Campaign Contributions

The Federal Election Commission gave the go-ahead Monday evening to using text messages to donate money to federal candidates and committees, a move advocates hope will boost the participation of small contributors and counterbalance the influx of massive donations. In a rare instance of bipartisan agreement, the six-member panel unanimously approved a proposal by two political consulting companies - one Republican and one Democratic - to work with a third-party aggregator to collect donations by text.

L.A.'s 9th City Council District is among the poorest in the city, taking in a stretch of South Los Angeles where the median household income is less than $30,000 per year. Yet despite persistent economic woes, the district has become a hot spot for expensive campaign contributions in this year's election, with special interests from across the state spending big in the race to replace termed-out Councilwoman Jan Perry. Labor unions, businesses, billboard companies, healthcare interests and others have spent $900,000 on unlimited "independent expenditures" for state Sen. Curren Price (D-Los Angeles)

A Senate Republican leader has proposed eliminating limits on campaign contributions to state candidates, arguing the restrictions are ineffective. Sen. Ted Gaines, chairman of the Senate Republican Caucus, introduced legislation to repeal major portions of the Proposition 34 that put a $4,100 limit on contributions by individuals to candidates for the legislature and a $27,000 limit on contributions to candidates for governor. The measure would have to be acted on by the state voters.

Strict limits on campaign contributions imposed by voters nearly three decades ago are crumbling in the Los Angeles mayor's race, with big donors using loosely regulated "super PACs" to help candidates like never before in a citywide election, a Times analysis has found. Of the $17.5 million collected so far to support mayoral hopefuls Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti, roughly one-third - a record $6.1 million - has gone into independent political action committees that can accept contributions of any size.

Here is a roundup of alleged cons, frauds and schemes to watch out for. Campaign contributions - As November draws closer, campaign-related telephone calls are sure to increase. Some thieves are using the opportunity to scam those with an interest in politics, the Better Business Bureau said in a recent consumer alert. Several people have contacted the BBB to report that they have received suspicious calls from people who said they were raising money for political campaigns. People interested in making donations should visit candidates' official websites, which will include links to safely contribute, the BBB said.

Congratulations on your series on campaign contributions and political favors ("Big Business, Big Bucks," Sept. 21-23). We are told that all that the donor wants is "access." That is just political doublespeak for "action." Are the American people so naive as to believe that the money does not speak louder than their individual votes? If Sen. Fred Thompson's committee had the guts to follow up on your articles, it would attract much more public interest. At least you have pointed the way. Now we have the best president and Congress that money can buy. Only by fully exposing what campaign contributions can buy will the present corrupt system be changed.

A donor to the mayoral campaigns of City Controller Wendy Greuel and council members Eric Garcetti and Jan Perry was fined $170,000 on Thursday by the Los Angeles Ethics Commission for laundering dozens of campaign contributions. Peter Barker, president of Orange County-based Barker Management, admitted he had reimbursed employees or their spouses for 68 contributions given to an array of city campaigns over 12 years, including the mayoral bids of Greuel, Garcetti and Perry. The practice, known as campaign money laundering, enabled him to bypass city contribution limits.

Glendale resident Gareth Neumann is hoping to change the state's political campaign and election process by getting a reform initiative he authored approved by voters next November. Neumann needs to gather nearly 400,000 signatures to qualify the measure for the ballot. The initiative, titled "Candidates. Campaign Finances. Gifts," would amend a section of the California Political Reform Act by limiting campaign contributions from any source to $25.

Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley) has amassed nearly $121,000 in campaign contributions to bolster his reelection bid, while none of his potential rivals have raised even the $1,336 filing fee to qualify for the ballot. Gallegly, who plans to seek a fifth term, raised $93,546 in the last six months of 1993, according to financial reports filed with the Federal Elections Commission. Gallegly's receipts included $14,000 from special-interest political action committees.

In the first half of 1993, incumbents in the Democrat-dominated House of Representatives raised $31.5 million in campaign contributions, the highest total reported in the 20 years that records had been kept. If money in such huge amounts has become the lifeblood of modern politics, as apologists for uninhibited fund raising maintain, it has also become ineradicably identified in the public mind with the distortion and corruption of the political process.

WASHINGTON - While they await a Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage, gay rights advocates are taking their fight to a new arena: campaign finance law. A Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Massachusetts who supports gay marriage has asked the Federal Election Commission to determine whether gay couples have the right to make joint contributions to political candidates. In a request for an advisory opinion Friday, attorneys for state Rep. Dan Winslow, a moderate Republican running in a special election to fill the seat vacated by Secretary of State John F. Kerry, asked the commission whether gay couples could donate to his campaign with a single check, as heterosexual married couples were allowed to do. The matter underscores the far-reaching and unexpected implications of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, known as DOMA, which denies federal benefits to gay couples legally married in their states.

A Senate Republican leader has proposed eliminating limits on campaign contributions to state candidates, arguing the restrictions are ineffective. Sen. Ted Gaines, chairman of the Senate Republican Caucus, introduced legislation to repeal major portions of the Proposition 34 that put a $4,100 limit on contributions by individuals to candidates for the legislature and a $27,000 limit on contributions to candidates for governor. The measure would have to be acted on by the state voters.

A donor to the mayoral campaigns of City Controller Wendy Greuel and council members Eric Garcetti and Jan Perry was fined $170,000 on Thursday by the Los Angeles Ethics Commission for laundering dozens of campaign contributions. Peter Barker, president of Orange County-based Barker Management, admitted he had reimbursed employees or their spouses for 68 contributions given to an array of city campaigns over 12 years, including the mayoral bids of Greuel, Garcetti and Perry. The practice, known as campaign money laundering, enabled him to bypass city contribution limits.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca told his deputies Thursday that he would no longer accept campaign contributions from department employees, according to an internal memo obtained by The Times. Baca also said other sheriff's managers who run for an elected office would be barred from making employment decisions affecting employees who have donated to their campaigns. Baca's announcement comes amid concerns that campaign contributions to sheriff's brass by department employees created potential conflicts of interest in promotions and other personnel decisions.

Candidate Kevin James has spent weeks trying to depict City Controller Wendy Greuel, a rival in the race for mayor of Los Angeles, as part of an irresponsible, spendthrift culture at City Hall. James' campaign super-charged that claim this week with a press release that suggested Greuel also could be in thrall to Los Angeles County official facing criminal corruption charges. James' broadside Wednesday described Greuel's "close relationship" with County Assessor John Noguez, who remains behind bars awaiting trial on charges that he took payoffs to lower property assessments.

The House Ethics Committee said Monday that it would begin an inquiry into whether Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.) violated campaign finance laws. First though, the committee will defer to a separate investigation from the Justice Department, which is also looking into whether Grimm, who recently won reelection over Democrat Mark Murphy, is guilty of a number of infractions. The Ethics Committee listed possible solicitation and acceptance of illegal campaign contributions, falsification of information included in campaign finance reports and offering to assist a foreign national obtain a green card in exchange for campaign contributions.

Los Angeles County district attorney candidate Jackie Lacey's campaign has blasted her opponent, Alan Jackson, for taking campaign contributions from a convicted felon who served prison time for his role in a multimillion-dollar mortgage loan scheme in the late 1990s. "Jackson cannot just shrug this off and say, 'I didn't know.' The fact is that it is his job to know -- his most important job," the Lacey campaign said in a news release the day The Times reported that Victorino Noval, a generous donor to the Jackson campaign, was a felon.

NEW YORK -- Just three weeks ago it might not have been such a happy gathering for Mitt Romney's 1,000 top donors at the gilded Waldorf Astoria Hotel in midtown Manhattan. Back then, the Romney campaign appeared to be falling under its own weight -- facing wall-to-wall coverage of the GOP presidential candidate's secretly taped remarks at a private fundraiser, sliding poll numbers in key swing states and a candidate struggling to gain control of his message. But as the smartly suited donors, who are known as stars, stripes, or the Counsel of 100 based on the amount of money they have helped raise for Romney, met here Tuesday to hear from campaign advisors and watch the presidential debate, it was hard to find anyone who projected anything other than an air of optimism about Romney's prospects three weeks from election day. On Monday, shortly before they met for a gala dinner on the aircraft carrier Intrepid, the Romney campaign revealed that it had brought in $170 million in September -- just shy of the $181 million raised by President Obama -- numbers that surprised even some of Romney's bundlers and aides.