It's important not to limit the amount of their own money that candidates can spend, but to give other people access to enough money to run competitive races.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
People have their constitutional right to contribute to a campaign and if they have discretionary money that they want to contribute to a candidate, whether a Republican or a Democrat, they should be able to do so.
Much of what candidates have to do is raise money and appeal to constituencies or interest groups that can provide that money.
I do not believe wealthy candidates should spend vast resources in their own campaigns.
It is essential that there should not only be a limit on campaign spending but it should be required to say where that money is spent and how it is spent. I think there has been more abuse in campaign spending, actually, than in campaign contributors.
Elections are a competition with only one winner. Giving more money to the opponent every time one speaks on behalf of a favored candidate discourages the speech that triggers the matching funds.
I don't think anyone's pushing for spending limits in the campaign.
I contribute to public candidate campaigns, and there's a federal limit on how much you can contribute to each individual candidate. I obey the law in that regard, and I feel like I'm doing it properly.
Unfortunately, money in politics is an insidious thing - and a loophole in our campaign finance system was taken advantage of with money going to existing or new 527 groups with the sole purpose of influencing the election.
I don't think politicians should be allowed to take money for their campaigns from outside interests.
There's nothing in the First Amendment that even remotely talks about spending money for political contests, and to say that an individual can spend as much of his or her own money as he or she wants constitutionally without any limitation, I think is just absurd.