Democrats Took the Most Foreign Money

It turns out that Democrats have taken twice as much foreign money in this election cycle as Republicans. They’ve taken “more than $1 million from political action committees affiliated with foreign companies. House and Senate Democrats have received approximately $1.02 million this cycle from such PACs, according to an analysis compiled for The Hill by the Center for Responsive Politics. House and Senate GOP leaders have taken almost $510,000 from PACs on the same list.”

Earlier, President Obama accused the Chamber of Commerce, which is supporting mostly Republicans but also some Democrats, of using foreign money to influence elections — a claim that even liberal newspapers, like The Washington Post, have conceded is baseless (The Post has not endorsed a Republican for president since 1952).

Obama’s 2008 campaign also deliberately facilitated illegal foreign contributions by allowing donors to use untraceable prepaid credit cards, and refusing to use basic security measures that were “inexpensive” and “widely used” by other campaigns.

It’s not clear what’s so bad about foreign donations to political causes, anyway, as long as they are legal. (Direct foreign contributions to politicians’ own political campaigns are illegal, but contributions to other causes typically are not.) But for Democrats to complain about foreign money while collecting the lion’s share of it is like the pot calling the kettle black.

It’s also not clear why liberals should object to foreign contributions, when they support giving taxpayer benefits to foreigners, such as in-state tuition for illegal immigrants, as well as affirmative action for them in college admissions if their country of origin is in Latin America or Africa.