Session. This is from russia with facebook, foreign influence in the u. S. Elections. Please silence your phones. This will be a onehour session. Hold your questions until the end. If you have questions, we will have a runner with notecards. G, ife spirit of unri something in here today inspires you are prisons and idea you want to go back and share with your community, please share it with the rest of the folks here, as well. Our inspiration cards are outside the back door. Out and put it up in the engagement station. Do not forget to give feedback about themit app sessions. I am your moderate moderator today. I and with represent. Us. We do legal advocacy work at i cannot be joined by better panel to discuss what has become an issue of True National priority, the vulnerability of our states, local, and National Elections the foreign influence in the urgent need for americans across the political spectrum to come together to find old forwardlooking and Sustainable Solutions to this problem. The 2016 elections made very clear that our elections are vulnerable to foreign influence. 21 state election systems were targeted by the russian government. The u. S. Intelligence community concluded with high confidence of the russian government interfered with the 2016 president ial election in order to, according to the office of the National Director of intelligence, undermine the faith of americans in the democratic process. We will get into this not being the first time there has been russian influence, and we have every reason to think that the loopholes exploited present vulnerabilities for 2018 and beyond. There has never been a more important time to talk about this issue and come together to find a tradition to find solutions. I will briefly introduce our panel. E will have opening remarks i will ask a couple followup questions. Theere many 20 remaining 20 minutes will be for question and answer. Ellen weintraub has served as chair of the fec since 2003. Orleans,here in new and she served on a legal team that advised a Senate Rules Committee during the election between Mary Landrieu and woody jencks and woody jenkins. Then we have a professor of law from the university of montana. He teaches and writes about federal and state constitution law, election law, and related subjects. He served as a solicitor for the state of montana. His recent scholarship on this issue has focused on the historical and constitutional perspectives on life or in influence is such a concern to our democracy. Fromve a professor of law Stetson University college of law, a fellow with the Brennan Center of justice. A professor worked as counsel for the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center. She looks at how dark money could be heading illegal foreign money. [indiscernible] yes, i would love to. To her left is the senior director of trial that ignition in chief of the Campaign Legal center, where he directs District Court litigation and coordinates, implements, and manages the broader trial court strategy. Of theed in the Office General counsel of the federal election commission, where he litigated cases like Citizens United. From theric wang institute for free speech, a political law attorney who focuses on political activity regulation under federal and state Campaign Finance, lobbying, ethics, and tax laws. He was interim general counsel at americans for prosperity. He was counsel to carolyn hunter, chair of the fec. Commissioner weintraub, start us off. Ms. Weintraub great to be here. Know, because our intelligence agencies told us, that a Foreign Government took steps to try and intervene in our election. Our intelligence agencies warned us that they will do it again if we do not take steps to stop it. Of the cia, head said that just last week. So this is not a theoretical concern anymore. Do foreigners also take advantage to loopholes in our finance system to spend more money directly into our elections . That is the funny thing about loopholes we do not entirely know because we do not have all the information. The given what we already know, that a Foreign Government but facebook ads to interfere with elections, we would be naive to think that they would not be exploring other avenues. It is a Cost Effective technique buying these ads on facebook. Senator warner has pointed out that if you added up all the money that the russians spent to try and influence the u. S. , the dutch, the french, and the british elections, is still would not cost as much as one fighter jet. So we have to think very hard when we think about money and politics and the influence that , about how cheap some of this is to do it what are the various mechanisms that a foreigner could use to try to get into our election . They could try and get a direct donation, which has happened. They could use dark money otheres, llcs, c4s, entities that can spend money in our elections but do not tell us who is behind them to try and influence our elections. Good how much foreigners own of our corporations, about 25 percent of stocks that are u. S. Corporations are actually owned by a foreigner. So when corporations are spending in our elections, think about whose interests they are representing. Then there was the hacking of the infrastructure, which also cost money to pay the hackers. I know the department and the state governments are working hard on hardening the resources against that. That one is a little out of my jurisdiction. Admin there were those internet ads, and we know that they had an effect. They organized events with people on different sides of the issue. People showed up and actually got into fights with each other, all of this organized by a foreign country. That is pretty scary. When we look at Digital Democracy and how much of our political advertising is moving to that, we have to feel a more attention to this. Billion was spent on digital political advertising, an eightfold increase from 2012. This is skyrocketing and is the wave of the future. We have to do something about it. One small step were trying to take at the fec is to make sure their adequate disclaimers on the advertising you see on the internet. Believe it or not, this has not been clear up until now, and we put it out for comment a couple years ago just youve we should do something about this, and we got six comments. It a couple of months ago said maybe we should take another look at this, and we put it out for comment again, and 150,000 of you commented on this. 98. 5 percent of you said to please do something. 150,000,re among those thank you. We need to hear from you. Having more opportunities for public comment. I will be tweeting on this, so follow me on twitter. There are states and localities that have been active in these issues. Is just a at the fec small slice of what needs to be done. There are ask in congress there are acts in congress that take aim at trying to keep foreign money out of our elections, and all of those proposals need your support. Starttor well, i want to i want to start with the words of someone who could not be on the panel today, but it is perfect for being in new orleans this time of year on a campus. The way that professor painter puts it, getting foreign money in u. S. Political campaigns is about as easy as getting illegal a call into the freshman guard of a typical college campus. [laughter] contexto draw some around this and particularly think about the cross partisan concern that this represents. One way to look at it is to say, you know, it is russia. They are interested in disruption of the dnc last year. Who knows what it will be. 20 years ago, the dnc was actually known for going after four and campaign contributions. After Foreign Campaign contributions. I worry a little about the suspicion about outsiders. I think when we talk about citizenship and think about this itue of outside influence, is not about drawing lines against bigotry against outsiders. It is about selfgovernance and our choice about who we want to participate. We should be able to make that choice how we want. We have avenues to bring outside voices in, and they are welcome. Circle ofw the citizenship and belonging to the american Political Community broader if we want, but that is our choice. Moment ofa red dawn being scared of these russians. It is just that it should be up to estimate the decision in the first place. One common vocabulary for thinking about these questions and what i think about in my job is the constitution. We will hear about the First Amendment, but it turns out there is a lot more in the document beyond the First Amendment. And if you read the constitution, the whole thing, there is also its of concern expressed in there about foreign influence here and we want house members to be citizens for seven years. The father, in some ways, to the bill of rights, george mason, argued for seven years here they wanted to say three. George mason was for opening a wideopen door for immigrants, and if you are following that issue, it is worth looking at with the Founding Fathers had to say about immigration. They were quite proimmigration. Wide opene said was, for immigrants but not choosing to let foreigners and adventurers make laws for us and govern us. It might happen that a rich foreign nation might send over to a that will bribe the legislature for insidious purposes. So we will express concern about outsiders. The president being an natural born citizen, which im sure if professor painter were here, he would mention. More generally, this idea of a republican form of government that James Madison talked about. The concern once you open government to represent us, to represent the people, is to make sure that it is the right us, that we have some say in that. I will in end and what i think is maybe the best argument for getting a hold of this issue for empowering both state and federal governments, is a the rights enforcing rights are not necessarily on the same side in republican governments. The Party Without the majority may have such a support your ready of resources, of military talent and experience does not have to be jet fighters, can be actors, for an powers foreign powers will render it superior the party with less political power in the country, through foreign help, can gain control and power through our democracy. That is the reason we should care. Good evening. I will try that again. Good evening. Good evening. We are all in the same room together. Let me get to the crux of the matter. D. C. Onstant lying out of is giving me a headache and is breaking my heart. One of the biggest lies that is troubling me today is one that has been told by the president s lawyers, and that line is that there is no crime that the special counsel is investigating. That drives me nuts as both a citizen and as a law professor. So if you will forgive me, here are some possible crimes of the special counsel could credibly be investigating. Bribery is a crime. Moneylaundering is a crime. Violating the foreign corrupt practices act is a crime. Lying to the fbi is a crime. Lying to the special counsel is a crime. Failing to register as a Foreign Agent is a crime. Violating the logan act is a crime. Breaking into a Computer System is a crime. The receipt of stolen goods is a crime. Soliciting money as an american president ial candidate from a a crime. Ational is accepting money from or receiving value from a Foreign National as a president ial candidate is a crime. Aiding and abetting the foregoing is a crime. Being part of a criminal conspiracy is a crime. Obstruction of justice is a crime. Last but not least, treason is a crime. [applause] and, fortunately for all of us, many of those that i just listed i listed the federal crimes. There are also state analogs to most of what i just mentioned, and the reason why it is important that there are state analogs to what i just mentioned is president ial pardoning power only extends to the federal crime. Bem hopeful that there will serious prosecutions, whether it comes out of the special counsel s office or out of our state attorneys general. Iwill leave it there, but will just ask you to banish the word collusion from your vocabulary. It is not useful, because that is actually not a crime. [laughter] thanks. Fromt to thank those represent. Us for inviting me to speak here today. I have one legal point at a point more about messaging than about the law. The legal point i would like to make is that the issue of stopping foreign interference in is fundamentally different, constitutionally different, statutorily different, different in terms of enforcement than pretty much Everything Else we usually talk about in terms of Campaign Finance a debate. In every other area, you have our side, the prodemocracy side, trying to enhance the First Amendment right of the citizenry as a whole to meaningfully participate in the democratic process. Side, theve the other sort of procorruption site, seeking to enhance the First Amendment rights of all of oligarchs and corporations to overwhelm the First Amendment rights of the citizenry. So you have this balancing of First Amendment interests. In the context of stopping foreign interference in our election, that is not the framework. Foreign actors outside the United States have no First Amendment rights. I am going to let that sink in for a second. There is no First Amendment interests on that side. The russian actor whos posting things on facebook from a troll farm in kiev or moscow is not protected by the First Amendment. On the other side of the equation, the interest the government is furthering by stopping that activity is not just the First Amendment interests of the citizenry, but it is the fundamental core obligation of the federal government to keep the country safe from Foreign Agents who are seeking to harm it. In the regular campaignfinance context, you have the First Amendment rights, and we balance of them. It is a balancing act. In this context, there is no balance to be had. And the second and final point i want to raise, the one i call messaging, is that i think despite what i just said, there is a tendency when talking about into the samego terminology that we use for the regular campaignfinance debate. You talk about transparency and responsiveness and burden. I think that is unhelpful. This is a National Security issue just as much as what the department of defense does. We would not let russian soldiers enter this country and station themselves outside polling places, so we should not be letting russian agents enter this country electronically or otherwise to interfere with our process. Within the framework which we should be having this debate. [applause] thanks for that. I agree with a lot of what he just said. For those of you who know me and the institute of free speech, you will recognize that i am sort of the audit man out on the odd man out on the panel. I have an alternative viewpoint. So iish the role of rebel, will discuss action items first and then policy. I think you will see why. So when we tap into foreign interference in the election, how do they achieve that . States, you can bypass the elected officials by getting a Voter Initiative on the ballot, but you will need to form a ballot measure committee, which i will refer to as a pac. Donor disclosure, even urging your neighbors and social Media Contacts to support a ballot measure initiative. It requires you to perform form a pac. It is not uncommon for the act of one to get tens of dollars in legal compliance. Free speech,ax on but proceeds go to the Campaign Finance bar. Last year, my colleagues and i looked at the campaignfinance laws and found that 15 states report to regulate you as a pac even if you spent so much as a penny. Triggered byy be spending less than 1000. Of those states, 20 report to regulate you as a pac even if your major purpose is not political campaigns. Changing the laws of our system often requires action by an alleged official. Certain action by an elected official. With your not align agenda, you might need to remove them. Analysis toe pac ifly, in many states, even you disseminate messages urging your fellow citizens to contact their elected officials about legislation, what Campaign Finance attorneys call issue advocacy, that might trigger pac status. Lobbying laws might get you. More than a quarter of the states regulate socalled grassroots lobbying. The campaignfinance regime, there is complex registration and reporting requirements. You might wonder what the big deal is requiring disclosure. It is just disclosure when someone else is being gored. Democrats here, i ask, do you want the Trump White House keeping tabs on all your Political Activities . To republicans, in an alternative universe, would you want the Hillary ClintonAdministration Monitoring everything you are doing . Deen. Ard from katniss ever do you want them looking over the shoulder of her all the time . That is basicall