If you take one look at the website Blue Nation Review, you can see that its sole purpose is to protect the image of Hillary Clinton during her election campaign. When you dig down deeper, we find that David Brock bought the Blue Nation Review last year. Davis Brock is a known Clinton supporter and is still on the books of a super PAC called American Bridge 21st Century and its breakaway super PAC called Correct the Road.

He reportedly resigned from his position with the super PAC last year, but is still currently getting paid by them. (Sirota, 2016) When asked by Time Magazine about his plans for the 2016 presidential election, he said, “I essentially had to make a decision. Do I want to be involved in supervising and handling the research against the Republican candidates or do I want to be involved in some combination of defense and offense for Hillary Clinton?” (Scherer, 2015)

This website has certainly met Brock’s goal of “defending” Clinton. It is nauseating to look at; the smoke and mirrors used to actively manipulate the perception of Clinton is obviously designed to lure in and retain potential voters. It is illegal for any super PACs to be in direct contact with campaigns. However, Correct the Road claims to be allowed to coordinate with the Clinton campaign by using the Blue Nation Review.

The super PAC credits its ability to coordinate with the Clinton campaign “by relying on a 2006 Federal Election Commission regulation that declared that content posted online for free, such as blogs, is off-limits from regulation. The ‘Internet exemption’ said that such free postings do not constitute campaign expenditures, allowing independent groups to consult with candidates about the content they post on their sites. By adopting the measure, the FEC (Federal Election Commission) limited its online jurisdiction to regulating paid political ads.” (Gold, 2015)

Given Brock’s involvement in both the super PACs and the Blue Nation Review, he is most certainly testing the legal limits of campaign financial support for Hillary Clinton. “Experts say Brock’s roles at the two groups show how he has used sophisticated legal maneuvers to circumvent campaign finance restrictions designed to prevent corruption and the influence of high-dollar donors on the political process.” (Markay, 2016) If they were to be investigated by the Federal Election Commission or the IRS, would they come out squeaky clean? Operating within this loophole is a risky move for the Clinton campaign, especially when she is currently being investigated by the FBI for fraud and the mismanagement of top-secret special-access intelligence.

References:

Gold, M. (2015, May 12). How a super PAC plans to coordinate directly with Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Retrieved Feb 2, 2016, from The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/05/12/how-a-super-pac-plans-to-coordinate-directly-with-hillary-clintons-campaign/

Markay, L. (2016, Feb 1). Experts: David Brock Pushing Campaign Finance Boundaries. Retrieved Feb 2, 2016, from The Free Beacon: http://freebeacon.com/politics/experts-david-brock-pushing-campaign-finance-boundaries/