ProPublica’s Marian Wang describes in a piece posted yesterday the ongoing “gridlock” at the Federal Election Commission (the agency, Wang explains, “tasked with ensuring that campaigns and contributors play by the rules”). Wang notes how “hands-off” the FEC has been in the face of a “flurry” of new sorts of campaign spending (think, for one, super PACs), and walks readers through the factors contributing to the “persistent stalemate” at the agency—including “its structure of six commissioners evenly divided on party lines.”
This is a topic that election law expert Rick Hasen flagged as “tremendously under-covered” during a Q&A I did with him back in January, after I asked him what stories he’d pursue if he were a reporter on the campaign finance beat now. Make that slightly less tremendously under-covered.
Liz Cox Barrett is a writer at CJR.