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23 Cornell J. L. & Pub. Pol'y 1 (2013-2014)

handle is hein.journals/cjlpp23 and id is 1 raw text is: ARTICLES CONGRESSIONAL DISCLOSURE OF TIME SPENT FUNDRAISING Brent Ferguson* This Article advocates passage of a law requiring members of Con- gress to disclose the amount of time they spend fundraising. In the wake of Citizens United and other court decisions severely limiting lawmakers' ability to regulate campaign spending, many schol- ars have turned their focus to campaign finance disclosure laws. Ac- cording to some, laws requiring campaigns and donors to reveal the source of contributions and expenditures are the last bastion of federal campaign finance law. Yet despite a history of broad acceptance, disclo- sure laws rest on an increasingly shaky foundation. The most troubling aspect of current disclosure law is that it con- tains loopholes so obvious and irresistible that many political players choose to spend dark money, the source of which is unidentified. Fur- ther, some argue that even when the source of political spending is dis- closed, the information provided to the electorate is of questionable usefulness for a host of reasons. Finally, opponents of disclosure laws point to their potential chilling effect and threats of retaliation that can occur when the public learns who supported a certain candidate or bal- lot measure. Even those who support disclosure laws have recently con- ceded that perhaps disclosure requirements should encompass only large spenders rather than those contributing only a few hundred dollars. For these reasons, there have been calls to reform federal disclo- sure law so it is more properly tailored to serve its goals without chilling speech. Many have proposed effective, intelligent changes that would improve the disclosure regime greatly. However, the current discussion about disclosure largely ignores the fact that there is a gaping hole in disclosure requirements: while the electorate receives some information about a candidate's financial backers and can learn about a legislator's votes and other activities, voters cannot discover how much time their representatives spend raising money. Information about legislators' fun- * J.D., Columbia Law School 2010. I'd like to thank Professor Richard Briffault for helpful comments, as well as Chris Ferguson and Lauren Wright. Special thanks to Lilli Scalettar for her help and support. 1

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