Campaign Finance Reform in Wisconsin

Bob Bauer points to a new report issued by the Brennan Center for Justice discussing the campaign finance laws in Wisconsin. Bauer is skeptical of the conclusions in the report, concluding himself:

The Brennan Center leaves no doubt of its conviction that the reforms can be reformed. It does not trouble to reassure readers who doubt that this next round of reforms will succeed any more than the last. If, as the Center states, it is true that "throughout the last century, governments in [the] states often led the way for the rest of country, providing ‘laboratories of democracy’," we should be prepared to confront more directly and more carefully the reasons for their failures.

My experience with Wisconsin goes back a few years, when not long after the state legislature mandated the use of electronic filing for candidates and PACs in the state (a good step forward), the same state legislature failed to provide funding to create the electronic filing system. Talk about bright.

But if the Brennan Center is adamant about "reforming" the Wisconsin system, perhaps they need to look carefully at the expereince of Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Green at the hands of the Wisconsin State Elections Board. While scandals have plagued the state's recent history, the Center fails to point to what in the law as it currently stands or as they propose would prevent the scandals they point to. If a lawmaker or other official is going to break the current law, what is to prevent them from breaking a future law?

The Brennan Center has published a number of studies of state campaign finance laws, which can be found here.