Leaked Clinton Emails: Illegal Coordination with SuperPACs

Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

This should come as no surprise since everyone with half a brain realizes Democrats coordinate with the media on messaging all the time.

Via Law Newz:

Federal campaign finance laws generally prohibit a candidate’s election campaign from coordinating with the candidate’s super PAC. However, the law on what constitutes coordination is somewhat fuzzy, or open to wide interpretation, to say the least. The latest email dump from Wikileaks includes a legal memorandum that provides a perfect example of how far Clinton campaign lawyers are willing to go in interpreting what may be considered illegal coordination with a super PAC.

The April 2015 memorandum outlines a strategy for the Clinton campaign to work with the Priorities USA Action Fund super PAC (Priorities) in a manner that campaign lawyers argue does not rise to the level of coordination under campaign finance law. One particular focus of the memo is in the area of fundraising and the sharing donor information between the campaign and the super PAC.

The memo interprets the law as allowing the Clinton campaign to “identify donor prospects for Priorities and provide Priorities with the donors’ contact information using a specific template form approved by the legal team.” A footnote then explains why using the template form is so important:

Merely completing [the template form] likely would not be an in-kind contribution from [the campaign] to Priorities. However, sending over a substantial portion of HFA’s donor list likely would have to be valued and reported as an in-kind contribution.

In other words, it appears the campaign may be able to avoid a potential coordination violation by simply breaking up the donor list and sending it to the super PAC in small increments.

State of the race

With the presidential race headed into the home stretch, now that summer is over, a lot of Republicans are hoping for a brilliant finish by Donald Trump to make up the remainder of the ground he lost since the Hillary Clinton Democratic convention coronation.  That seems wishful thinking; Trump is Trump.  Perhaps he can be tempered by advisors, but not contained.  He reminds me of a baseball pitcher who you know is going to throw several wild pitches but is also capable of some terrific pitches.  The problem is control - you don't know what sort of pitch you are going to get at any given point in time.  But in the presidential race, there are no relief pitchers.

Sadly that's where that analogy breaks down because pitching doesn't score runs and that's what Trump needs now.  That's where the RNC comes in.

...Clin­ton is ahead in all 26 states that Obama won in 2012, plus the Dis­trict of Columbia, with a total of 332 elect­or­al votes, 62 more than needed to win. The closest state is North Car­o­lina, with a half-point Clin­ton even though it has gone Re­pub­lic­an in five out of the past six elec­tions. Iowa is next-closest with a Clin­ton lead of 1.5 points, fol­lowed by Nevada at 2.3 points, Flor­ida at 2.7 points, Ohio at 3.8 points and Wis­con­sin at 5.3 points. The RCP av­er­ages also show Clin­ton with a tiny, three-tenths of a point lead in Geor­gia, a state that has gone Re­pub­lic­an in five out of the past six elec­tions. Trump has a 2.5 per­cent­age point lead in Ari­zona, a state that has gone Re­pub­lic­an in five out of the past six elec­tions, and is up by 3 points in Mis­souri, which has gone Re­pub­lic­an in four out of the last six.

Taken to­geth­er, these data sug­gest that while the elec­tion is not over, it would take a pretty ma­jor event or turn of events for Clin­ton to lose...

As much as it pains me to say it, that last bit of assessment could be right. Trump could win if he had another 6 months, but he could also give up a few grand slams and bury his chances of winning.

All is not lost though for those of us experiencing nightmares over an ultra liberal SCOTUS (Supreme Court).  Clinton has been raking in cash but that's what Republicans need to dump into the race, starting today - cash.  Loads and loads of cash.  They need a state-by-state infrastructure in place and they need it right now.  They need an endless barrage of ads from now until November.  If the RNC cannot handle that on it's own then the conservative Super-PACs need to coordinate their efforts.

Trump needs to win in all of those close states - Florida, Ohio, Nevada, North Carolina, Iowa and Wisconsin.  Georgia, Missouri and Arizona should work out and maybe some defense is needed.  But if Trump cannot win the latter three, he doesn't deserve to win.

Trump seems like a one man show but he's running against a machine and he needs help.  He should focus on presidential speeches, debate over-prep, and voter engagement.  That's what he can do to bend the current course further to his direction. It's what he has to do.  The RNC and every Republican and conservative PAC have to kick in their efforts.  The election and stopping Hillary Clinton is too important to sit idly by.

10 (Mostly Unhealthy) Lessons from Florida

10 lessons, mostly unhealthy, learned from the Florida GOP primary.

Anti-Gingrich Spending Hammer

ouch.

Via Open Secrets (see snapshot below is from today), below is a summary of the independent expenditures (primarily from 527 PACs).  Out of $22.4 million spent on negative ads to date, 70.7% has been spent against Newt Gingrich.  Out of the money spent pro-Newt or anti-Newt, 83.9% have been run against Newt.  Out if all the money spent both pro and anti any candidate (i.e. all campaign spending by independent sources), 55.6% of all money spent, has been anti-Gingrich.

With all of that negativity aimed in his direction, not only is it amazing Newt Gingrich hasn't blown a gasket yet (indicating that he probably won't during the remainder of the election cycle), but it's truly astounding that he is in this race at all at this point.

That has to bode well for the long term of his candidacy if indeed he can win Florida even come close, the money should come.

Candidates Opposed/Supported

Candidate	Entire Cycle Total	Last Week Total	Last 24 Hours Total	Supported	Opposed
Gingrich, Newt (R)	$18,955,343	$7,069,723	$0	$3,049,023	$15,906,320
Romney, Mitt (R)	$6,311,434	$1,507,013	$0	$1,689,400	$4,622,034
Obama, Barack (D)	$2,086,413	$10,490	$0	$637,468	$1,428,699
Santorum, Rick (R)	$2,498,560	$0	$0	$2,099,559	$399,001
Paul, Ron (R)	$3,694,206	$173,918	$350	$3,561,216	$132,990
Perry, Rick (R)	$3,964,824	$0	$0	$3,964,824	$0
Huntsman, Jon (R)	$2,453,454	$0	$0	$2,453,454	$0
Cain, Herman (R)	$501,718	$0	$0	$501,718	$0
Total	$40,465,952	$8,761,144	$350	$17,956,662	$22,489,044