Freedom Line Blog

Roll Call reports that former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has been ordered by the Federal Election Commission to repay nearly $2.3 million in misused matching funds.

The FEC’s order follows a legally required audit of Edwards’ campaign after the candidate took taxpayer money in return for capping his expenditures.  It turns out Edwards exceeded the cap and violated the law.  (For those familiar with Edwards’ post-2008 history, it’s no surprise his fiscal excess rose to the level of his personal excess.)

What does this have to do with campaign finance law?  Plenty.

To supporters, one of the goals of campaign finance laws is to increase the amount of transparency in who funds a candidate.  That goal is much easier to achieve when the hook of federal auditing is swallowed along with matching funds.  Like most liberals, John Edwards is relentlessly supportive of increasing government oversight on just about everything.  Now, the very transparency and oversight he championed for others is unearthing all kinds of sordid details he would surely prefer stay out of view.

Maybe Edwards’ inner libertarian will awaken and he’ll become an advocate for less government and more privacy.  If nothing else, he would be well advised in the future to practice a lot more discretion.