Babies Skirt Campaign Finance Laws

We all knew that Barack Obama had a strong appeal to young voters but until today we didn’t know the half of it. Matthew Mosk reports that even babies are getting on board, giving the maximum donation allowed by law.

Elrick Williams’s toddler niece Carlyn may be one of the youngest contributors to this year’s presidential campaign. The 2-year-old gave $2,300 to Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). So did her sister and brother, Imara, 13, and Ishmael, 9, and her cousins Chan and Alexis, both 13. Altogether, according to newly released campaign finance reports, the extended family of Williams, a wealthy Chicago financier, handed over nearly a dozen checks in March for the maximum allowed under federal law to Obama.

Such campaign donations from young children would almost certainly run afoul of campaign finance regulations, several campaign lawyers said. But as bundlers seek to raise higher and higher sums for presidential contenders this year, the number who are turning to checks from underage givers appears to be on the rise.

[…]

Although campaign finance laws set a limit of $2,300 per donor per campaign, they do not explicitly bar donors based on age. And young donors abound in the fundraising reports filed by presidential contenders this year.

A supporter of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R), Susan Henken of Dover, Mass., wrote her own $2,300 check, and her 13-year-old son, Samuel, and 15-year-old daughter, Julia, each wrote $2,300 checks, for example. Samuel used money from his bar mitzvah and money he earned “dog sitting,” and Julia used babysitting money to make the contributions, their mother said. “My children like to donate to a lot of causes. That’s just how it is in my house,” Henken said.

Just how much campaign cash is coming from children is uncertain — the FEC does not require donors to provide their age. But the amount written by those identifying themselves as students on contribution forms has risen dramatically this year, according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics. During the first six months of the 2000 presidential campaign, students gave $338,464. In 2004, that rose to $538,936. This year, the amount has nearly quadrupled, to $1,967,111.

[…]

Congress tried to outlaw political contributions from those under age 18 as part of the McCain-Feingold Act in 2002, but the Supreme Court struck down that provision as an infringement on the constitutional rights of minors. With that ruling in mind, the Federal Election Commission wrote new regulations two years ago that tried to balance what it considered a legitimate desire among some children to make political contributions against the possibility that parents would seek to pad their donations by funneling money through children.

The regulations established a three-step test to determine whether a contribution is acceptable: It must be made with the child’s money, the parent cannot reimburse the child for making the donation and the contribution has to be knowing and voluntary.

Of course, if a baby gets a $2000 monthly allowance, it’s his money, right? And who’s to say that the baby isn’t fully cognizant of his donation? After all, literacy tests have been banned.

Bruce McQuain calls, once again, for a system of unlimited, fully disclosed contributions. Considering how well attempts to restrain the influence of money into politics over the last thirty-plus years have worked, one would think this idea would finally gain traction. My guess, though, is that common sense will continue to be trumped by lobbyists for “public interest” groups and lawyers.

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James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is Professor and Department Head of Security Studies at Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. So are Sen. Obama or his supporters breaking the law or not? It stands to reason that those who are ineligible to vote in our elections should also not be eligible to contribute to political campaigns, so on what basis did our glorious conservative Supreme Court strike the provision down? Hmm? Could it make things less convenient for certain fundamentalist wackos with extra-large families when it comes to funding the campaigns of like-minded Republican politicians? Seems this has backfired. Interesting times….

  2. floyd says:

    Should private donations be allowed only from eligible voters? Otherwise it appears to be de facto enfranchisement of the ineligible.

  3. JKB says:

    Well, these kids might want to get their finances straight lest the IRS start inquiring as to whether they declared this income they are not donating. This is politics, unpaid payroll, income, or gift taxes and under the table income, even to a child, can flare up when the partisans start fighting.

  4. Lurker of sorts says:

    I can only find Elrick and Cain in the FEC database but then the others probably have a different last name. The linked article does not indicate what their last name is.

    Also the article says the trust fund manager acted in their stead which probably was never even considered in the FEC regulations.