Thread by @EllenLWeintraub

Sad to report: @FEC announced today the dismissal of a slew of important cases on key issues like dark money, soft money & coordination. Several of us had worked hard over the past few years to keep these matters alive in the face of obstructionist colleagues and bad caselaw. 🧵

@FEC These efforts involved a activating a previously unused, alternative enforcement path that Congress wrote into our governing statute.

There is still hope that the American people's interests can be vindicated, at least in these matters.

@FEC This path allows those who file complaints to sue those they allege have violated the law when @FEC fails to act. The strategy was working. Today's dismissals should not affect those existing lawsuits – the dismissals have not cured the injury that allowed those suits to proceed.

@FEC It's not surprising that this alternative enforcement strategy bugged the heck outta some of my colleagues, who thought they held all the cards.

I make zero apologies for using every tool I can find to get the law enforced.

@FEC The matters that have been shut down are: MUR 6589R (American Action Network); MURs 6915 and 6927 (John Ellis Bush); MURs 7427, 7497, 7524, and 7553 (National Rifle Association of America Political Victory Fund, et al.); ...

@FEC ... MURs 7558, 7560, and 7621 (Donald J. Trump, MAGA PAC, et al.); MUR 7486 (45Committee); MURs 7654 and 7660 (America First Action), MURs 7672, 7674, and 7732 (Iowa Values), and MUR 7726 (David Brock, et al.).

@FEC My statements on many of these closed matters are also being released today.

Two with @ShanaMBroussard:

Iowa Values: fec.gov/files/legal/mu…
45 Committee: fec.gov/files/legal/mu…

Two regular statements on my own:

NRA: eqs.fec.gov/eqsdocsMUR/742…
Brock: fec.gov/files/legal/mu…

@FEC @ShanaMBroussard Two more statements are worthy of special note:

Jeb Bush: fec.gov/files/legal/mu…
AAN: fec.gov/files/legal/mu…

D.C. Circuit distortions of the @FEC's enforcement process have actually resulted in *my* being the “controlling” commissioner to explain these dismissals.

@FEC They should be an intriguing read for election-law and administrative-law nerds everywhere. For the first time *ever*, the controlling rationale in two @FEC dismissals is that those dismissals *are* contrary to law, which should make the next round of lawsuits quite interesting.