Category: Election Integrity

Democratic election attorney and Russian collusion hoaxer Marc Elias is working to carve out a new avenue for backing candidates through ‘dark money‘-funded websites presenting as media outlets. Elias’s law firm is representing a liberal political website that claims to be a legitimate news outlet despite its primary content and activities more closely resembling a Super PAC.

The Morning Mirror, operated by Star Spangled Media, presents as a general-interest news blog that publishes a random assortment of stories without an author’s byline. However, as the 2024 election cycle kicked off, the blog began pushing stories touting certain Democratic candidates‘ records on abortion, with Star Spangled Media subsequently boosting these posts through digital advertising.

By claiming to be a for-profit media operation, however, Star Spangled Media can avoid standard campaign finance disclosures and could serve as a conduit for nearly untraceable Democratic ‘dark money.’

CAMPAIGN FINANCE QUESTIONS.

Star Spangled Media and The Morning Mirror’s partisan stories and digital ads are drawing scrutiny from Arizona‘s campaign finance regulator, the Arizona Citizens Clean Election Commission. The commission is investigating whether the media network is really a political entity—such as a political action committee (PAC)—that should be subject to the state’s campaign finance disclosure laws. Elias’s law firm, representing Star Spangled Media, insists the operation is a journalistic endeavor, not a political one.

“Star Spangled Media is a for-profit media company that is in the business of publishing and distributing original news stories, commentaries, and editorials,” Jonathan S. Berkon, an attorney at the Elias Group, argued in a letter to the commission in late May. Berkon contends that the ads are paid for through for-profit revenue, meaning Star Spangled Media is not a “covered person” under the state’s campaign finance law.

Despite indications that Star Spangled Media is a PAC moonlighting as a media company, the election commission maintains that without additional information, it cannot determine whether the Democrat-aligned organization violated the state’s campaign finance laws. The commission contends “it is impossible… to determine whether its political articles—many of which appear to be generated by using campaign created media—go through the same process as its non-political articles.”

“Because the Commission cannot conclude the press exception applies, the Commission cannot conclude that Star Spangled Media is not a covered person and does not intend to engage in campaign media spending,” the Arizona Citizens Clean Election Commission added, concluding: “Equally importantly, however, the Commission is not concluding the opposite—simply put more facts about Star Spangled Media’s internal operations and news presence in Arizona would be necessary for the Commission to reach a reasoned conclusion about whether the press exception applies.”