NOT a story of US vs THEM, but a nice graphic of what could be if we used a matching funds system to fund our presidential campaigns. This issue is not really my forte, and I know many of you will be better equipped to discuss in detail any pros or cons. Frankly, I don’t see any cons, I was just impressed with the graphic, and the way we could get back to public financing of campaigns. It made an impression on me
Remember this is just an example based on finance reports using figures of the current candidates, and also includes Ted Cruz.
The Intercept just posted, what I thought was, a really interesting story comparing a scenario of a campaign financing similar to how New York City does it, with what we are currently working with. New York City matches small donations (under $200) at a 6 to 1 ratio. Note: No idea how that ratio would work on a federal level.
The report by the U.S. PIRG (Public Interest Research Group), looked at the data of donations through the end of the 4th Qtr 2015.
The report assumes that to participate in the matching funds program, candidates must voluntarily agree to take no donations over $200. Therefore, to determine the amount candidates would receive in matching funds, the report caps donations by individuals at $200 in its accounting, even if they gave more than that amount, adds up all the candidates’ donations using those new numbers, and then multiplies the result by by six.
The Sanders campaign raised $72.8 million through the end of the fourth quarter of 2015, compared to $110.4 million raised by the Clinton campaign. However, with a six-to-one match of public funds for Sanders’s small-dollar donations, Sanders would have received an additional $340.3 million in matching funds, for a total of $413.1 million.
What if we could fund our presidential campaigns like this?
There are more figures discussed in the article, along with another graph further down in the article comparing the money each campaigned raised, additional funds under matching system, and money raised by Super PACs. Bernie still outpaces Clinton, along with Trump, Cruz, and Kasich.
This article by the Intercept is an update from one they did earlier, but when there were more candidates in the race, and used the 3rd quarter 2015.
Can you imagine the amount of time Hillary would save by not having to attend private fund-raisers, or rely on PACs, etc? That in itself would be an improvement for her, not to mention the overall health of our democracy. Not sure if she’d consider campaigning on this (maybe she has?), but I sure could get behind it.
I have to leave in a little bit to bid a construction job, so if I’m not commenting, you know why.
