Press Releases

Congressman Ed Case (Hawai‘i – District 1) testified in support of his amendment to H.R. 1: For the People Act, which incentivizes political parties to prioritize small-dollar donations in supporting candidates. The full text of his written testimony on the House floor is below:

"Thank you, Mr. Chair. I rise today to speak in favor of my proposed amendment. This amendment will empower small-dollar donors to participate in our elections process and focus the attention of candidates and political parties on earning financial support from a broader base of voters.

All across our political spectrum, we decry the historically low esteem in which Congress is now held as well as the utter absence of many if not most of our fellow citizens from their government. As if the two were unrelated, for of course, low esteem breeds absence and absence breeds low esteem. Most Americans simply feel left out, without a voice, unvested and unwanted, and thus the downward cycle.

Nor is this just about low esteem and absence. For if the vast majority of Americans are not vested in our government and if our government is only supported and is only representative of the very few, mostly monied and influential, interests of our country, then that does not lead to representative decisions and erodes the consent of the governed, the political and social consensus on which our democracy is based.

As just one manifestation of this dangerous and worsening syndrome, the Center for Responsive Politics reviewed 2018 election cycle contributions and found that (still again): “Only a tiny fraction of Americans actually give campaign contributions to political candidates, parties or PACs. The ones who give contributions large enough to be itemized (over $200) is even smaller. The impact of those donations, however, is huge.” In fact, according to the Center, while less than a half percent of the population contributed $200 or more, their contributions totaled 71% of all individual contributions in 2018 to candidates, PACs, parties and outside groups.

The clear corollary is that the vast majority of Americans do not participate in our elections with their financial support and that, of those that do contribute, their voices are drowned out in a sea of larger contributions from a precariously narrow interest base. This is why leading reform groups such as Issue One and its ReFormers Caucus, a fully bipartisan group of now over 200 former Members of Congress, Governors and Cabinet members committed to nonpartisan solutions to fixing our broken system, cites increased and broadened voter participation in the election process through means such as amplifying the voices of small donors as key to returning our government to the people.

My amendment would take one small but meaningful step in that direction by authorizing national political party committees to contribute up to $10,000 to a candidate, twice the amount currently authorized, if the amount consists solely of individual contributions of less than $200, and by making corresponding changes in the limit on coordinated expenses. By permitting such committees to provide enhanced support to their candidates through use of separate small dollar accounts, this change would incentivize greater attention by committees to small-dollar donors, greater participation by such donors in the political process, and representation of a broader and more representative America by those elected."