Last Friday, New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver adopted the final version of a set of rules designed to make campaign finance in the state more transparent and accountable.
The Brennan Center submitted comments during the rule-making process, urging, among other reforms, a definition of “coordinated expenditures” that would better capture scenarios where outside groups misuse their unlimited spending power after Citizens United to collaborate with candidates.
Based on our study of coordination between candidates and outside groups and of the regulatory landscape in states across the country, we suggested several indicators of coordination that reflect how candidates and outside spenders really cooperate. Many of those indicators appear in New Mexico’s new rules.
In taking this important first step, New Mexico joins a growing list of states taking action to reduce the flow of unaccountable, unregulated money into the state’s political landscape.
The rules will take effect on October 10, 2017.
Read the final rules here.
Read more about coordination here.
Read more about the growing phenomenon of unaccountable political advertising here.
(Photo: Thinkstock)