Democracy Dollars

Democracy Dollars for Real Democracy

Modern political campaigns have become dominated by large donations from mega-donors like the Koch brothers and George Soros or large corporate interest driven political action committees and labor unions. Going where the money is has skewed the political agendas of both the left and right and eliminated the voices of everyday people politicians are supposedly elected to serve. 

Two Supreme Court decisions have enshrined these large, dark money donations into our constitutional landscape by making money into “protected” political speech. Those rulings probably will not be revisited, much less reversed, anytime soon. The challenge has become how to dilute the impact of the large donors by giving everyday working people something of value that can be solicited and won with a discussion about issue based platforms politicians run on and promise to enact.

Many working people now are disillusioned with politicians and the political process and believe their individual voices are not being heard by those beholden to large money donors. Many live paycheck to paycheck and cannot afford even a modest political contribution. Those feeling disenfranchised stay away from the polls, feeling their voices no longer matter. Younger voters tend to not even bother to register.

The city of Seattle may have found a solution. The city came up with “Democracy Dollars.” It is simple, elegant, scalable to national proportions and completely constitutional. 

Seattle collects property taxes, as do all municipalities. City leaders decided to add a small amount to each property tax bill, about $11 on a $500,000 home, to fund a voucher program that started initially with Seattle city council and city attorney races. Each registered voter was then given four $25 vouchers to use on those races. Those running for those seats could opt into the voucher program or choose not to, relying instead upon the regular campaign finance rules. Those candidates who opted in had to agree to spend no more than $300,000 on the election. 

Seattle collected $3 million a year in property taxes to pay for the voucher program starting in 2016. Seattle residents spent $1.4 million in vouchers in the last election. The remaining balance will be carried forward for future election cycles. The program is set to expand to more races in coming years as the fund surplus grows. 

A recent study shows that only 8,200 residents gave money to Seattle city races in 2013. In 2016, more than 25,000 residents gave vouchers and money to candidates who ran in those same races. A younger more diverse electorate became involved politically with the implementation and growth of the voucher program. 

The voluntary nature of candidate participation makes the voucher program constitutional. Candidates cannot be forced into a public funded election system under current Supreme Court rulings, unless they agree to public funding for their campaigns.

The Democracy Dollar system scales up well to a national level. Two Yale Law professors wrote the outline in 2017. Given the numbers of registered voters, a voucher system could generate just about the same amount of aggregated individual donations as special interests pump into the system in large contributions. In 2012, all candidates for federal offices and their nominally “independent” supporter groups spent about $7 billion on their races. That went down to about $6.8 billion in federal races last year. With $100 vouchers, registered voters could pump $6.5 billion into the same races.

This year Rep. Ro Kanna, (D-CA) and former Senator Russ Feingold put together a federal solution called the Democracy Dollars Act. It provides 50 “Democracy Dollars” to every registered voter for use in federal elections, $25 for presidential elections, $15 for Senate races and $10 for House campaigns. 

These amounts seem small but when multiplied by millions of voters, the power of the PACs and dark money donors become diluted. Think about a fundraiser for 100 people where you can raise $2500 for a presidential candidate with the best issue based agenda. The system turns individual voters into someone the candidate has to convince in order to obtain that voter’s voucher support. 

If you want a democracy where each voter really has a voice, support Democracy Dollars voucher systems everywhere.