The Patriot Post® · So Much for 'Getting the Money Out of Politics'

Does this year’s election spending spree effectively blow up the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform pipe dream of “getting the money out of politics”?

The 2020 election saw a record $14 billion spent on campaigns, much of it thanks to uber-wealthy Democrats. Case in point, billionaire Michael Bloomberg spent $100 million in just three states — Florida, Ohio, and Texas — with the aim of flipping them to Joe Biden. President Donald Trump won all three handily. Oh, and let’s not forget the $1 billion Bloomberg spent on his own failed bid to win the Democrat nomination.

Elsewhere, Democrats shelled out over $300 million on three Senate races in Kentucky, Maine, and South Carolina in a failed effort to unseat Republican Senators Mitch McConnell, Susan Collins, and Lindsey Graham. Tell us again about getting the money out of politics.

Democrat super PAC ActBlue spent a whopping $1.5 billion stumping for Democrat candidates, with little to show for it in the end. The never-Trump “Republican” Lincoln Project raked in tens of millions of dollars from wealthy donors as the PAC campaigned against not only Trump but Republican senators as well.

The truth is, all campaign-finance reform has done is create a mirage of separation between candidates and money. Money isn’t just talk; it’s speech. The authors of campaign-finance reform failed to get money out of politics because they failed to appreciate the nuance or understand or respect the free speech protections enshrined in the Bill of Rights.

Finally, it’s rather amusing that even though leftist elites spent hundreds of millions to swing elections their way, in most races it proved to be an utter failure. Obviously, people are free to chose who they vote for no matter how much money a candidate has spent in attempting to convince them one way or the other. The issues still matter to many Americans.