Democrats Attempt To Use Campaign Finance Laws To Silence Conservative Groups
With Democrats re-election chances looking bleak, fiscally conservative group Americans for Prosperity has got their attention in a big way. The group, and its backers the Koch brothers of Koch Industries, have become the new “vast right wing conspiracy” and the coordinated smears have started. The President mentioned AFP in a speech, The New Yorker ran a hit piece on the Koch brothers and rumor is here at the AFP-sponsored Defending the American Dream summit that the New York Times is launching an investigation into the group.
Now, in states where AFP has been running ads hitting out at policies like the stimulus spending and the health care bill, Democrats are filing legal challenges suggesting that the ads violate the group’s tax-exempt status.
In a complaint filed this week with the Internal Revenue Service, lawyers for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee charged that the group, the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, has been running ads in Kansas, Missouri and Michigan that are inherently “political in nature,” contravening a ban under federal tax law. A copy of the complaint was provided to The New York Times.
The foundation, which has just begun a $1.4 million ad campaign criticizing the economic policies in Washington as “wasteful spending,” has become a vocal critic of Democratic policies and drew a rebuke this month from President Obama.
Non-profit groups like the foundation, which falls under section 501(c)3 of the tax code, are forbidden from participating in “any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to a candidate.” They may, however, seek to educate voters or conduct broader get-out-the-vote drives “if conducted in a non-partisan manner,” the I.R.S. says.
That these ads hit out at specific policies, such as the stimulus and Obamacare, as opposed to specific politicians makes them entirely legal. These challenges are little more than Democrats using AFP as a strawman to distract from the issues which are the very policies AFP is criticizing.
I’ve never liked that these political groups get tax-exempt status, and that the tax-exempt status is used to control their political speech, but setting that aside what’s really going on here is a political attack from the left. Like AFP or hate them, that the group is being used, in a coordinated manner from the President to the left’s liberal allies in the media, as an excuse for Democrats to skip talking about their record over the last four years is clear.
Tags: americans for prosperity, Barack Obama, election 2010
