U.S. Supreme Court blocks matching funds

Listen to this article

Phoenix (Dolan) — The U.S. Supreme Court has blocked Arizona’s Clean Elections system from distributing matching funds, throwing a number of high-profile campaigns into disarray just weeks before candidates were to start receiving money.

The court on June 8 granted a request by the Goldwater Institute to halt a recent ruling of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that declared matching funds constitutional. The justices ordered that the distribution of matching funds be put on hold until it can hear a full appeal of the matching funds system.

Goldwater Institute attorney Nick Dranias said he doesn’t expect the court to hear the appeal in McComish v. Bennett until around October, meaning matching funds are essentially finished for 2010 in Arizona. The primary election is Aug. 24. The general election is Nov. 2.

The case could have an impact in Wisconsin as well. The state recently passed matching funds legislation, but only for candidates to the State Supreme Court.

Under the law, which will go into effect in December, a candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court may qualify for public financing by receiving contributions from at least 1,000 separate contributors in amounts of not less than $5 nor more than $100 in an aggregate amount of at least $5,000 but not more than $15,000. Public financing benefits for eligible candidates are $100,000 in the primary and $300,000 in the general election.

Dranias and Clint Bolick, director of the Goldwater Institute’s legal division, said publicly funded candidates in Arizona had fair warning that matching funds might not be there for them. U.S. District Court judge Roslyn Silver wrote in 2008 — more than a year before her ruling — that the system was likely unconstitutional.

The decision will take a major toll on several campaigns, most notably in the governor’s race. Businessman Buz Mills has already spent nearly $2.3 million in his quest for the Republican nomination, and due to the court’s ruling, incumbent Gov. Jan Brewer and state Treasurer Dean Martin will be left with only $707,000 for the Republican primary, instead of the total $2.1 million they had been slated to receive due to matching funds.

Brewer said she felt it was “extremely unusual” for the judicial branch to change in the middle of an election cycle and said she hoped the Supreme Court would reconsider its decision. Dranias said he considered that to be extremely unlikely.