Scrap the State's Taxpayer Funding of Elections
Joseph Burns, an election law partner at Holtzman Vogel, offers his views on the new NYS public campaign finance program and why it doesn’t work.
December 18, 2024 at 10:00 AM
7 minute read
2024 marked New York State’s first foray into the world of publicly funded state elections. While the 2024 presidential election attracted more attention, the public campaign finance program and its impact on Empire State politics is, arguably, more important to the future of state government. Proponents of this program promised that it would usher in a new era of clean elections, competitive campaigns, and good government. The program, however, appears to be exactly what the critics predicted: an expensive boondoggle that creates opportunities for corruption and does nothing to improve our political system.
Originally, a state public campaign finance program was adopted by a commission established by then-Governor Andrew Cuomo. A Niagara County Supreme Court Justice, however, found that the commission was unconstitutionally exercising legislative powers when it created a public campaign finance program, and the program was invalidated.
The current public campaign finance program—which is identical to the earlier one established by the commission – was created as part of the state budget in 2020.This occurred as an eleventh-hour change to the budget in March of 2020 just as the state and country were entering into the COVID-19 lockdown.
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