#NC#Republican#lawmakers on Tues overrode the Democratic governor’s veto of a bill that overhauls who runs elections & achieves a long-sought goal of the state’s #GOP.
The #legislation creates bipartisan boards that could #deadlock on establishing #EarlyVoting locations or #certifying results….
Most of the money spent by the senator Tim Scott’s presidential campaign has gone to newly formed companies whose addresses are Staples stores in suburban strip malls.
Scott entered the 2024 race with a war chest of $22 million, and his campaign raised $5.8 million from April through June. In that same time, he laid out about $6.6 million, a significant clip — but most of it cannot be traced to an actual vendor.
Instead, roughly $5.3 million went to two shadowy entities: newly formed limited liability companies with no online presence and no record of other federal election work, whose addresses are Staples stores in suburban strip malls.
Their minimal business records show they were set up by the same person in the months before Mr. Scott entered the race.
Masking the companies, groups and people ultimately paid by campaigns — effectively obscuring large amounts of spending behind businesses and convoluted consulting arrangements — has become common, as political candidates and organizations test the limits of campaign finance law.
Federal law requires campaigns to disclose their spending, including itemized details of their vendors, as a safeguard against #corruption and in the interest of #transparency.
But as in many aspects of #campaign#finance#law, campaigns have found "workarounds", and the body that oversees such regulations, the Federal Election Commission, is perpetually hamstrung by partisan #deadlock.
Campaign finance experts said that among increasingly #brazen moves by political candidates, Mr. Scott’s new financial disclosures stood out as exhibit A.
“This practice completely #undermines the federal campaign finance #disclosure#requirements,” said Paul S. Ryan, a campaign finance expert. “The public has a right to know how political committees are spending donor dollars.”