One of the refrains often heard from advocates of taxpayer-funded elections is that eliminating the need to raise money will encourage more candidates to run for office. (Although, it’s been shown in Chapel Hill’s taxpayer-funded campaign ploy to not be true.)
In fact, the organization established in North Carolina to lobby for taxpayer-funded elections, the NC Voters for Clean Elections group, likened removing barriers to running for office akin to “civil rights.”
“The movement to reduce the impact of big money on politics and to remove the barriers that keep people from participating in the political process (whether through voting, running for office, or lobbying elected officials) is fundamentally a movement for basic civil rights and basic equality. Democracy will not be fully meaningful until all citizens can competitively run for office and until money is not the primary determinant of who gets elected and what legislation gets considered.”
But what is included in the Senate’s version of the budget that will be given final approval today?
An increase in the filing fee to run for office. Yep, for as much as the liberals love to pay lip service to making it so “all citizens can competitively run for office” or attempt to “get money out of politics” and they just increased the amount of money you need to get into politics. Hypocrisy at its finest.
Bonus observation: Legislators just made it more expensive for their potential challengers to file for office. Like incumbents need MORE protection…
Bonus bonus observation: Think the Senate leadership is upset about Republicans filing candidates in all 50 districts and decided to make it cost a little more to do so next time?
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