New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman took aim yesterday at the loopholes that allowed dark money groups to pour unlimited money into elections without disclosing their donors by releasing a draft of new disclosure rules. The regulations would require any tax-exempt group working in New York to report its percentage of expenditures that are political in nature (using a stricter definition of political than the IRS), and mandate disclosure of donors of $100 to any group spending significant amounts in NY politics.

Not to be outdone, Gov. Cuomo took to the airwaves the same day to argue why regulations beyond the AG's authority are vitally important, including pass a Fair Elections public financing system for statewide and legislative races.

Campaign Finance/Fair Elections
Center for American Progress: Public Financing of Judicial Races Can Give Small Donors a Decisive Role
CAP argues that small donor matching public financing similar to the Fair Elections Now Act, is a must to ensure the integrity of judicial elections. “Public financing programs can drastically limit the opportunity for lawyers, corporations, or others to influence the law through campaign contributions.”
 
Jurist: What's Left for Campaign Finance Reform?
Law Professor Steven Schwinn: “The First Amendment allows creative public finance systems, tighter contribution limits, and greater disclosure, and we already have sound policies and proposals in these areas. Now we need to get serious about them.”
 
Roll Call: Empty Ethics Posts Draw Critics' Ire
A group of advocacy organizations have criticized House leadership heavily for failing to fill openings at the Office of Congressional Ethics, which could effectively neuter the organization.

Congress/2012
HuffPo: Obama 2012 Campaign Spending Buried Romney On Airwaves And With Staff
Check out the breakdown of where the two presidential campaigns spent their incredible amounts of money. Obama had huge advantages in spending on payroll and TV/radio.
 
Center for Public Integrity: GOP gov's group raises $100 million in mostly losing effort
“Despite outraising its Democratic counterpart by a 2-to-1 margin, the Republican Governors Association won only four of 11 races in the 2012 election, a far cry from the success it enjoyed two years ago.”
 
Washington Times: HHS appointee a familiar face
The revolving door goes both ways. Jim McElhatton looks at the career history of the next director of the Department of Health and Human Services.
 
WaPo: Did Karl Rove earn any money from American Crossroads?
If you claim that Karl Rove got paid from his involvement with the American Crossroads super PAC, Glenn Kessler is prepped to slap you with all the Pinocchios he can muster.
 
OpenSecrets Blog: Lawyers, Education Consistent as Obama's Top Industries, Wall Street True to Romney
The Center for Responsive Politics looks at the industries which gave the most money to the two presidential candidates.
 
The Atlantic: How Romney and His Super PAC Blew the Great TV War of 2012, Revealed
Analysis based on CMAG data: “When it came to the biggest expenditure of his presidential campaign — TV ads — the technocratic and data-loving Mitt Romney allowed his campaign, plainly and simply, to waste a lot of money.”
 
NYT: Deconstructing Dodd-Frank
Cool graphic from the Times chronicling the enormous lobbying effort by Wall Street over the still-in-progress Dodd-Frank regulations.
 
Bloomberg: Freshmen: PACs First, Oaths Later
Freshmen members of Congress now know that their top priority is getting ahead for the next money race: “Once the province of senior House and Senate members, [leadership] PACs have become as ubiquitous as re-election committees for lawmakers in both houses of Congress, no matter what their positions.”

Other/States
NYT: Cuomo Puts Campaign Finance on 2013 Agenda
In a radio interview, NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that he would push legislation that regulates political spending by nonprofits, other corporations, and individuals beyond what the state’s attorney general has authority to put in place. He said public financing was extremely important to be in the bill, but didn’t say whether its absence would be a dealbreaker.
 
NYT: Quinn Delays Hearing on Campaign Bill
After Mayor Bloomberg called City Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s campaign finance bill “a terrible idea” and “really not good for democracy,” she said she would delay movement on the legislation. The bill would loosen regulations on political spending by unions and some other groups. Quinn says the intention was never to create a loophole and that she will revise language to clarify that.
 
TMP: Eric Holder: Time To Consider National Voting Standards
While he didn’t endorse Sen. Boxer’s LINE Act, Holder said that the country should consider uniform national standards for election administration, citing a MacArthur Foundation study showing 90 percent support for such a measure.