Foreign money legal and abundant in U.S. elections, laundered through corporations

[ColemanMaskell]

https://theintercept.com/2016/08/03/citizens-united-foreign-money-us-elections/

From The Intercept
Three Paths Citizens United Created for Foreign Money to Pour Into U.S. Elections

. . .
the 2016 election has seen a surge of contributions to Super PACs by so-called ghost corporations, which appear to exist solely to make those donations and whose ownership is unknown. Whether any of these corporations are ultimately owned by foreign nationals is likewise unknown.
…

501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) organizations are, in fact, much more attractive than Super PACs to anyone hoping to influence elections anonymously, because, unlike Super PACs, they are not required to publicly disclose their donors. This is why contributions to politically active nonprofits are often referred to as “dark money.”
This additional layer of obfuscation makes it even less likely that money originating with foreign nationals would be noticed.
…

Consider, for instance, that the American Petroleum Institute is partially financed by the U.S. subsidiary of Aramco, the state-owned Saudi oil company. In the 2010 midterm elections, API was one of the funders behind attack ads that helped the Republican Party take back the House of Representatives from the Democrats and stop most of Obama’s plans in their tracks.

Similarly, the American Chemistry Council, partially funded by U.S. subsidiaries of Saudi, Japanese, and Belgian corporations, also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars that year to elect its favored politicians. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the largest undisclosed outside spending group in federal elections, which has already spent over$16 million on congressional elections this year, has acknowledged that it receives foreign money.
…

[MattP]

1. Thank goodness that the Supreme Court cleared up that money doesn't corrupt

[ColemanMaskell]

2. Sept 16th update story (attempted fix killed by Republicans)

Sept 16th follow-up story

FEC Republicans Kill Attempt to Block Foreign Money in U.S. Elections

https://theintercept.com/2016/09/16/fec-republicans-kill-attempt-to-block-foreign-money-in-u-s-elections/

… The main proposal on foreign money discussed at the meeting came from one of the FEC’s Democratic members, Ellen Weintraub, and was intended to address a peculiar loophole created by the 2010 Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision.
U.S. law strictly prohibits “foreign nationals” — a term which includes foreign individuals, corporations and governments — from putting money into the U.S. political process. However, the law also states that any company incorporated in the U.S. is a U.S. national, regardless of its ultimate ownership.

President Obama predicted in his 2010 State of the Union address that — becauseCitizens United lifted previous bans against corporate involvement in federal elections — it would therefore make it possible for “foreign corporations” to “spend without limit in our elections.”
…
Thursday’s proceedings, say Holman, suggests that “the Republican commissioners continue to fulfill McConnell’s design: to immobilize the Federal Election Commission.”