Super PACs Are Just Getting Started

January 09, 2012

By CREW Staff

Elections, Super PACs, Newt Gingrich , Political Candidates

 

With New Hampshire on the horizon, there is one clear lesson from the Iowa caucuses: Don’t underestimate the clout of super PACs, which spent more than $8 million tearing down, among others, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.  Super PACs spent more than $65 million during the 2010 midterm elections.  At their current Bacchanalian rate, they’ll soar past their previous record long before the 2012 elections. It’s enough to give everyone who praised the Supreme Court’s disastrous Citizens United decision – and accompanying lower court decisions - a hangover.  Take, for example, Mr. Gingrich, a vocal supporter of the Citizens United decision who is now experiencing a difficult morning after.
On January 3, Mr. Gingrich decried super PAC Restore Our Future and its ties to fellow Republican candidate Mitt Romney, telling CBS, “This is a man whose staff created the PAC, his millionaire friends fund the PAC, he pretends he has nothing to do with the PAC - it’s baloney.”  In other words, it’s not fair.  Mr. Gingrich says he still supports the Citizens United decision, but he has the air of a man thinking twice about the lack of disclosure coming with it.
Mr. Gingrich may yet benefit from super PAC spending, though he’s promised to “publicly disown” any super PAC going negative to help him.  We’ll see.   On December 28, 2011, a former Gingrich aide who now lobbies for Boeing formed a super PAC called the New Independent Party.  It will be interesting to see what role that group plays in New Hampshire, South Carolina and the other primary states.  Still, even candidates with super PACs already working for them are thinking twice about the lack of disclosure- former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, for instance.  Former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, a Huntsman supporter, recently said Mr. Huntsman believes the names of the donors funding those groups should be subject to near instantaneous disclosure.
With super PACs poised to play an ever bigger role in the general election, the unlimited money fueling negative attacks ads will only grow.  Meanwhile, the ineffectiveness of the current minimal disclosure requirements becomes clearer every day.   More and more, even those who originally supported the Citizens United decision will start to realize this is an arms race no one can win.