{"id":8356,"date":"2019-01-10T10:59:24","date_gmt":"2019-01-10T15:59:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/press-releases\/new-testing-the-waters-report-examines-how-presidential-candidates-ignore-campaign-finance-laws-regulators-let-them\/"},"modified":"2019-01-10T10:59:24","modified_gmt":"2019-01-10T15:59:24","slug":"new-testing-the-waters-report-examines-how-presidential-candidates-ignore-campaign-finance-laws-regulators-let-them","status":"publish","type":"press","link":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/tl\/press\/new-testing-the-waters-report-examines-how-presidential-candidates-ignore-campaign-finance-laws-regulators-let-them\/","title":{"rendered":"New \u201cTesting the Waters\u201d Report Examines How Presidential Candidates Ignore Campaign Finance Laws & Regulators Let Them"},"template":"","class_list":["post-8356","press","type-press","status-publish","hentry","press_type-press-release"],"acf":{"details":{"summary":"Today, Common Cause released a new report on the many ways presidential candidates bend and break campaign finance laws as they barnstorm early primary states, fundraise, evade contributions limits, and build their campaign teams while denying they are running for office. \u201c\u2018Testing the Waters\u2019 or Diving Right In?\u201d is part of Common Cause\u2019s 2020 Candidate Watch project through which the organization will watchdog candidate compliance with and government enforcement of campaign finance laws during the current election cycle.","featured_image":"","press_type":236,"authors":["{\"site_id\":\"1\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":7855}"],"related_issues":[137,2082],"related_work":false,"location":46},"sidebar":{"helper_enable_sidebar":false,"helper_media_contact":{"heading":"Media Contact","manually_enter_person":false,"person":null,"name":"","role":"","phone":"","email":""},"helper_links_downloads":{"heading":"Links & Downloads","links":null}},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"content":"Today, Common Cause released a new report on the many ways presidential candidates bend and break campaign finance laws as they barnstorm early primary states, fundraise, evade contributions limits, and build their campaign teams while denying they are running for office. \u201c\u2018Testing the Waters\u2019 or Diving Right In?<\/a>\u201d is part of Common Cause\u2019s 2020 Kandidato Panoorin<\/a> project through which the organization will watchdog candidate compliance with and government enforcement of campaign finance laws during the current election cycle.\r\n\r\nThe report, which should serve as a useful resource for reporters\u2019 ongoing coverage of the 2020 presidential election, outlines how for decades candidates in presidential elections have pushed legal boundaries in the early stages of campaigns. But things reached a new level of absurdity in 2015, when Jeb Bush spent the first half of the year raising more than $100 million in illegal-to-candidates funds for a super PAC he set up, while denying that he was a candidate. He then announced his candidacy, the super PAC spent the funds supporting his candidacy, and the Federal Election Commission (FEC) let him get away with it.\r\n\r\nThe report concludes with a recommendation that the FEC repeal its regulation exempting presidential candidates from certain campaign finance laws while they are \u201ctesting the waters\u201d of a campaign.\r\n\r\n\u201cAmericans expect and deserve candidates who obey the laws on the books when they run for president and they expect to see those laws enforced,\u201d said Paul S. Ryan, report author and Common Cause V.P. for Policy & Litigation<\/strong><\/em>.<\/em><\/strong> \u201cFor too long the FEC adopted a \u2018hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil,\u2019 approach to enforcement of the laws that presidential candidates routinely break early in their campaigns. Complaints I filed with the FEC in 2015 regarding obvious violations still sit before the Commission unresolved. We are hopeful that the prosecution and conviction of Michael Cohen, former personal lawyer and fixer to Donald Trump, represents a new commitment by the Department of Justice to enforce the campaign finance laws the FEC refuses to enforce\u2014and that we won\u2019t see a repeat of the lawlessness that characterized the beginning of the 2016 presidential cycle.\u201d\r\n\r\nThe report consists of five sections followed by a conclusion and recommendations for how regulators, journalists, and citizens can hold candidates accountable and end the spiraling cycle of abuse of our nation\u2019s campaign finance laws by presidential candidates.\r\n