We donвЂ™t know much about WestвЂ™s knowledge of campaign lawsвЂ“most lay people know very little about such laws, but good candidates get advice from good campaign lawyersвЂ“but according to his spouse he is suffering from mental illness, which could well be relevant to his state of mind. and Russian operatives during the 2016 campaign: for such conduct to be criminal, one must act wilfully, knowing one is violating campaign finance laws. ThereвЂ™s one other wrinkle, an issue IвЂ™ve spent a lot of time on in discussing the Trump Tower meetings between Donald Trump Jr. IвЂ™m not sure and perhaps there are other precedents on point IвЂ™m not aware of. Perhaps this is close enough that the conduct is illegal. The West situation is somewhat different, in that West is spending money on his own campaign allegedly in coordination with another campaign to help that other campaign. Goland stands for the proposition that spending supporting a candidate for office done in cooperation with a candidate (or candidateвЂ™s committee) counts as a coordinated contribution subject to the contribution limits, and that secret motivations to help another candidate do not matter. Goland intended to contribute to VallenвЂ™s campaign, and it is immaterial to conviction under section 441a(a)(1)(A) that he did so in support of Cranston. The independent expenditures exception to contribution limits does not apply to Goland because: (1) agents of Vallen and Goland were acting in concert and (2) Vallen cooperated with Goland by accepting the money and performing the commercial. He worked through his agent, Barnes, to fund and arrange the Vallen commercials. Goland was charged with contributing to the Vallen campaign. Goland asserts that his contributions were вЂњindependent expendituresвЂќ because he did not directly contribute to VallenвЂ™s campaign and because he was secretly supporting CranstonвЂ™s reelection. He claimed that the $120,000 he spent in coordination with Vallen was not an illegal excessive campaign contribution to Vallen because he was spending his money to support Cranston. Cranston went on to narrowly win the election of Zschau.ДЄt the time of the campaign, Goland could have given (or spent in coordination with a candidate) no more than $1,000 to any candidate for office, but could spend independently as much as he wanted. Goland said he spent the money supporting Vallen in the hopes of siphoning votes away from Zschau. Goland spent $120,000 producing commercials supporting a right-wing, anti-Israel third party candidate, Ed Vallen with VallenвЂ™s cooperation (Goland hid his identity and worked through a company because he thought Vallen would have rejected his help). Michael Goland was a Cranston supporter because of CranstonвЂ™s pro-Israel views. Senate race in California between the incumbent Alan Cranston (a Democrat) and his Republican opponent, Ed Zschau. (Disclosure: I was a clerk to the author of this Ninth Circuit opinion, Judge David Thompson, when Goland was decided.) Goland involved a 1986 U.S. The closest case I can think of on point is United States v. IвЂ™m not sure how authorities would treat such a case, which would get into some difficult questions of motive. If heвЂ™s doing so in coordination with the Trump campaign to help Trump win, that could count as an excessive contribution to the campaign and be illegal.Д«ut this is a really odd situation, and I cannot think of a case in which a candidate has been found to make an excessive contribution to another candidate by coordinating a spoiler run for office. West surely is spending more than $2,800 on his campaign. When someone spends money supporting a candidate but does so in coordination with a candidate for office, that counts as a contribution and is subject to the $2,800 limit. A person can contribute up to $2,800 to a presidential campaign (and spend unlimited sums independent of that candidate to support that candidateвЂ™s run). The real issue is one of potential illegal coordination. Third party candidates run for office for all sorts of reasons, and thereвЂ™s nothing illegal about running for office while secretly (or openly) hoping your run will help another candidate. WestвЂ™s motivations alone in running for office cannot be the basis for a campaign finance violation. Kushner is one of the key people running TrumpвЂ™s reelection campaign. IвЂ™ve been getting a lot of questions about whether Kanye West, who is running for President and getting on the ballots i n at least a few states, is somehow breaking campaign finance law by doing so given the possibility that he is running for office, at least in part, to help President TrumpвЂ™s reelection (by potentially siphoning votes away from Biden, though thatвЂ™s far from clear) and given that he has reportedly been speaking вЂњalmost dailyвЂќ with the PresidentвЂ™s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Michael goland