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CRACKING
THE CODE
COLUMBIA, M.D. — The 2014
election is over a year away, but
even so Rep. John Sarbanes (DMd.) found himself standing in
late July in the recessed living
room of two supporters, Mary and
David Marker, addressing a room
full of potential donors to his reelection campaign. In this day
and age of astronomical political
spending, it’s never too soon for a
lawmaker to gear up for the next
campaign. And yet this was no
ordinary fundraiser, and Sarbanes
was making no ordinary pitch.
“I want to thank you all for
coming,” Sarbanes said. “I want to
thank you for being interested. I
want to thank you in advance for
becoming a grassroots donor tonight. Remember, $5 is enough to
state your commitment.”
Five dollars might not seem
like enough, not when donors can
contribute up to $2,600 for each
primary and general election, and
politicians typically spend their
time asking people to do just that.
But this was a small-donor fundraising party — an event Sarbanes
plans to repeat across his district
as he attempts to fundamentally
change the way political candidates raise money.
In the past two years, Sarbanes,
HUFFINGTON
10.27.13
a four-term congressman and the
son of former five-term Sen. Paul
Sarbanes (D-Md.), has emerged
as a leader in a new vanguard
of campaign finance reformers.
These politicians and activists are
pushing to empower small donors
and to fight back against the rising tide of big money in politics
and the increasing pressure con-
“I JUST WOKE UP ONE
DAY AND — I JUST CAN’T
KEEP DOING THIS THE
SAME OLD WAY.”
gressional candidates face to raise
money for their campaigns, peers
and parties.
“I just woke up one day and —
I just can’t keep doing this the
same old way,” Sarbanes said in
an interview with The Huffington
Post. “I can’t keep going to the
same donors with the same story.
There’s got to be something more
innovative here.”
Sarbanes has room to innovate. The seat he occupies, which
stretches between Baltimore and
Washington, is safely Democratic.
So before the 2012 election, he
stockpiled a half-million dollars in
donations that could be unlocked