by BLACK ENTERPRISE Editors
Congressional seats, even the safe ones, don’t come cheap
To run for Congress, candidates must satisfy three constitutional qualifications: Meet the minimum age requirement, be a U.S. citizen and reside in the state they seek to represent.
Senate contests are often costlier than House races due to their statewide scope. Still, winning a House seat can require raising millions.
And he lost.
Republican candidate Bernie Moreno raised $26.6 million to defeat Brown. But outside spending — the money spent by groups that are not formally connected to a candidate or their campaign — was a massive factor in the race. OpenSecrets found that a total of $296 million was spent to support or oppose the candidates.
The contest turned out to be one of the most expensive nonpresidential races in history.
Several House races hit the eight-figure mark, including in Virginia’s 7th district, where the Democratic candidate, Lt. Col. Yevgeny “Eugene” Vindman, raised nearly $18 million to win the election.
For candidates, raising money to run for Congress can be a full-time job.
In the aftermath, his credit rating plummeted, and he struggled to rent an apartment in Washington, D.C.
He worked part-time as an Uber driver to try to make ends meet.
Critics have long fretted that the high cost of campaigns makes it prohibitive for regular Americans to run for office.
Money raised by a candidate goes to a variety of expenditures, including advertising, events, fundraising, payroll, field operations and consultants.
But there’s also another path where it flows — to fellow lawmakers.
Part of the pressure to raise money isn’t just to win a seat in Congress, it’s to earn a spot on one of the top committees, where legislation is formed, and tax dollars can be directed as a lawmaker wishes.
“We’re seeing donations to leadership PACs, and those are political action committees controlled by a candidate or elected official,” Pino explained. “They are primary ways in which members give to their colleagues.”
Super PACs have become the answer to many lawmakers’ fundraising needs. These PACs can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money from corporations, unions, associations, and individuals to support or oppose political candidates. However, the spending must be “independent,” meaning the PACs cannot donate directly to candidates or coordinate with campaigns.
Pino points out that donations to super PACs often come from the wealthy, not the district or state in which the candidates are running, giving these donors real influence.
“They’re not coming from within the state or the district of where the candidates are running, which takes away the power of the very constituents that are supposed to be voting this candidate in.”
And an OpenSecrets analysis found that candidates are continuing a decades-long trend of nationalizing their campaign fundraising. For example, in that Virginia House race that Vindman won, money flowed in from across the nation, with donors from New York, Texas, California and Florida contributing to the candidates.
And it will just get more expensive.
“It’s just discouraging,” Pino said.
This story was produced by OpenSecrets and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
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Source: Black Enterprise
