I haven’t mentioned this before, but in real life I’m George Soros, billionaire currency trader and occasional supporter of liberal politics. I recently heard that Democratic U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota was retiring, and that in the next election his seat was likely to won by ex-Gov. Hoeven, a Republican.
Since I have more money than God, I figure I should be able to do something about this. Would it be legal for me to go on national television and offer Hoeven $50 million to NOT run? Assuming he hasn’t officially filed his candidacy, is there anything illegal about me directly and publicly paying Hoeven to stay out of the race?
I know that most billionaires who wanted to do something like this would be more discreet about it, and I’m sure I could just offer Hoeven a $10 million-a-year job as chairman of my “Foundation for the Preservation of Elvish Culture” or something. Then I could act all surprised when he suddenly decides he doesn’t have time to run for senator. But I’ve decided I want to make a point about this and do it as a straight-up quid pro quo. Can I?
PS: I’m strictly asking about the hypothetical legality of this move, not trying to start a GD-style flamewar about politics in general, so let’s keep it clean, ok?
You may want to check out Title 18, United States Code, Chapter 11 first. After that I’d check out the relevant North Dakota and New York statutes. With the kind of money that you have, Mr. Soros, if I were you I’d consult an attorney on all of this to be sure that you do not run afoul of RICO statutes as well.
Since you have more money than God, don’t you think it would be easier and safer to bribe the voters instead? Money wins campaigns, it’s a proven fact. Drop a few millions into the race and you’ll probably get the desired result anyway, and from a legal standpoint it’s much more acceptable to voters who are used to it and might be shocked that someone would be so overt as to buy a candidate.
Certainly, there are plenty of other ways to get somebody out of a race. I’m just curious as to what law, if any, I’d be breaking. Obviously, it would be illegal to bribe the guy once he’s elected. But I’m wondering if I’ve found a loophole in the anti-bribery statutes by bribing him beforehand.
I would ask one of my cadre of extremely expensive lawyers, but at the moment they’re all busy peeling a truckload of grapes I’m planning to wallow in later.
Not so fast, Airman Doors ! All those rules and regulations you quoted apply to elected officials, people in office, etc… Of course it’s extremely illegal to buy a candidate in office, everyone knows that much.
However, Mr. Soros proposes to buy private citizen Mr. Hoeven, currently unemployed, and as such neither a government official in office, a financial institution examiner or a port security manager. Nor would Hoeven receive or solicit money for preferential appointment to office, since Senators aren’t appointed. I wonder, however, if “not entering the race” would count as a service rendered or to be rendered… if Hoeven is elected, then immediately resigns when Mr. Soros asks him to, that’s an open and shut §203.B.2 case. Not running at all, however ? Even if “not doing something” counts as a service rendered, which it probably does at that, he by definition cannot render that one as as an official member of government.
I don’t think there is anything illegal about doing this. Here is something from 2006 in Nevada. The article claims there is nothing that could prevent this in the State of Nevada at least.
It happens more than you think, people just don’t talk loudly about it and it usually isn’t for millions.
Say you have Bob and Jim running in a primary for a State Senate seat and the party wants Bob to win. Its not unheard of to call Jim and say, “Look here is the reality. You won’t win, but you can really do damage to Bob. Drop out. Governor Jones will appoint you to the State Revenue Board for four years, $50K a year. There is a State House seat with your name on it when the incumbent retires.”
Is this as crass as walking into a person’s office and offering $10 million not to run? No but its still more or less a bribe.
Now just because there isn’t something that explicitly says that this is illegal, doesn’t mean that some enterprising prosecutor won’t come up with something and get a grand jury to indict you for it.
Putting it in the form of a direct offer of payment to not run could send the DA into the library to search into whether this is covered by any possible interpretation of elections statute, but it usually would depend if the person has or has not registered an exploratory committee or otherwise taken steps to officialize a candidacy; the person could essentially be saying goodbye to any future public service career due to the public opinion impact. Visual Purple and Neptunian Slug have pointed out how the same move is more customarily performed among “reasonable gentlemen”.
The place where it shows most often is trying to get the nomination. Many extremely rich or well funded campaigns never got off the ground. They spent huge amounts of money and ended up with a tiny number of delegates. Their opponents often had little money or recognition, yet defeated them soundly.
RICO is hard to apply. It has to be systematic and an established pattern. A one time act wouldn’t fall under it.
Money is vital to getting your message across and if that is the case you can make people think what they want. Yeah money’s no guarantee of a win in an election, but it certainly gives you a disproportinal edge.
It’s estimated that a run for a US Senate seat nationwide averages about 25 million dollars and that’s if you lose or win. Obviously it’s more in some states and less in others but that still shows what an obscene amount of money it takes just to try
Allow me to suggest to you that a more economical investment would be to have a bunch of party girls get him drunk and then have their pimp(s) export him to Mexico and have someone keep him under wraps there until the election is over. Fifty to a hundred grand, tops.
IANALAPOSRRR (I Am Not A Lawyer, A Politician, Or Some Really Really Rich), but I don’t think what you’re proposing violates any Federal laws. The U.S. Code section that Airman Doors, USAF linked to isn’t applicable here. I think it would be really, really interesting to see someone try this.
Should you decide to just slip Hoeven the $50 million in cash instead of giving him this job, I’d like to be the first to apply for it.
That doesn’t guarantee that he loses the election. People can still vote for him, even if he isn’t around & actively campaigning.
After all, Eugene Debs got a fair number of votes for President in 1920, despite being locked up in prison on trumped up anti-American charges.
People have even received votes after their death. Here in Minnesota, Paul Wellstone received many votes for re-election to the Senate even after he had been killed.
Not having the candidate around to campaign & make speeches is a disadvantage. But not always – there are more than a few candidates who would have won the election if they had just kept their mouth shut. I’ve worked on campaigns where we would have had an easier campaign if the candidate had been under wraps in Mexico!
In the 2008 Minnesota Senate race (including the extended recount), Franken raised $22.5 million, Coleman $19.3 million, and Barkley $165,000, for a total of just under $42 million.
To influence 2,887,646 voters. So a total of $14.53 per actual voter.
Plus the recount efforts cost over $12 million, an additional $4.15 per voter.
Nearly a $20 bill for each voter!
(And that doesn’t count money spent by ‘independent’ groups on this race. For example, defending Norm Coleman was a priority race for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and they spent additional millions on that.)
If you are who you say you are, it’s too bad you didn’t post this last week. We might have been able to help you out before you went and died in the alps…
I should also note you’re wiki page says you died today. The rest of the news world seems to have missed this tidbit.