King Votes to Overturn IRS Rule Enabling Dark Money

Press Release

Today, U.S. Angus King (I-Maine) voted to overturn the U.S. Treasury Department's controversial decision that allows special interests to hide their donors from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). In July, the Treasury Department and the IRS eliminated the requirement for certain types of tax-exempt organizations to report the identities of major donors to the IRS, which allowed "dark money" donors to hide their contributions to tax-exempt non-profit organizations that engage in political activity. Senator King opposed this change, and in July cosponsored the Spotlight Act, which would reverse the rule and require donor information to be disclosed to both the IRS and the public. The CRA passed the Senate this afternoon by a Congressional Review Act vote of 50-49, and will now be sent to the House of Representatives for consideration.

"In my opinion, Maine's town meetings are the finest examples of democracy at work, where anyone can walk in with an idea and try to sway public opinion. But not a single one of these gatherings would allow someone to stand in the middle of the room with a bag over his or her head and anonymously attack other members of the community -- because Maine people believe you should stand behind your beliefs," said Senator King. "The same rules should apply to our campaign finance system -- let's require transparency, and make sure Americans know who's trying to influence their vote."

Senator King has been a long-time advocate for election transparency as a means of increasing voter trust and engagement in our electoral process. Last September, Senator King announced his support for a series of campaign finance bills called the We the People Democracy Reform Act of 2017. This bicameral legislation proposes a series of wide-ranging electoral reforms to restore integrity, accountability, and transparency to our broken political system. The legislation includes proposals to comprehensively reform campaign finance laws, increase transparency and accountability in the political system, end gerrymandering, increase voter participation, and strengthen lobbying and revolving door laws. In June 2016, Senator King joined with a group of his colleagues to announce a new legislative package aimed at reforming America's campaign finance system and making government more accountable to the people. The package includes a bill authored by Senator King that would require real-time transparency in federal elections as well as legislation that would amend the Constitution to end unlimited campaign contributions and provisions that would reform the lobbying laws to limit special interest influence on elected officials.

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