For years here I’ve maintained we can forget about getting big money and dark money out of politics— this more or less seals it.
The Obama administration has thrown in the towel on cracking down on hundreds of millions of dollars in “dark money”— funds given to advocacy groups that claim to be social welfare organizations rather than political committees.
Closing the so-called social-welfare loophole — which exempts the groups from federal tax and disclosure requirements — was one of the most urgent priorities of campaign-finance reformers in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision in the Citizens United case. But then the IRS came under fire for holding up conservative groups applying for the social-welfare tax exemption, and many Republicans cried foul.
By giving in to a GOP provision in the omnibus spending bill, the administration has effectively given up on limiting the political influence of nonprofit groups with unknown funders.
And…. no comment from the Obama administration or democratic leadership on this. Heck, it’s Christmas and time for our House of Lords, errrrr Congress to take a nice, paid vacation.
From the Huffington Post article:
Everyone from Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS to the Harry Reid-aligned Patriot Majority USA has taken advantage of the lax rules governing 501(c)4s. Since there's no legal requirement that 501(c)4 organizations disclose their donors, anyone can use them as a vehicle to pour unlimited money into our political system. And we mean anyone. As former Republican Federal Election Commissioner Trevor Potter has pointed out, even foreign nationals and governments could use 501(c)4s to quietly influence U.S. policy.
Let that sink in folks: Rather than allow the IRS to prevent the abuse of tax-exempt nonprofit status for purely political purposes by both parties, Congress has specifically banned the agency from taking any kind of action -- even at the risk of allowing secret foreign money to poison our elections.