (i.e., make campaign contributions to your opponent) seems to me, particularly since the activists aren't "interested" financially in the vote, to be telling a politician, "Vote X, and we'll hurt you in a legal manner." That has to be ok in our system.
The money here would be used, I presume, to fund the campaign of an opponent who would be using the money to make sure citizens are better informed about the positions of Senator Collins and her opponent (including their positions on who should be confirmed as judges). Not only do I not understand why one would think this a crime, I fail to understand why it should not be praised within a democracy in which a lack of information and a lack of engagement defines too often characterizes the average citizen.
I had hoped that by posing the question I might stimulate a discussion of the nettlesome "quid pro quo" issue, but I guess not.
Doug, thank you for your assertion that the opponent "would be using the money to make sure citizens are better informed ...." I needed a good belly laugh.
Have you watched any political ads in the last 20 years?
Doug, you are really baffled by the idea that, in our byzantine system of campaign finance and our elastic definitions of fraud, bribery etc. that people could characterize this sort of thing as extortion? Now I happen to agree with you that the First Amendment probably engages here, but surely you jest when you profess not to understand the thinking that would lead to the other conclusion.
Kent, I have watched lots of political ads and they inform voters in the (biased) way that all advocates for a cause do. And, because I see money as speech in this context (as does SCOTUS), I still struggle to see how collecting money to amplify the speech of a future political opponent should be viewed as a form of bribery or extortion. If Collins thinks voting for Kavanaugh's confirmation is the right thing to do, she should vote for him and explain to voters why and the more money in her next race the more likely she will be able to get that message out.
federalist, I was jesting a bit because I do know that federal, state and local prosecutors readily can and (too often) will seek to expand the definition of all sorts of crimes in all sorts of setting to seek to achieve all sorts of ends. But I still sense that the involvement of campaign dollars leads people to over-react to this kind of political pressure when no one doubts that Prez Trump and/or Sen McConnell have made it clear in some way that they would likely back a primary challenger of any GOP Senator who does not vote for Kavanaugh. Do you think it is a coincidence that it is only GOP Senators NOT running for re-election looking to slow down Kavanaugh confirmation?
Within a healthy democracy there should be all sort of political speech and political pressure, and $$ is a part of that story. As long as the money does to advancing the political discourse, rather than the personal accounts of the representatives, I say the more the merrier.
Prior to the most recent development, it was a near certainty that the ads, if they ran, would have stated the fact that Sen. Collins voted yes followed by grotesque distortions about Judge Kavanaugh and what his confirmation meant.
That is not my idea of "better informed."
Now, of course, we need to see what develops.
Almost every political ad I have ever seen includes what some would describe as "grotesque distortions." Unless you plan to have a "truth squad" empowered to censor some political speech, Kent, I think you have to recognize that campaign money goes to this various kinds of political advocacy. Short of fraud, the response is "fact checking" by independent media and more speech (which can be aided by more money).
I do not recall you, Kent, favoring limits on campaign financing (let alone some kind of censorship of ads with claimed "distortions"), so I return to fearing that you are seeing just one little symptom of a much bigger issue (which folks on the left are inclined to call a huge problem).
Pretty wild extrapolation from what I actually said. My point was that your assertion that political ads "make sure citizens are better informed" is astonishingly naive.
*I* have to "recognize that campaign money goes to this various kinds of political advocacy"? Not only do I recognize it, that was an essential part of my point.
If you recall correctly, you do not recall me favoring or opposing limits on campaign financing. The subject is off-topic for the blog and ultra vires for CJLF.
Your "fear" seems to assume that the topics I write about on this blog are the only ones I see or think about. The assumption is mistaken.
So how would you describe when political ads and the money spent on them do, Kent? If they are not about seeking to make the public better informed, what are they about? I am trying to understand if this issue is colored by the fact you dislike the type of speech that is being fundraised here. (And gosh knows, as a swing-state resident, I have plenty of reason to dislike political ads. And yet I realize they create a kind of political engagement among many folks who do not even know the names of the vast majority of people who represent them.)
More to the point, I am still struggling to understand how one thinks it bribery or extortion to say I am going to spend money to support political speech if and when a politician acts in a way that makes me want to speak/spend money against them (even speech that some think could include "grotesque distortions"). Absent some view that some forms of political speech (and money to support that speech) can/should be illegal, I am still scratching my head about how you think this is "considerably closer" to anything illegal. Can you explain a bit more why/how this seems like a close case to you?
This is taking more time than I intended to spend on it. Hopefully this answer will establish that there is a real question here (without purporting to answer it), which is all I set out to do in the first place.
In McCormick v. United States, 500 U.S. 257, 273 (1991), the Supreme Court distinguished soliciting campaign contributions from Hobbs Act violations by the specificity of the connection between the payment and the official act:
The McCormick opinion goes on to quote with approval from the DOJ Manual: "Campaign contributions will not be authorized as the subject of a Hobbs Act prosecution unless they can be proven to have been given in return for the performance of or abstaining from an official act; otherwise any campaign contribution might constitute a violation."
McCormick is about extortion, but its principles apply to bribery as well. In United States v. Allen, 10 F.3d 405, 412 (1993), the Seventh Circuit approved the following jury instruction in a bribery case based on McCormick:
Now suppose the crowdfunding website had collected contingent contributions to Senator Collins, rather than her opponent, and then sent her a letter: "Dear Senator Collins: If you vote 'no' on Judge Kavanaugh these contributions will be triggered. If you do not they will not." That, in my opinion, is bribery.
Have they cleverly avoided the bribery laws by effectively offering to withhold a contribution from the opponent if Senator Collins votes the way they want and communicating that by public media rather than directly? I think there is a real question here.
I get that it can be bribery to say expressly: you will get this money for your campaign if and only when you vote a certain way. But unless they say I will take money away from you and give it to your opponent for a particular vote, I still do not see how this can amount to a crime rather than a (common) form of political pressure.
Sorry to bog you down, but I deeply dislike the tendency to try to add criminal labels to any behavior we may dislike or find distasteful. So I was really struggling to connect the dots. Your explanation helps, and I apologize for taking too much of your time.