Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

New Jersey's​ dark money law delayed

Dark money graphic
erhui1979/Getty Images

The donors behind New Jersey's most politically influential groups will remain a mystery indefinitely after a federal judge hit the pause button on a law that would have outed such "dark money" actors.

Set to go into effect later this month, the law would have required social welfare nonprofits and other nonprofit political organizations to disclose donors that gave more than $10,000 as well as spending related to elections and other political activity that exceeded $3,000. Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, signed the measure into law in June, despite previously vetoing the bill and calling it unconstitutional.

Soon after the governor signed the bill, though, Americans for Prosperity — a libertarian group funded by the Koch family, who would be affected by these new disclosure requirements — sued the state, arguing the law violated the First Amendment and targeted certain groups over others.


Two other nonprofit political advocacy groups, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Illinois Opportunities Project, have also filed lawsuits against the state for similar reasons.

U.S. District Judge Brian Martinotti's decision to delay the law's enactment came as a result of Americans for Prosperity's lawsuit. He granted a preliminary injunction to halt the law's implementation until the lawsuit is resolved.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

If allowed to stand, the law would require political nonprofits to start recording donor information on Oct. 15, with the intent to publish the first quarterly reports in January. But with the Martinotti's decision, these reports are on hold.

Supporters of the law had hoped it would shed light on dark money activity ahead of the off-year election this fall, when all 80 seats in the Legislature are on the ballot. In 2017, groups without donor disclosure requirements spent $41 million to influence the state's gubernatorial and legislative elections, according to estimates from New Jersey election officials.

Read More

a hand holding a red button that says i vote
Parker Johnson/Unsplash

Yes, elections have consequences – primary elections to be specific

Can you imagine a Republican winning in an electoral district in which Democrats make up 41 percent of the registered electorate? Seems farfetched in much of the country. As farfetched as a Democrat winning in a R+10 district.

It might be in most places in the U.S. – but not in California.

Republican Rep. David Valadao won re-election in California's 22nd congressional district, where registered Republicans make up just shy of 28 percent of the voting population. But how did he do it?

Keep ReadingShow less
A better direction for democracy reform

Denver election judge Eric Cobb carefully looks over ballots as counting continued on Nov. 6. Voters in Colorado rejected a ranked choice voting and open primaries measure.

Helen H. Richardson/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images

A better direction for democracy reform

Drutman is a senior fellow at New America and author "Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America."

This is the conclusion of a two-part, post-election series addressing the questions of what happened, why, what does it mean and what did we learn? Read part one.

I think there is a better direction for reform than the ranked choice voting and open primary proposals that were defeated on Election Day: combining fusion voting for single-winner elections with party-list proportional representation for multi-winner elections. This straightforward solution addresses the core problems voters care about: lack of choices, gerrymandering, lack of competition, etc., with a single transformative sweep.

Keep ReadingShow less
To-party doom loop
Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America

Let’s make sense of the election results

Drutman is a senior fellow at New America and author of "Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America."

Well, here are some of my takeaways from Election Day, and some other thoughts.

1. The two-party doom loop keeps getting doomier and loopier.

Keep ReadingShow less
Person voting in Denver

A proposal to institute ranked choice voting in Colorado was rejected by voters.

RJ Sangosti/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images

Despite setbacks, ranked choice voting will continue to grow

Mantell is director of communications for FairVote.

More than 3 million people across the nation voted for better elections through ranked choice voting on Election Day, as of current returns. Ranked choice voting is poised to win majority support in all five cities where it was on the ballot, most notably with an overwhelming win in Washington, D.C. – 73 percent to 27 percent.

Keep ReadingShow less