Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Conservatives sue in Rhode Island to avoid donor disclosure

Rhode Island Statehouse

Rhode Island requires political advocacy organizations to disclose information about the donors behind their election-related messaging.

Shobeir Ansari/Getty Images

Two conservative advocacy groups are fighting Rhode Island's campaign finance laws that mandate donor disclosure for political advertisements — because it would impact their bottom lines and donors' personal safety.

The in-state Gaspee Project and the Chicago-based Illinois Opportunity Project filed a lawsuit against the Rhode Island Board of Elections in federal court on Thursday. The plaintiffs argue that political ads not coordinated with a campaign are protected under the First and Fourteenth amendments and should not be subject to the state's disclosure rules.

But supporters of campaign finance laws like the ones in Rhode Island say increasing transparency around political ads helps voters know who is behind the messaging.


Rhode Island's law requires groups that spent independent expenditures of $1,000 or more to report their donors and expenditures to the election board. The groups must disclose: information about the person responsible for the content; the candidate or referendum the content refers to; and the identity of all donors of an aggregate of $1,000 or more.

For groups that engage in electioneering communications — meaning any paid TV, print or online political content published in close proximity to an election — state law requires the content to include the group's name, the name and title of its chief executive, and a list of its top five donors.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Both the Gaspee Project and the Illinois Opportunity Project are registered as 501(c)(4) "social welfare" organizations that engage in political issue advocacy. Both intend to spend more than $1,000 on mailings advocating their positions to voters ahead of the 2020 election, according to the lawsuit.

The organizations are suing Rhode Island's Board of Elections in the hopes that, if successful, they can avoid disclosing the names of their top donors while spending money to influence state elections.

"Plaintiffs are concerned that compelled disclosure of their members and supporters could lead to substantial personal and economic repercussions. Across the country, individual and corporate donors and staff of political candidates and issue causes are being subject to harassment, career damage, and even death threats for engaging and expressing their views in the public square," the lawsuit reads.

The groups also state in the lawsuit that they believe Rhode Island's disclosure requirements will lead to "declines in their membership and fundraising, impacting their organizations' bottom lines and ability to carry out their missions."

The political reform advocacy group Common Cause supports Rhode Island's campaign finance laws and believes legal precedent will uphold the disclosure requirements.

"We believe the law is constitutional and will survive this challenge because federal courts around the United States have upheld similar disclosure provisions. Disclosure is critically important to the health of our democracy," Common Cause Executive Director John Marion told The Providence Journal.

Stephen Erickson, vice president of the elections board, used Twitter to call the lawsuit shameful and an attack on the state's disclosure rules.

"Voters MUST know where the money comes from. In an era of intentionally false ads, Russian intervention, false narratives about voter fraud, democracy is being strangled," Erickson tweeted. "This is NOT a first amendment issue. People have a right to speak. People do not have a right to use sock puppets to distort public discourse."

Read More

"Voter Here" sign outside of a polling location.

"Voter Here" sign outside of a polling location.

Getty Images, Grace Cary

Stopping the Descent Toward Banana Republic Elections

President Trump’s election-related executive order begins by pointing out practices in Canada, Sweden, Brazil, and elsewhere that outperform the U.S. But it is Trump’s order itself that really demonstrates how far we’ve fallen behind. In none of the countries mentioned, or any other major democracy in the world, would the head of government change election rules by decree, as Trump has tried to do.

Trump is the leader of a political party that will fight for control of Congress in 2026, an election sure to be close, and important to his presidency. The leader of one side in such a competition has no business unilaterally changing its rules—that’s why executive decrees changing elections only happen in tinpot dictatorships, not democracies.

Keep ReadingShow less
"Vote" pin.
Getty Images, William Whitehurst

Most Americans’ Votes Don’t Matter in Deciding Elections

New research from the Unite America Institute confirms a stark reality: Most ballots cast in American elections don’t matter in deciding the outcome. In 2024, just 14% of eligible voters cast a meaningful vote that actually influenced the outcome of a U.S. House race. For state house races, on average across all 50 states, just 13% cast meaningful votes.

“Too many Americans have no real say in their democracy,” said Unite America Executive Director Nick Troiano. “Every voter deserves a ballot that not only counts, but that truly matters. We should demand better than ‘elections in name only.’”

Keep ReadingShow less
Hand Placing Ballot in Box With American Flag
Getty Images, monkeybusinessimages

We Can Fix This: Our Politics Really Can Work – These Stories Show How

As American politics polarizes ever further, voters across the political spectrum agree that our current system is not delivering for the American people. Eighty-five percent of Americans feel most elected officials don’t care what people like them think. Eighty-eight percent of them say our political system is broken.

Whether it’s the quality and safety of their kids’ schools, housing affordability and rising homelessness, scarce and pricey healthcare, or any number of other issues that touch Americans’ everyday lives, the lived experience of polarization comes from such problems—and elected officials’ failure to address them.

Keep ReadingShow less
Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump
text
Photo by Dan Dennis on Unsplash

Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump

Donald Trump wasted no time when he returned to the White House. Within hours, he signed over 200 executive orders, rapidly dismantling years of policy and consolidating control with the stroke of a pen. But the frenzy of reversals was only the surface. Beneath it lies a deeper, more troubling transformation: presidential elections have become all-or-nothing battles, where the victor rewrites the rules of government and the loser’s agenda is annihilated.

And it’s not just the orders. Trump’s second term has unleashed sweeping deportations, the purging of federal agencies, and a direct assault on the professional civil service. With the revival of Schedule F, regulatory rollbacks, and the targeting of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, the federal bureaucracy is being rigged to serve partisan ideology. Backing him is a GOP-led Congress, too cowardly—or too complicit—to assert its constitutional authority.

Keep ReadingShow less