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You are here: Home / Politics / Proud to Be A Democrat / Great Bill, Great Policy, Great Politics

Great Bill, Great Policy, Great Politics

by | 80 Comments

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This is an exciting bill:

House Democrats unveiled details of their first bill in the new Congress on Friday — a sweeping anti-corruption bill aimed at stamping out the influence of money in politics and expanding voting rights.

This is House Resolution 1 — the first thing House Democrats will tackle after the speaker’s vote in early January. To be clear, this legislation has little-to-no chance of passing the Republican-controlled Senate or being signed by President Donald Trump.

***

There are three main planks the bill covers: campaign finance reform, strengthening the government’s ethics laws, and expanding voting rights.

Campaign finance

  • Public financing of campaigns, powered by small donations. Under Sarbanes’s vision, the federal government would provide a voluntary 6-1 match for candidates for president and Congress, which means for every dollar a candidate raises from small donations, the federal government would match it six times over. “If you give $100 to a candidate that’s meeting those requirements, then that candidate would get another $600 coming in behind them,” Sarbanes told Vox this summer. “The evidence and the modeling is that most candidates can do as well or better in terms of the dollars they raise if they step into this new system.”
  • Passing the DISCLOSE Act, pushed by Rep. David Cicilline (RI) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (RI), both Democrats from Rhode Island. This would require Super PACs and “dark money” political organizations to make their donors public.
  • Passing the Honest Ads Act, championed by Sens. Amy Klobuchar (MN) and Mark Warner (VA), which would require Facebook and Twitter to disclose the source of money of political ads on their platforms, and share how much money was spent.

    • Ethics

  • Requiring the president to disclose his or her tax returns.
  • Stopping members of Congress from using taxpayer money to settle sexual harassment cases or buy first-class plane tickets.
  • Giving the Office of Government Ethics the power to do more oversight and enforcement and put in stricter lobbying registration requirements.
  • Create a new ethical code for the US Supreme Court, ensuring all branches of government are impacted by the new law.

    • Voting rights

  • Creating new national automatic voter registration that asks voters to opt out, rather than opt in, ensuring more people will be signed up to vote. Early voting and online voter registration would also be promoted.
  • Restoring the Voting Rights Act, part of which was dismantled by a US Supreme Court decision in 2013. Ending partisan gerrymandering in federal elections and prohibiting voter roll purging.
  • Beefing up elections security, including requiring the Director of National Intelligence to do regular checks on foreign threats.

    • Obviously, the devil is in the details, but on their own, each one of these seems reasonable and a genuinely good thing. The other thing I like about this is that it is a direct response to what the public is demanding, and the House will be passing it while the Republicans are already on the defensive regarding corruption, with two members of their caucus currently under indictment and all of them staggered by the overt corruption and cronyism of the malignant narcissist in chief and his lackeys in the administration.

    Pass it, and dare them to vote against it. It may be DOA in the Senate because Mitch McConnell is shameless, but they can just do what the GOP does best, and beat the Republicans around the head and neck with it all the way into 2020.

    Reader Interactions

    80Comments

    1. 1.

      TenguPhule

      Stopping members of Congress from using taxpayer money to settle sexual harassment cases or buy first-class plane tickets.

      Wait, they use taxpayer money to buy first class instead of coach?! Those bastards!

    2. 2.

      Yarrow

      It is great politics. Everything in that bill is so sensible and things that people already want. Republicans can be bludgeoned for two years for voting against getting money out of politics and ethics reforms.

    3. 3.

      jl

      @TenguPhule: Also need something that requires them to go through the same bureaucratic hell to upgrade as the lesser people do in private and public sector, even if willing to upgrade with their own money.

    6. 6.

      Anthony Cooper

      The next time (hopefully 2020) the Dems get the trifecta, it’ll be good to have a bunch of bills pre-written to push through Congress and onto the President’s desk.

    7. 7.

      Schlemazel

      This will sail through the House, probably have GOP support. It will never reach the floor in the Senate. The media will politely ignore that last part.

      Don’t give up, ight harder. keep the pressure on the GOPpers. We need to flip the upper chamber.

    9. 9.

      Schlemazel

      @TenguPhule:
      A couple of years ago I was lying back and forth to DC weekly. I sat near Sen Franken on several flights. Next to him one time. I asked about 1st class & he said wouldn’t on his dime so he wouldn’t on mine. But there is no rule against it

    10. 10.

      Yarrow

      Glad to see Dems playing strong offense. It’s about time the Republicans played defense. Go ahead, defend your treasonous party, Republicans, and the traitor in the White House. Have fun with that.

    11. 11.

      Doug R

      @Schlemazel: I remember hearing Al Franken talking about flying after 9/11. He used to keep baseballs in his carry on. His plan if a hijacking occurred was to bean the hijacker, the joke being he’d have more balls in his face than I think was Harvey Firestein.

    13. 13.

      Platonailedit

      Eric Swalwell: "We also believe that sitting in the House basement are pages of lies and the transcripts of witnesses who came before the House Intelligence Committee that we wanted to send to Bob Mueller … So item number one will be to get those transcripts to Mueller." @MSNBC— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) November 30, 2018

      Just. Do. It.

    14. 14.

      Mandalay

      Requiring the president to disclose his or her tax returns.

      Requiring all presidential candidates to disclose their tax returns for the previous six years would be even more useful. If we already had that in place I doubt whether Trump and Sanders would have even entered the race.

    15. 15.

      Pogonip

      I like it.

      I’d also like to see a law against “negative” campaigning—the kind of ad where ominous music plays while the narrator talks about how the opposing candidate worships Cthulhu, beats his wife, and loves fried puppy for dnner. Politicians claim they don’t like to stoop to this but have to because everyone does it, and it works. Which may be true, so level the playing field—don’t let anybody do it. I think the most effective law of this kind would restrict the candidate from talking about anything but himself, his ideas and his accomplishments, if any. Not a word about the opponent.

    17. 17.

      Schlemazel

      @Yarrow:
      My guess is he had the miles to do it any time he wanted but the optics are bad. I don’t doubt he understood and played a part of regular guy, he really was one.

      A previous GOPper, Rudy Boschwitz, wrote a paper on how to appear regular when he was in the Senate. Wear a plaid shirt, roll the sleeves up. If you have a suit & time make a big production of taking off the coat & loosening the tie. In a parade stop often and mop your brow. You still see them working that bullshit 30 years later

    21. 21.

      jl

      I particularly like the small donor part. I think the corruption that came along with nearly unlimited and unregulated big money produced both a lot of bad policy, and a lot of the public anger against government and public institutions. I think the House Dems are split between those who like the old system and those who don’t like it but don’t want to risk elections through unilateral disarmament I think some hated the old system, but were reluctant to move away from it until they got evidence that there was a feasible alternative.

      So, looks like a critical mass of leadership is tired of the big money and is ready to move, only question is how to do it and how fast. They are at least willing to make public stands on it, and put it into the legislative history for 2020. Which I think is a good thing. And it may explain the more frantic and loud PR over the ConservaDem corporate hack House revolt against Pelosi compared to last one,

    23. 23.

      Mandalay

      @Yarrow: It seems that you are correct on two fronts…

      It might not be constitutional for a state to require presidential candidates to release their tax returns in order to get ballot access. The U.S. Supreme Court has previously ruled that neither states nor the federal government can create additional qualifications for congressional representatives or senators, per AP, and various legal experts anticipate that would extend to presidential candidates…

      Michael McConnell, a professor at Stanford Law School, told AP there’s a “tax law problem, because federal law guarantees the confidentiality of tax returns,” and he anticipates “that law would pre-empt any state law requiring someone to divulge their returns.”

      Bummer. But presumably the Democratic Party could still make it a requirement for their candidates, right? Then Sanders could pick whether he wanted to run as a Democrat and show his tax returns, or run as an independent and get attacked for being a tax cheat.

      Either way, Democrats are going to have to figure out what to do about Sanders using the Democratic Party as a flag of convenience during the campaign, because early indications seem to be that he is going to run again.

    25. 25.

      Redshift

      @TenguPhule: Yeah, they’re allowed to fly first class at taxpayer expense, but none of them do, because it would be used against them. That’s why the first class flights for Trump’s plutocrat cabinet officials has been such a big deal.

      I’ve been on flights to Chicago with Paul Ryan and Tammy Duckworth, both flying coach.

    27. 27.

      Yarrow

      Wait…how did I miss this yesterday?

      HUGE.

      Baked into Cohen’s plea agreement:

      The right for Mueller to describe the totality of Cohen’s involvement in criminality (including matters not included in the plea) at Cohen’s sentencing.

      Translation: Mueller guts Trump like a fish in open court on December 12th.

      — The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) November 30, 2018

      Buckle up!

    30. 30.

      Dorothy A. Winsor

      @Redshift: When we lived in Podunk Iowa, Mr DAW was once on a flight with Charles Grassley. The plane had a row of double seats on one side and a row of single seats on the other, so if Grassley had a first class ticket, Mr DAW couldn’t tell. Also, it was a waste of money.

    35. 35.

      jl

      @?BillinGlendaleCA: And this year too. Hell with all those people. Threw them some twenties, but they never even came to my house and listen to me order them around. Did you ever hear about the ‘tax cut for jl’ proposal that would revitalize the economy? No, neither did I.

    37. 37.

      ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

      @zhena gogolia:
      Oh! I thought you were making a joke. And I’ve seen photos of him, he’s far from fat. I forget where that RW meme came from.

    38. 38.

      Keith P.

      This is an exciting bill:

      Meh….subpoena power is vastly more interesting than a symbolic bill.

      BTW: Someone mentioned it earlier, but the CPU usage here is NUTS….it’s doubling my other Edge window streaming CNN in a size-doubled window (windowed scaling is not particularly performant). I can barely type comments, since I have so many dropped characters (just this tab)..

    40. 40.

      Mary G

      Competence will look very attractive after two years of Republicans unable to agree amongst themselves except to shove $1.5 trillion of public money into the pockets of the rich. I hate the dark money that Citizens United has allowed into the system. I’ve read conservatives arguing that requiring people to disclose who gave what impairs their freedom of speech, because liberals will mock them or something. I didn’t notice in September that the Supreme Court refused to order that, per the Atlantic:

      Secret money in politics will soon be a lot less secret. The Supreme Court on Tuesday let stand a lower-court ruling forcing politically active nonprofit groups to disclose the identity of any donor giving more than $200 when those groups advertise for or against political candidates.

      The public shaming of corporations who donated to “public hangings are fun!” Cindy Hyde-Smith shows that we the people can threaten boycotts and they will take the money away.

    43. 43.

      Pogonip

      @Yarrow: Not necessarily. You can’t commit libel in other cicumstances, why should you be allowed to do it in a political campaign?

    44. 44.

      rikyrah

      Online voter registration is completely different from online voting.
      We have online voter registration in Illinois. You can only do it if you have an Illinois Drivers license and/or Illinois State ID.

      Fastest way to register to.vote. From beginning to completion where you are a registered voter, takes 3-4 days.

    47. 47.

      Yarrow

      If, and it's an unanswered question at this point, hard proof comes to light that the President played a role in using pardons as bargaining chips to get potential witnesses to perjure themselves, it's hard to see how he can remain in office. https://t.co/SnyhhfAIeJ— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) December 1, 2018

      Yes, yes…..

    50. 50.

      Schlemazel

      @Chris T.:
      was on a prop plane from Davenport IA to Mpls. the seats were canvas stretched over an aluminum frame.

      The funniest part was we had to fly around a huge thunderstorm & when the pilot (who was right in front of me, no separate cockpit) announced we had made it around the storm he also said we had to land for fuel . . . In Sioux City IA. not sure if you can visualize that but I bet DAW is laughing right now

    52. 52.

      Yarrow

      @A Ghost To Most: Reposting my reply from below:
      That is too funny. They actually use the word “crime” in the phrase they are using to downplay the actual crime. “It’s not a serious crime; it’s a process crime” It’s still a crime! They’re admitting these people committed crimes, and somehow that’s supposed to be good. The bar is so low they need to dig a deeper ditch for it.

    56. 56.

      Brachiator

      I am kinda meh on the idea of public financing of elections. I like the idea of more transparency, though.

      The rest of the bill is pretty solid.

      If more politicians fly coach, maybe they will force the airlines to install wider seats with more legroom.

      Overall I like the idea of the Democrats forcing the GOP to kill good bills.

    57. 57.

      Kraux Pas

      I’d like to see them compel states with ID laws to make damn well sure that all citizens can get their ID for free.

    59. 59.

      Jamey

      I’ll truly be happy when any or all of these things happen:

      A) It’s called the “Trump This, Bitches!” Bill
      B) Proposed by the “Fuck Your Feelings” caucus
      C) In Spanish

    60. 60.

      debbie

      @zhena gogolia:

      I once flew in a 10-seater over part of the Rockies to get to Telluride CO. Roger Ebert was on the flight, and it took the pilot quite a while to figure out a seating arrangement that was balanced.

    65. 65.

      Amir Khalid

      @Yarrow:
      I think they’re trying to construct a distinction like that which exists in some sports between the personal foul and the technical foul, but does not exist in criminal law.

    68. 68.

      Yarrow

      @Amir Khalid: They probably are. It’s just hilarious that they are using the word “crime” in their attempt to make it seem small. It’s still a crime! It’s right there in the phrase they made up. Crime!

      Just imagine if Democrats attempted this nonsense. It would be “a crime is a crime is a crime” all day long, not to mention “lying under oath,” “the president palled around with criminals,” and so forth.

    71. 71.

      Ella in New Mexico

      THANK YOU BABY JESUS Dems get it and if this ever passes the country in on the way back to some sort of sanity.

    74. 74.

      opiejeanne

      Such a relief the way no one is jumping down the throat of anyone who is happy about this House Bill, as opposed to the response to the same bill earlier today.

      I hope Elizabelle doesn’t leave.

    76. 76.

      opiejeanne

      @debbie: Yeah, I saw that. I was surprised that Moar was being such a dick, but then it turned into a pile-on and the optics were pretty bad, mean boys on girl who dared say something.

    77. 77.

      SFAW

      @Amir Khalid:

      which exists in some sports between the personal foul and the technical foul,

      I think I know what you’re getting at, but in basketball, a “technical foul” is dealt with more harshly than a “personal foul.” For those of you that insist on calling soccer “football,” technicals are more like a yellow card. A “flagrant foul” in hoop is more like a red card.

      Why, yes, I DO have too much time on my hands — why do you ask?

    79. 79.

      Sister Golden Bear

      @debbie: @A Ghost To Most: Durango was an alternate airport. The Telluride airport is on the mesa above the town — with vertical drop-offs on either ends of the runway. To land you fly up the box canyon and make a U-turn just before the end. It’s an… interesting… landing, especially watching the trees go by your window on approach. Reminiscent of the old Hong Kong airport where the planes flew between the office buildings on approach.

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