Democrats are giddy right now; the substantial lead that Donald Trump had held over President Biden for months has largely vanished as the matchup has changed to Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz […] Trump is blustering in ways that indicate he thinks he’s losing (yesterday’s presser at his shabby golf motel was particularly pathetic), while J.D. Vance’s poll numbers are in the toilet—or the couch—and showing no indication of recovery any day soon.
[But] lessons from […] recent past years should keep Democrats from easing up or becoming overconfident. The official beginning of the election season is still almost a month away, and the big money pledged by right-wing and neofascist billionaires hasn’t even shown up yet.
[…]
We saw this played out here in Portland just last month. Susheela Jayapal […] was a well-thought-of and successful Oregon politician, on the board of the Metro government that oversees the three counties that make up the Portland metro area. She had a long list of great accomplishments and was a shoo-in to replace retiring Democratic Congressman Earl Blumenauer—until the America Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC] came into our district and dropped millions into the race with a deeply dishonest smear campaign. […] local radio and TV were saturated with ads that essentially portrayed her as either evil or incompetent or both. And right up until the election, nobody knew that AIPAC was funding the campaign; they’d set up a front group and carefully timed its incorporation so it didn’t have to disclose its funder until after the election was over.
[…]
AIPAC also reportedly spent more than $14 million to take down New York’s Jamaal Bowman and, just this week, knocked out Missouri congresswoman and Squad member Cori Bush with $8 million. As the pro-Israel PAC notes on its home page, big money dropped into a race in the last weeks works: “98% of AIPAC-backed candidates won their general election races in 2022.”
But AIPAC is a piker compared to what’s going to be coming down the road as the tech, banking, insurance, and fossil fuel billionaires and their companies weigh in to the presidential race this fall.
[…]
In this post–Citizens United era, truth has become a casualty of big money. For example, according to Open Secrets, the Empower Parents PAC has contributed $82.5 million, Susquehanna International Group $69.7 million, Citadel LLC $59.9 million, and Uline Inc $59.6 million to Republican causes so far. And they’re just getting started.
Ever since Citizens United legalized literally unlimited contributions to the new category of political action committees it created (super PACs), just in the 15 months from January 2023 to April 2024, over $8.6 billion has been raised for this year’s federal campaigns with over 65 percent of that money—$5.6 billion—running through PACs. And, as noted, they’re just getting started.
Harris polling right now (and specifically, the trend, since the polling is on track to continue improving until the election) is our control period, before the money and right-wing propaganda hit.
I guess we’ll find out in November not just whether democracy in the US ends, but whether Citizen’s United is the cause of death.