At the turn of 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave a farewell speech to the nation. For those of you who may not know the history, Eisenhower was the commander of all allied troops in Europe during World War II, and later became the 34th President of the U.S., serving two terms starting in 1953. In his goodby speech, he did what most Presidents did as they left office–he acknowledged the solemn responsibility of passing on the mantle of President to a successor, emphasized the importance of preserving our democracy and gave advice to both government and those governed.
Eisenhower’s deep concern was that we should be wary of the newly created arms industry and how interwoven it was into the economy and the government. Up until World War II, there had been no permanent “defense industry”. In 1945 and beyond, there was. Eisenhower called it the “military-industrial complex”, and was concerned that it would take on a life of its own, for self-preservation of the jobs and profits that it sustained, even to the point that there would be an inclination to create or keep international conflicts going, in order to “feed” the defense industry. He foresaw that politicians would compete for defense contracts to be let to their districts and states, supporting jobs and the resultant tax revenues. Eisenhower warned us that the defense industry would become a behemoth, with its own survival instincts, influencing every aspect of American life, public policy and foreign relations. He saw that defense companies would lobby Congress and the Administrations to increase spending, supporting candidates through campaign contributions however they legally could.
Campaign financing has changed dramatically over the course of our country’s history. There has always been concern about the corruption that can happen when too much money tempts public servants to do the will of their financial supporters rather than do what’s right for their constituents. A steady pace of legislation was built up over the full course of our nation’s history, to ensure that campaign contributions were limited and transparent as to amount and source.
In 1757, after George Washington bought $195 worth of punch and hard cider for friends prior to an election, the legislature passed a law prohibiting candidates, or persons on their behalf, from giving voters “money, meat, drink, entertainment or provision …any present, gift, reward or entertainment, etc. in order to be elected.” From that point forward, there has been a great concern about the potential for corruption of our democracy that can stem from the influence of large amounts of money coming from unknown sources. A body of laws were enacted over many years to protect our democracy from such corruption.
But the guardrails were burned to cinder when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Citizens United against the Federal Election Commission (FEC) in 2010, stating that corporations could indeed contribute to political campaigns as a protection of the right to free speech. Corporations were viewed as sentient entities. Then, four years later, the Supreme Court decided in McCutcheon v. the FEC that aggregate limits on corporate contributions were unconstitutional. The sources of the contributions also became opaque, what is now called “dark money”, when contributed to non-profits.
Now the lid was truly off the boiling pot.
To gauge the impact of Citizens United and McCutcheon, one need only look at the spending rate for Federal elections by all candidates, and from all sources, in the 24 month period prior to a general election. Adding up the money disbursed by Presidential candidates, Congressional candidates, political party committees and political action committees prior to the 2010 Citizens United decision, the total spend from 2003-2004 was about $7.4 billion, and in 2007-2008 it was $7.3 billion.
The 2011-2012 Presidential election cycle was the first after the 2010 Citizens United decision. The total spend from these sources jumped to $9.1 billion, which also now included what is called a “Super PAC”, a vehicle for political influencing that didn’t exist prior to that court case. Super PACs contributed about $800 million in that cycle.
In the next Presidential election cycle, total spending on political influencing in 2015-2016 reached $11.8 billion, with Super PACs contributing double what they did in 2011-2012, or $1.6 billion.
In the 2019-2020 Presidential election cycle, total spending reached an incredible $30.2 billion, of which $3.3 billion came from Super PACs and nearly $13 billion came from “regular” PACs.
Presidential election cycle spending in 2019-2020 increased over 400% since the 2010 Citizens United decision (not adjusting for inflation, which was a couple of percent annually during the period of 2010 to 2020). The mid-term election cycles have also been increasing spending. In 2005-2006 the total spend for all candidates at the Federal level was about $4.7 billion. In 2009-2010 it was $5.4 billion. In the first mid-term cycle after the Citizens United case, in 2013-2014, the spend was about $7 billion, then up to $11.8 billion in 2017-2018, more than 200% higher than prior to that landmark case.
The $30.2 billion spent in 2019-2020 represents a huge influence on politics and politicians. It also represents a very large industry that supports livelihoods for many, many people. By searching for job ads for political campaign workers, political marketing companies and political consulting firms, it appears that the average annualized compensation for workers in these fields is about $40-60,000, with senior strategists earning $150,000 a year or more. If we use the lower end of the range, that equates to a workforce of about 380,000 people who earned their living promoting one candidate or another, one legislative agenda or another. By comparison, in 2019 the aerospace and defense industry employed about 2.2 million people. The biotech industry in 2021 employs between 800,000 and 1 million people. The politico-industrial complex is not yet as big as defense or biotech, but at the current trend, it won’t be long before it is.
Did you know that there are thousands and thousands of people who are paid to post specific messages and responses on social media, in order to ensure that those messages are “trending” and that no contrary opinion is left standing without a blasting reply? Many of those heartfelt, passionate debates in the comment sections are from people who earn their living by writing what they’re paid to write, saying what they’re paid to say.
This growing segment of political influence workers and the economic impact of spending billions of dollars on constant campaigning has probably reached a self-sustaining growth cycle, because there are no longer any regulatory limitations to prevent it. And since both major parties are fully devoted to raising money in every way possible within the current legal framework, it’s probably ludicrous to think that Congress will act to limit its own ability to tap the money spigots available across the country.
It may be too late to stop the juggernaut political industry from being inextricably welded into our economy, our social structures and our electoral processes. Maybe it was too late prior to 2010, I don’t know. But even if there is no likelihood of legislative or Constitutional action to reign in the flood of lucre, there is another remedy we could all decide to do instantly.
We could stop contributing to anyone’s campaign, political cause, policy “think tank”, political non-profit, PAC or Super PAC. Because if you and I and all the individual donors don’t contribute, the majority of that $30.2 billion spent in the 2019-2020 cycle wouldn’t have existed.
[NOTE: All political spending figures were taken from the Federal Election Commission website official reports.]