The Supreme Court just made money matter even more

There is a number that decides who gets to run for office in this country. It isn’t the candidate’s IQ, résumé or ideas. It is how much money he or she can raise.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court made that money matter even more.

In a case called NRSC v. FEC, the court tore out one of the last rules keeping a flood of party money out of individual campaigns — the limit on how much a political party can spend in direct coordination with its own candidates. Five months before the midterms, the spigot just opened wider.

If your honest reaction is a tired shrug — another ruling, more money, same direction — don’t look away from that feeling. Because hiding underneath it is the most unifying fact in American politics.

We agree on almost nothing now. But we agree on this: too much money runs the government.

Democrats say billionaires bought it. Republicans say special interests own it. Independents say politicians answer to donors, not voters. Same complaint, in three languages.

And Tuesday the court made it worse — again. This is year 15 of the same story: a straight line from Citizens United in 2010, through Federal Election Commission v. Ted Cruz for Senate, to today. Every few years, one more rule comes down. Every few years, a little more of your voice gets drowned out by someone else’s checkbook, under the veil of “free” speech.

I spent six years at the Federal Election Commission. I ran budget planning there when McCain-Feingold passed. And I learned something in that building that most people never get to see.

We want leaders who understand budgets, infrastructure, defense, medicine, energy........

© The Hill