{"id":11009,"date":"2018-06-12T13:00:07","date_gmt":"2018-06-12T17:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=11009"},"modified":"2018-06-12T12:29:34","modified_gmt":"2018-06-12T16:29:34","slug":"a-request-for-the-state-board-of-elections-and-the-general-assembly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=11009","title":{"rendered":"A Request for the State Board of Elections and the General Assembly"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n

One of the purposes for the disclosure of political contributions is to help voters decide whom to support in elections.\u00a0 In order to serve that role, contributions should be disclosed with enough time remaining before the election so that voters can review them before proceeding to the voting booth.\u00a0 But that\u2019s not quite the case in Maryland.<\/p>\n

Recently, we wrote that the percentage of voters who vote early has been rising for years<\/a>.\u00a0 That percentage hit a high of 31% in the 2016 general election and could be between 20% and 25% in the upcoming primary.\u00a0 Unfortunately for some of those voters, they will not have access to the latest campaign finance reports when they vote.\u00a0 Consider the following entries on the state\u2019s election calendar<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Primary Election<\/u><\/p>\n

Annual 2017 campaign finance report due: 1\/17\/18 (11:59 PM)<\/p>\n

Pre-primary 1 campaign finance report due: 5\/22\/18 (11:59 PM)<\/p>\n

Early voting begins: 6\/14\/18<\/p>\n

Pre-primary 2 campaign finance report due: 6\/15\/18 (11:59 PM)<\/p>\n

General Election<\/u><\/p>\n

Pre-general 1 campaign finance report due: 8\/28\/18 (11:59 PM)<\/p>\n

Early voting begins: 10\/25\/18<\/p>\n

Pre-general 2 campaign finance report due: 10\/26\/18 (11:59 PM)<\/p>\n

The above calendar shows that people voting during the first two days of the early voting period will have no way to know about the contents of the last pre-election campaign finance reports when they vote.\u00a0 This is potentially important because there are sometimes surprises in those last reports.\u00a0 In 2014, the Baltimore Sun reported on October 26<\/a> that Democratic gubernatorial candidate Anthony Brown received a $500,000 loan from the Laborers Union in his final pre-general report, an unusual event that far exceeded the $6,000 limit on PAC contributions.\u00a0 However, early voting started on October 23<\/a>.\u00a0 According to the State Board of Elections<\/a>, 101,537 people voted during the first three days of early vote in the 2014 general election and would have not seen that report in the Sun.\u00a0 One can easily imagine similar surprises occurring with regards to big self-funding checks, bundled corporate contributions, out-of-state PAC checks or the like.<\/p>\n

To remedy this problem, we request that the State Board of Elections and\/or the General Assembly change the due date of the final pre-election campaign finance report to 72 hours before early voting begins.\u00a0 This will give the media time enough to report on anything interesting in those last reports and for voters to consider it before they head to the booth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco. One of the purposes for the disclosure of political contributions is to help voters decide whom to support in elections.\u00a0 In order to serve that role, contributions should be disclosed with enough time remaining before the election so that voters can review them before proceeding to the voting booth.\u00a0 But that\u2019s not … Continue reading A Request for the State Board of Elections and the General Assembly<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,138,227],"tags":[1545,1541,1571],"class_list":["post-11009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adam-pagnucco","category-campaign-finance","category-early-voting","tag-adam-pagnucco","tag-campaign-finance","tag-early-voting"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mKJE-2Rz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11009"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11009\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11011,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11009\/revisions\/11011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}