I don't know what it means, but it seems interesting

When I first read the press release announcing Correct The Record was splitting off from American Bridge and that they intended to coordinate with the campaign and DNC committees, it piqued my curiosity about this notion of coordination. Here's the sentence where that is disclosed:

Correct The Record, though a SuperPac, will not be engaged in paid media and thus will be allowed to coordinate with campaigns and Party Committees.

The article most-cited about this is from the Washington Post: How a super PAC plans to coordinate directly with Hillary Clinton’s campaign

To discuss the concept of coordination, usually cited is some portion of the following from this article:

That befuddled many campaign finance experts, who noted that super PACs, by definition, are political committees that solely do independent expenditures, which cannot be coordinated with a candidate or political party. Several said the relationship between the campaign and the super PAC would test the legal limits.

But Correct the Record believes it can avoid the coordination ban by relying on a 2006 Federal Election Commission regulation that declared that content posted online for free, such as blogs, is off limits from regulation. The “Internet exemption” said that such free postings do not constitute campaign expenditures, allowing independent groups to consult with candidates about the content they post on their sites. By adopting the measure, the FEC limited its online jurisdiction to regulating paid political ads.

The part which seems much more interesting to me is:

However, the FEC rules specify that online activities are exempted from campaign finance rules if they are conducted by "uncompensated" individuals, campaign finance lawyers noted. It is unclear how Correct the Record, whose staff will be paid, plans to navigate that restriction.

"The moment anyone is paid to engage in Internet activity it falls outside of that exemption," said Jason Torchinsky, an election law attorney who represents many conservative groups. "If you are a super PAC paying people and coordinating your activities with the campaign, you are not covered by the individual Internet exemption and are making impermissible in-kind contributions."

And then there is this coda without real explanation:
Update: Correct the Record officials say they are not relying on the individual Internet exemption, but rather a related exemption in the definition of coordinated communications.

So what's the related exemption? Never have seen a reference to it.

* * *

I'm putting it here because it may or may not be interesting (by showing earlier thought and his own personal interest) with respect to the further declarations of intolerance for discussing whether a person is PAID to post on TOP.

Today, when I was searching the FEC site on the topic of coordination, I found this:
http://sers.fec.gov/fosers/showpdf.htm?docid=36747#search=coordinating%2...

It is a COMMENT from June 2005 submitted to the FEC by an attorney for Kos and a couple others regarding Notice of Proposed Rulemaking: The Internet: Definitions of "Public Communication" and "Generic Campaign Activity" and Disclaimers

Beginning on page 13:

we believe that the FEC should not generally require bloggers to disclose payment from candidates, and that bloggers should instead be treated the same as any other vendor paid by candidates for legitimate services rendered, whether in terms of separate advertising or the provision of editorial content.

Snip

...we return to the principle of parallelism. Unless circumstances dictate otherwise, the Internet should be regulated no more stringently than any other medium. The fact is that all payments to bloggers are already disclosed on the “other end” of a transaction, as part of a campaign's disbursement filings, just as payments to any other vendors. (Footnote references that to determine who is being paid one would have to go through un-searchable 3500 page documents which may indicate payment for research consulting as opposed to editorial services, something which appears to be a knock against the comment rather than promoting it.)

Snip

On a factual level, it is worth noting to the Commission that most payments to bloggers come through paid advertising not paid editorial content. Such advertising by its nature discloses its source, and there is no need to double the disclosure requirements by forcing private citizens to reveal what the campaign has already done.

In short, the argument includes saying that bloggers who DO submit paid editorial content should be exempt from some kind of disclaimer about their work being sponsored because if the blogger is getting funds from a campaign or a PAC, that organization would have to list the expenditure at some point when required to file about disbursements. Of course, this means reporting could happen AFTER the election (long after the blog post is posted) depending on when the work was done and filing deadlines. And if there is a third party involved (say, bloggers are hired by a PR or other firm), then the name of the blogger may not be documented anywhere ever at all.

This does not appear to me to be consistent with transparency.

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detroitmechworks's picture

of Facebook to get Pro-Bernie Sites shut down, this is just more blatant rules lawyering. (They post porn images to Bernie pages, then report the page for violating the terms of service)

I HATE rules lawyers.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Granma's picture

That were taken down. It seems to have been a bug that affected other Facebook pages too. I need to do some research to learn how this was determined. But it was so stated this morning on a campaign related site.

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detroitmechworks's picture

Otherwise, there's been too many "Technical Glitches" that favored Clinton for me to buy it.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Granma's picture

I cannot find confirmation for the statement that it was not only Bernie Facebook pages. I don't know if it is too soon for that information to be more public, or if the fact is that it was only Bernie pages.

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Thanks for posting your research here.

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Citizen Of Earth's picture

is typical of the govt has sold out its citizens. So PACs can't "coordinate" with campaigns. Unless someone is monitoring phone calls and shadowing PAC employees on business trips, we have no idea who they are talking to and what was said.

And is a blog a News service or just "web hang out"? I would argue dKos is no different than a HuffPo. If paid people are writing propaganda for you based on known campaign messaging, and your campaign is giving the blog money, it should be considered "coordination".

The trolls who play predator in the comments sections are paid by the PAC to influence public discussion. How is that much different from the blog authors who write the propaganda?

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Donnie The #ShitHole Douchebag. Fake Friend to the Working Class. Real Asshole.

MsGrin's picture

It's not different in the slightest.

I know you follow this topic - if you ever see anyone from CTR claiming which exemption, exactly, allows them to coordinate, please share. Wink

What I did not mention here is that the May press release seems to presage the August 'coordination' of the DNC/HVF/State parties agreement.
What's spooky about all of this is that I sense that they are counting on the hiding in plain sight aspect of this for a legal defense at some point...

I think you are right comparing TOP to HuffPo - maybe he has a future in that direction. I think what's going on now is scorching the earth (salting it, too) such that it will not re-surge to what it has been. Obviously, he does not care. He's getting something else out of it.

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'What we are left with is an agency mandated to ensure transparency and disclosure that is actually working to keep the public in the dark' - Ann M. Ravel, former FEC member

which coincidentally occurred shortly after Teachout nailed Kos on his sell-out, his lawyers were arguing that this didn't really need to be disclosed at all on his site, and wanted it engraved in legalese. (and BTW-he was "hired" by more than one campaign over a few years' time)

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Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

Rich Fucks getting laws passed that benefit themselves...
That's what he thinks is called storming the gates...

I don't think he knows what storming the gates really is...
But he's surely working to make sure it happens sooner..

Anyone need to learn how to tie a necktie?
Sharpen a pitchfork?
Make a flaming torch?

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