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The Federal Election Commission would have something to say: "The Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) prohibits any foreign national from contributing, donati

The Federal Election Commission would have something to say: "The Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) prohibits any foreign national from contributing, donating or spending funds in connection with any federal, state, or local election in the United States, either directly or indirectly. It is also unlawful to help foreign nationals violate that ban or to solicit, receive or accept contributions or donations from them. Persons who knowingly and willfully engage in these activities may be subject to fines and/or imprisonment." [0] The definition of "foreign national" is quite broad. How this works with regards to PAC contributions is unclear to me. [0] https://transition.fec.gov/pages/brochures/foreign.shtml https://transition.fec.gov/pages/brochures/foreign.shtml

LeifCarrotson 9y ago
> Persons who knowingly and willfully engage in these activities may be subject to fines and/or imprisonment. Who are these "persons"? It can't logically be the foreign nationals who are attempting to help a campaign. They're not under the jurisdiction of US federal law. It also can't logically be the candidates. Otherwise, the obvious tactic would be to provide overt, unrequested aid to the opposition candidate(s) and send them all to jail. I'm not sure it can be Facebook or other Internet sides. It is true that Facebook is a US company, but the content on their sites is protected under the DMCA safe harbor exemption. And then the law wouldn't handle the case of sites not under US ownership. FECA dates back to the 70s, and it doesn't seem to do a good job of handling the globalization of the Internet. If someone from overseas looked at the facts themselves and, without talking to a candidate, just plastered Google and Facebook and YouTube and Twitter with endorsement of one candidate and criticism of another, is it reasonable to try to stop them?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > It can't logically be the foreign nationals who are attempting to help a campaign. They're not under the jurisdiction of US federal law. Criminal violations of US laws whose prohibition is not expressly territorially restricted that occur outside of the US are successfully prosecuted in US courts with some frequency. Bringing people before the court for prosecution may be challenging where extradition isn't an option, but outright kidnapping from a foreign country or even full-scale military military invasion to do so have occurred.
  - Ajedi32 9y ago
    In this this hypothetical scenario though it's not even a "person" providing the funds, but a foreign government organization. A US court can't "fine or imprison" the Communist Party of China, or the Russian GRU, for example.
    - nradov 9y ago
      There's always a person making the decision and moving the funds. The Russian GRU isn't a sentient entity by itself. In principle those people can be held legally accountable, although it practice it's probably impossible.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      A US court can fine or imprison any of the individual people who comprise, direct as superiors, or act on the direction of those abstract entities that the US executive branch arranges, by whatever means (which, again, have historically included both foreign kidnapping and outright invasion) to bring before the court. Vladimir Putin is obviously, as a practical matter, much safer from that than Manuel Noriega was, but lower level individuals may not be so much.

LeifCarrotson 9y ago

> Persons who knowingly and willfully engage in these activities may be subject to fines and/or imprisonment. Who are these "persons"? It can't logically be the foreign nationals who are attempting to help a campaign. They're not under the jurisdiction of US federal law. It also can't logically be the candidates. Otherwise, the obvious tactic would be to provide overt, unrequested aid to the opposition candidate(s) and send them all to jail. I'm not sure it can be Facebook or other Internet sides. It is true that Facebook is a US company, but the content on their sites is protected under the DMCA safe harbor exemption. And then the law wouldn't handle the case of sites not under US ownership. FECA dates back to the 70s, and it doesn't seem to do a good job of handling the globalization of the Internet. If someone from overseas looked at the facts themselves and, without talking to a candidate, just plastered Google and Facebook and YouTube and Twitter with endorsement of one candidate and criticism of another, is it reasonable to try to stop them?

dragonwriter 9y ago
> It can't logically be the foreign nationals who are attempting to help a campaign. They're not under the jurisdiction of US federal law. Criminal violations of US laws whose prohibition is not expressly territorially restricted that occur outside of the US are successfully prosecuted in US courts with some frequency. Bringing people before the court for prosecution may be challenging where extradition isn't an option, but outright kidnapping from a foreign country or even full-scale military military invasion to do so have occurred.
- Ajedi32 9y ago
  In this this hypothetical scenario though it's not even a "person" providing the funds, but a foreign government organization. A US court can't "fine or imprison" the Communist Party of China, or the Russian GRU, for example.
  - nradov 9y ago
    There's always a person making the decision and moving the funds. The Russian GRU isn't a sentient entity by itself. In principle those people can be held legally accountable, although it practice it's probably impossible.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    A US court can fine or imprison any of the individual people who comprise, direct as superiors, or act on the direction of those abstract entities that the US executive branch arranges, by whatever means (which, again, have historically included both foreign kidnapping and outright invasion) to bring before the court. Vladimir Putin is obviously, as a practical matter, much safer from that than Manuel Noriega was, but lower level individuals may not be so much.