“Money Doesn’t Talk, It Swears”

Graphic by Mia Buchanan

An estimated $16,000,000,000 (16 BILLION dollars) will be spent on the 2026 midterm cycle. That’s nearly enough to provide five million children health insurance for a year or eradicate homelessness in the entire country. Over a quarter of that sum, $4.5 billion, will be “dark money;” that’s where the sources of the cash are concealed from public view, funneled through trade associations and astroturf “non-profits,” and laundered through Super PACs to conduct wink-and-nod “independent” campaign activity.

We owe this sorry state of affairs to the Supreme Court which has locked us into a campaign finance system wherein any common-sense spending limit on “independent expenditures” is said to violate freedom of speech.

What an inviting permission structure for billionaires and corporations.

Yes, both sides deploy dark money. But only side wants to keep the system just the way it is. Guess which?

It’s not like shutting down anonymous dark money alone would level the playing field. The Top 20 public donors thus far this campaign cycle are “dominated by the tech industry and ultrawealthy Republicans,” according to a New York Times report. Elon Musk, Miriam Adelson, the Winklelvoss twins, the Kochs, Andreessen and Horowitz, Crypto.com, etc. each has kicked in between $35 million and $115 million. Perhaps you’ve kicked in $35 to $115? George Soros, the devil incarnate to the right-wing echo chamber, does try to balance the ledger somewhat but he doesn’t come close.

Under the circumstances, the only antidote to the ultra-rich domination of the political system is for voters to thoroughly, decisively, and embarrassingly reject the oligarchs’ candidates of choice. Doing so would build momentum for real campaign finance reform in a near-term Congress—including ending the role of dark money and introducing meaningful public financing. Real change would also require expanding the number of Supreme Court justices to offset Mitch McConnell’s skullduggery.

In his 2010 dissent in Citizens United v. FEC, Justice John Paul Stevens, a Gerald Ford nominee, warned that allowing unlimited spending by wealthy donors and corporations threatened to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens.

Sixteen years later, in this election cycle, dark money alone will outstrip the total amount of expenditures in the 2010 midterms.

Don’t let them drown out your voice.