Bradley A. Smith is a professor of law at Capital University Law School in Columbus, Ohio. An authority on election law and campaign finance, he served between 2000 and 2005 as commissioner, vice chairman, and then chairman of the Federal Election Commission, in a seat designated for a Republican.
Mr. Smith believes that declining trust in elections is a serious threat to the nation’s democracy, and he says that Democrats are to some extent to blame for this decline, as well as Republicans.
“People think, oh well, this will just go away, or it’s just because of what is called the ‘big lie’ [former President Donald Trump’s false claim the election was stolen],” he says. “I think it’s a deeper and broader problem.”
Not just a Republican problem : Crisis of trust looms in US elections csmonitor.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from csmonitor.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
The New Hampshire House on Thursday concurred with the state Senate’s approved changes to key contribution and reporting thresholds as part of a campaign finance reform bill that also does away with the state’s voluntary campaign spending limits program
Darrell Bradley
“It is an important point because they need to have strong criminal laws in relation to illicit gains from public officials. I think when you target a civil asset recovery legislation and you tie that within the very important question of illicit gain by public officials, which is really an illegal activity that people should go to jail for, I think in a sense it diminishes the importance of what you are talking about. You really want to have a standalone legislation that deals with unjust enrichment that says very plainly any person that acquires wealth that cannot be explained, they will suffer penal consequences, including they can go to jail. So there has to be a civil recovery element of that. But first you want there to be a very strong deterrent for corrupt activities. That strong deterrent is that you go to jail. You have no right to the asset any way. What will really make it so that people don’t even think about touching public funds, or misappropri
As the State Elections Board Moves to Make Elections Less Transparent, General Assembly May Go the Other Way
Published May 11, 2021
I wrote on May 4 how the NC State Board of Elections (SBE) is, contrary to state law, trying to make our elections process less transparent by limiting the number of election observers:
For that reason, it is dismaying that the SBE is seeking to change the maximum number of voting place-specific observers from two every four hours to two per day…
…While the SBE claims that the proposed limit on observers is just part of a set of changes that “would provide clarity in election processes for county boards of elections, as well as political parties,” it would make our elections less transparent.