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      Ron DeSantis Finds a New Set of Laws to Ignore

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      There once was a Florida fund-raising committee called Friends of Ron DeSantis, which was overflowing with the $142 million it had raised. Mr. DeSantis used it personally for his campaign to be re-elected governor of Florida in 2022, but that was far more than he needed for that race, and when he was done he still had $86 million left over.But one day that committee disappeared. In fact, it was on May 15, just nine days before Mr. DeSantis announced that he was running for president. In paperwork filed that day, the committee changed its name to Empower Parents PAC and the governor’s name appears nowhere on the website’s home page. And just as that filing was made, the super PAC that is supporting Mr. DeSantis’s presidential ambitions said that it would be getting more than $80 million in leftover money transferred from Empower Parents.That transfer represents a new frontier in the long-running battle to undermine presidential campaign finance laws. And it is only one example of the many ways in which Mr. DeSantis, in particular, has tried make a mockery of those laws. If you want a preview of how Mr. DeSantis views the government’s limits on power and plutocracy — as feeble as they are already — there’s no better place to look than his campaign.There’s a reason that state political committees can’t just transfer their money into presidential super PACs. The Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, which led to the creation of super PACs, said plainly that those committees had to be independent of a candidate’s campaign in order to receive unlimited contributions.But Friends of Ron DeSantis, as a state committee, was never independent of its namesake. He signed the paperwork to set it up in 2018, and listed himself as the person to solicit and accept all of its contributions. That was true until May 5 of this year, when he filed another official letter with the state saying that he was no longer soliciting or accepting contributions.The state committee had already become something of a slush fund for donors who wanted to help Mr. DeSantis’s long-term ambitions, which were never well disguised. Consider this: Mr. DeSantis was re-elected on Nov. 8, and is prevented by law from running for a third consecutive term. But the committee took in more than $15 million after the election. Why, for example, would Gregory P. Cook, whose essential-oils company, doTERRA, received a warning letter in 2020 and a lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission for making false claims about preventing Covid, donate $1.3 million to Friends of Ron DeSantis on Feb. 22 of this year? Is it possible that he might want better treatment from a DeSantis presidency?The State of Florida certainly knew it was wrong to transfer money from a state campaign fund to a federal one. Since at least 2016, the biennial handbook issued by the Florida Division of Elections had expressly prohibited that move. “A Florida political committee must use its funds solely for Florida political activities,” the handbook said. But as NBC News reported, the DeSantis administration quietly deleted that wording, and this year’s version of the handbook conveniently says for the first time that such transfers are allowed. The new handbook bases its reasoning on the Citizens United decision — which of course had been in effect for 13 years, including when the handbook prohibited the move.The Campaign Legal Center, a nonprofit group that closely monitors these kinds of transactions, has filed a complaint against the DeSantis campaign with the Federal Election Commission, saying the transfer is illegal. But as Team DeSantis knows, the commission has deadlocked so often — with three Republicans countering three Democrats — that it has become toothless. In a similar but smaller case last year when a Republican member of the House tried to transfer state campaign funds, the commission refused to take action after the usual 3-to-3 vote.The transfer is only one of the ways Mr. DeSantis is pushing the limits of the campaign finance system. The super PAC supporting his presidential run, bearing the schoolboy name of “Never Back Down,” has made it clear that it has a dangerously broad view of what its role should be.Up to now, the main role of super PACs in elections has been to run TV ads in favor of a candidate or against an opponent, with an unconvincing disclaimer in small print at the end that the ad sponsor is not associated with any campaign or candidate. Super PACs can take in contributions of unlimited size, so they’ve been a great vehicle for wealthy donors, unions and corporations to demonstrate loyalty to a candidate without bumping up against the $3,300 individual donation limit per election for giving directly to a campaign.Those ads are bad enough, but Never Back Down is going much further by essentially taking over many of the main functions of the DeSantis campaign itself. As The Washington Post recently reported, the super PAC is opening office space in each of the early primary states, organizing a corps of door-knockers and volunteers, and launching a “Students for DeSantis” effort on university campuses, among other grass-roots organizing work. “This is going to be expansive and a completely different kind of super PAC,” Kristin Davison, the chief operating officer of Never Back Down, told The Post.The Times reported that Never Back Down is preparing to spend more than $100 million on the DeSantis field operation, hiring 2,600 workers by Labor Day to “knock on the door of every possible DeSantis voter at least four times in New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina — and five times in the kickoff Iowa caucuses.” The report quoted another leader of the super PAC as saying that no one had ever tried an effort like this before.One reason for that may be its dubious legality. No definition of a super PAC — technically defined as an “independent expenditure committee” (emphasis added) — can conceivably include that much detailed organizing work on behalf of a candidate, and it is impossible to imagine it can be done without silently coordinating with the “real” DeSantis campaign. By having wealthy donors, some of whom make multimillion-dollar contributions, pay for such fieldwork, the campaign can spend more money on things that only it can do, such as transporting the candidate and getting on 50 state ballots. That’s why donations given directly to a campaign, known as “hard money,” are much more valuable to a candidate, as well as being harder to raise because of the contribution limits.But as Mr. DeSantis has demonstrated repeatedly in Florida, he’ll just blow past the guardrails of the law if it suits his purposes. In his latest attempt to shatter the concept of independence, his super PAC has been put to work raising money directly for Mr. DeSantis’s campaign.Before the governor’s official announcement last month, Never Back Down raised $500,000 in hard money for a “draft committee,” all of which was to be transferred directly to the campaign once it became official, CBS News reported. For the draft committee, the super PAC limited contributions to the $3,300 limit, but by doing the work of fund-raising, and using its list of donors, the super PAC was in essence making a huge but unreported contribution to the campaign. One campaign finance expert described this effort by the super PAC as “unprecedented.”And the closeness between Never Back Down and the campaign continues to this moment. If you go to Never Back Down’s website, and click on the big red “donate” button at the top, it takes you to a page that collects donations for the campaign, not the super PAC.“This is effectively a huge in-kind gift to DeSantis’s campaign and will subsidize his fund-raising costs considerably, which is exactly the sort of role a super PAC should not be allowed to play,” said Saurav Ghosh, director of federal campaign finance reform at the Campaign Legal Center.On top of all that, the governor’s chief of staff, James Uthmeier, was used as one of the presidential campaign’s biggest fund-raisers, as NBC News reported Thursday. Breaching any ethical barrier between public service and politics, Mr. Uthmeier had administration officials around Florida pressure lobbyists to contribute to Mr. DeSantis’s campaign.Mr. DeSantis is hardly the only politician in the race who has demonstrated contempt for basic ethics and campaign finance laws. Donald Trump has funneled money from his leadership PAC to his super PAC, a different kind of abuse that has also drawn a complaint before the F.E.C. But Mr. DeSantis’s actions are pathbreaking in an unusually wanton and disdainful way. If that path should lead to the White House, it’s clear that big money will have a welcome place in American politics under his administration.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      How Nikki Haley’s Campaign Inflated Her Fund-Raising Haul

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      This month, her campaign said she had raised $11 million in the opening six weeks of her bid for the Republican presidential nomination. But the real figure appears to be about $8.3 million.Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador, has staked her presidential run on an image as a straight shooter, with experience and drama-free competence.This weekend, though, it became clear that the impressive early fund-raising numbers her campaign promoted this month had been inflated, apparently because of double-counted money.The campaign had broadcast an $11 million haul in its opening six weeks, through the end of the first-quarter filing period on March 31. But when three of her affiliated committees filed reports on Saturday, the math did not add up.Instead, the three committees appeared to have taken in about $8.3 million, including $2.7 million that one of the committees transferred to two other committees and that was double-counted in the overall figure.On Saturday, a spokeswoman for Ms. Haley said other campaigns had accounted for their money similarly in the past.How can this happen?The muddied accounting exposes the risks of building a campaign-finance operation with a patchwork of committees, which has become standard for presidential candidates. Ms. Haley is backed by four affiliated entities registered with the Federal Election Commission, three of which made filings on Saturday.Team Stand for America, her joint fund-raising committee, solicits contributions that are then divided between three entities: her presidential campaign committee, a multicandidate political action committee and a hybrid PAC (which did not file on Saturday).According to its filing on Saturday, Team Stand for America raised nearly $4.3 million in contributions in the first quarter. It also transferred $2.7 million to affiliated committees, and here is where the math got tricky. Without those transfers, the total raised by the three committees was $8.3 million, not $11 million.More details, pleaseMs. Haley’s principal campaign committee — Nikki Haley for President — disclosed that it had taken in $5.1 million in receipts. But only $3.3 million of that sum came from contributions: The remaining $1.8 million came from Team Stand for America in two transfers recorded on March 31, the filings show.Stand for America PAC, a group that supports her but can also raise money for other candidates, reported $1.5 million in receipts — but just $600,000 of that came from contributions, the filing shows. The PAC received $886,000 in transferred money from Team Stand for America on March 31.In offering the original $11 million figure, the campaign added up the total receipts for the three groups — $5.1 million, $4.3 million and $1.5 million — without accounting for the fact that $2.7 million was being moved between the groups.What does it mean?Not much. There is nothing inaccurate about the filings themselves — they appear to add up — and there is nothing new about campaigns overhyping their fund-raising.And $8.3 million is still a sizable haul for the first six weeks of a presidential campaign. In comparison, former President Donald J. Trump’s campaign disclosed $9.5 million in receipts in January for the first six weeks of his official bid.A spokeswoman for Ms. Haley did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.In 2021, Mr. Trump’s advisers announced, inaccurately, that his affiliated political committees had raised nearly $82 million in the first six months of the year. That figure improperly counted at least $23 million in transfers to new political action committees from other accounts, The New York Times found.Mr. Trump’s joint campaign committee — which has been the main vessel for his fund-raising this election cycle — raised $18.8 million in the first quarter, his campaign has said. It transferred $14 million to his principle campaign committee, according to filings Saturday. More

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      Trump Ignores Deadline for Personal Financial Disclosure to F.E.C.

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      The disclosure will eventually provide the first look at the former president’s businesses since leaving the White House.Former President Donald J. Trump has a minor addition to his mounting pile of legal challenges after he failed to meet the deadline to disclose his personal financial holdings.But the threatened initial penalty — a meager $200 — is the latest sign of how weak federal enforcement of campaign laws has become.The personal financial disclosure will eventually provide the first look at Mr. Trump’s post-presidential businesses, including his holdings in Truth Social, the social media company he helped create.“President Trump has significant financial holdings, and we have advised the Federal Election Commission that additional time is needed to file his financial disclosure report,” Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Mr. Trump, said in a statement.Mr. Trump was warned that the fee could be imposed if he does not file within 30 days of the March 16 deadline, which is later this week, in a letter from the Federal Election Commission’s acting general counsel that denied his request for a third extension last month.Meredith McGehee, a longtime campaign watchdog, said, “It’s very clear that former President Trump doesn’t feel the law applies to him and has spent much of his career hiring legal representation to delay and distract. This is in line with his general approach.”She added that the lack of teeth on the disclosure law highlighted the weak position of federal enforcement. “They kind of wag their finger,” she said. “‘No we really, really mean it’ — and then generally nothing happens.”But his other legal problems are far greater: His recent indictment in a hush-money case made him the first former American president to face criminal charges, and he is facing three other investigations.Mr. Trump’s financial disclosures were closely tracked during his first White House run and his presidency, as they provided notable insights about the effect that holding office had on his wealth, even as income and assets were reported only in wide ranges.The disclosures, for instance, showed how the pandemic affected his luxury hospitality businesses, and brought to light gifts that he received.The disclosure law is part of corruption-fighting efforts that date back to the Watergate era.Other politicians have sought to delay and game the disclosure requirements. Michael R. Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York City, notably announced his presidential campaign in November 2019 and then dropped out — after making two extension requests that he was legally entitled to — before the disclosure requirement kicked in. More

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      Pro-Trump Super PAC Files an Ethics Complaint Against DeSantis

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      The group, the MAGA Inc. super PAC, accused Gov. Ron DeSantis of violating Florida laws by operating a shadow presidential campaign. A DeSantis spokeswoman called it a politically motivated attack.Donald J. Trump spent much of the past year teasing a presidential campaign, telling New York magazine last summer that he had “already made that decision” on whether to run and promising his rally crowds for months that they would be “very happy” about his choice.Now, Mr. Trump’s allies are accusing Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida of doing the same — but insisting that he has violated state law.MAGA Inc., a super PAC supporting Mr. Trump, filed a complaint with Florida officials on Wednesday, alleging that Mr. DeSantis — the former president’s chief potential rival for the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination — is operating a shadow presidential campaign.The super PAC said that Mr. DeSantis should be considered a presidential candidate because he has taken meetings with donors, raised money for a political committee and toured the country to sell books, while allies are reaching out to potential campaign aides.“Governor DeSantis’s failure to declare his candidacy is no mere oversight,” reads the MAGA Inc. complaint to the Florida Commission on Ethics. “It is a coordinated effort specifically designed for him to accept, as unethical gifts, illegal campaign contributions and certain personal benefits.”The pro-Trump super PAC, which sent the complaint via certified mail on Wednesday, is asking the state commission to impose “the most severe penalties” under Florida ethics law, which include, among other things, impeachment, removal from office, public censure and ballot disqualification. NBC News earlier reported on the complaint on Wednesday.A spokeswoman in the governor’s office, Taryn Fenske, said the complaint was part of a “list of frivolous and politically motivated attacks,” adding, “It’s inappropriate to use state ethics complaints for partisan purposes.”While Mr. DeSantis hasn’t formally declared a White House bid, he is checking all the boxes of a potential candidate. He published a book that could double as the outline of a 2024 campaign platform and has been promoting the book on a nationwide tour — including stops in states that are hosting the first three Republican primary contests. He has also laid out foreign policy positions this week on Fox News.The allegations from the pro-Trump group echo a similar complaint filed against Mr. Trump last year in March by a Democratic super PAC. In that complaint, the Democratic group, American Bridge, argued to the Federal Election Commission that Mr. Trump had been behaving like a 2024 presidential candidate while avoiding federal oversight by not filing a statement of candidacy.The group filed a lawsuit in July against the federal commission, seeking to force it to take action against Mr. Trump within 30 days. The lawsuit accused Mr. Trump of trying to disguise his run for the presidency in order to leave voters “in the dark about the contributions and expenditures he has received, which is information they are entitled to.”The F.E.C. did not take action against Mr. Trump. He eventually announced a formal presidential campaign four months later.Mr. Trump’s allies could face a similarly tough road in persuading the state ethics commission to act. Mr. DeSantis has appointed five of the nine members of the commission.Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis were once political allies, but have grown increasingly antagonistic toward each other.Mr. DeSantis, who has branded himself as one of his party’s most ruthless political brawlers, has so far declined to directly confront Mr. Trump. Instead, he has made thinly veiled contrasts with Mr. Trump, telling crowds that his administration in Tallahassee has been free of leaks and chaos — such as the kind that often plagued the Trump White House — and excoriating the leadership of Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, one of Mr. Trump’s key public health advisers during the Covid-19 pandemic.Mr. Trump, on the other hand, has grown increasingly aggressive in his attacks on Mr. DeSantis.At an event in Davenport, Iowa, on Monday, Mr. Trump drew a mix of applause and groans from the crowd as he attacked Mr. DeSantis over attempts to cut ethanol production and said the Florida governor wanted to “decimate” Social Security and Medicare by supporting proposals that would have increased the age to receive benefits.Mr. Trump scheduled his event three days after Mr. DeSantis made his first introduction to Iowa voters in the same Mississippi River town. More

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      George Santos Signals Intention to Seek Re-election in 2024

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      The move by Mr. Santos allows him to continue fund-raising as a prospective candidate and to spend campaign funds.Representative George Santos, the embattled Republican from New York facing criminal inquiries and ethics investigations, filed paperwork on Tuesday indicating his intent to run for re-election.The statement of candidacy filed with the Federal Election Commission does not guarantee that Mr. Santos, a first-term lawmaker representing parts of Long Island and Queens, will run for office next year.But it allows Mr. Santos to continue to raise money and spend it on various campaign-related expenses, including paying back the roughly $700,000 he lent to his campaign and paying any potential legal fees connected to the inquiries that he is currently facing.The filing also offers a clear signal that Mr. Santos is leaving the door open to defending his seat in Congress, even as he has been besieged by calls to resign from his constituents, a handful of local Republican officials in his district and fellow House members, including representatives from his own party.Mr. Santos did not respond to a message seeking comment.Mr. Santos’s political future has been severely questioned after revelations in The New York Times that he lied to voters about graduating from college, working for prestigious Wall Street firms and boasting an extensive real estate portfolio. Subsequent reporting by The Times and other outlets has also raised questions about his campaign’s fund-raising and spending practices.Federal prosecutors have been examining Mr. Santos’s campaign finances and personal business dealings, and local prosecutors in New York have been exploring Mr. Santos’s behavior during his campaign. Last month, the House Ethics Committee said it would investigate whether Mr. Santos broke laws tied to his campaign filings or his personal business.While Mr. Santos has admitted to fabricating parts of his résumé and biography, he has denied any criminal wrongdoing. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has maintained that Mr. Santos was duly elected, and that the House would only take action if its Ethics Committee found cause.Yet many rank-and-file Republicans have raised concerns about Mr. Santos’s ability to properly serve constituents. Republicans in Nassau County on Long Island have said they would circumvent his office whenever possible, and 10 House Republicans have called on Mr. Santos to resign. Other Republican representatives have said they were hesitant to collaborate with Mr. Santos on legislation or party business.Mr. Santos has said he would not leave office unless all those voters who supported his campaign last year called on him to do so. A poll in January by Newsday and Siena College found that 78 percent of voters in Mr. Santos’s district wanted him to step down, including 71 percent of Republicans surveyed.Still, Mr. Santos appeared to bow to pressure in January, when he said he would temporarily recuse himself from sitting on two congressional committees. Mr. McCarthy said that he and Mr. Santos reached the decision jointly.But Mr. Santos has repeatedly declined to answer questions about whether he planned to run for re-election.In January, he repeatedly told reporters asking about his future plans that it was “too early” to answer. Last month, he told the Fox station in New York that he had not yet decided whether he would run in 2024.Mr. McCarthy — who endorsed Mr. Santos and helped his campaign in 2022 — told reporters in Washington that he would “probably have a little difficulty” supporting Mr. Santos in a re-election bid.Local Republicans have also voiced their opposition to re-electing Mr. Santos: The Nassau County Republican Committee, a powerful local party organization, has resolutely said it would not support him in 2024.The committee’s chairman, Joseph G. Cairo Jr., reiterated on Tuesday that Mr. Santos would not receive its endorsement.“If he decides to run, we will oppose and beat him,” Mr. Cairo said in a statement.The Federal Election Commission requires candidates to register if they raise or spend more than $5,000 toward an election, a threshold that Mr. Santos passed at the end of last year, according to campaign finance reports.Incumbent politicians are generally quick to register regardless of whether they have decided to run again, so they can continue to accept donations that can be used to pay old campaign debts.Those debts can include personal loans that candidates make to fund their campaigns, experts said. A Supreme Court decision last year cleared the way for candidates to be repaid well after their elections.Brett G. Kappel, an election lawyer, said that the commission’s guidance was also “pretty liberal” regarding the use of campaign money for legal expenses. Candidates can use funds for legal fees tied to “any investigation related to your status as an officeholder or candidate.” The inquiries into Mr. Santos’s campaign finances would likely qualify, he said.So far, only one other candidate has registered with the commission to fill Mr. Santos’s seat: Josh Lafazan, a Democrat who ran unsuccessfully in last year’s primary. More