Fred Wertheimer statement: FEC Reports Confirm Billionaires and Millionaires Playing Dominant Role in Presidential Campaigns

The FEC reports filed by individual-candidate Super PACs confirm that billionaires and millionaires have become the dominant players in financing the 2016 presidential campaigns.

The FEC reports also reveal that individual-candidate Super PACs are in the process of replacing candidate committees in the financing of the 2016 presidential campaigns. As of June 30, individual-candidate Super PACs supporting Republican presidential candidates had raised at least four times the amount raised by the Republican candidate committees.

Meanwhile, huge contributions from the wealthiest individuals in the country are flooding the presidential campaigns – the kind of contributions that can result in corruption and the appearance of corruption.

At least 25 individuals gave or raised $1 million each for the Super PAC supporting Jeb Bush, according to the Wall Street Journal. The largest contribution reportedly came from billionaire Mike Fernandez who gave $3 million. And then there is one billionaire, Donald Trump, who has decided that the best presidential candidate to finance is Donald Trump.

The 2016 presidential candidates and their individual-candidate Super PACs are wiping out the nation’s anti-corruption candidate contribution limits. In doing so, the presidential candidates and the Super PAC supporting them are creating the kind of system that the Supreme Court has described as an inherently corrupt system.

As the 2016 campaign unfolds, the American people are watching the perversion of the American presidency take place before their eyes.