Fundraising by President-elect Joe Biden’s planning committee for the inauguration has stoked the ire of the party’s left flank by seeking big-dollar contributions.
In keeping with this year’s scaled-back campaign, the events marking Biden’s inauguration will be mostly virtual, with a “footprint” that the Biden-Harris Presidential Inauguration Committee billed in a statement this week as “extremely limited.”
Still, the committee is inviting donors to give lavishly, itemized packages that include networking and photo opportunities, according to a menu of options published by the New York Times.
Corporations giving between $500,000 and $1 million, and individuals giving half that amount, will score virtual face time with Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, “preferred viewing” for the Jan. 20 ceremony, “VIP” swag and online concerts “participation,” and something of an IOU with four VIP tickets to a “future in-person event.”
They’ll also net virtual invites to briefings with senior committee and campaign leaders.
The committee has said it won’t take contributions from fossil fuel interests, but in a scathing letter this week, dozens of liberal groups under a coalition called Demand Progress asked for the organizers to issue a blanket rejection of all “major” corporate cash.
“Other corporate interests must also be prevented from wielding undue influence,” the letter said, outlining the concern that donations could be used to curry favor with a new administration.
Citing the “appearance” of impropriety, the group called “the drive to raise so much money” with no evident use for it “perplexing,” urging an effort to “stamp out the unfettered corruption that has defined the Trump era.”
Historically, major donors “tend to be government contractors or special interests with business pending before the federal government,” said Craig Holman, an ethics and campaign finance expert for the government watchdog group Public Citizen.
Further, said Holman, the team “could have, and should have, shown concern for the ravages of the pandemic by hosting a very minimal inaugural ceremony.” Although the events will be mostly online, some are expected to be larger-scale productions organized by the producers of major award ceremonies and Super Bowl halftime shows.
“They could have followed in the noble footsteps of Thomas Jefferson, who celebrated his inauguration simply by walking from the White House to the Capitol, made his inaugural speech, and then walked back home,” Holman said. “This also would have cost next to nothing.”
The swearing-in ceremony where the new president stands on the steps of Congress, or the inauguration itself, is publicly funded, including the security, maintenance, and construction costs, as well as law enforcement and first responders, the Campaign Legal Center’s Brendan Fischer told the Washington Examiner. “Basically, everything else is funded by the Inaugural Committee, typically a 501(c)(4).”
Fischer said past presidents-elect have voluntarily imposed limits on the sources of money that they’ll accept, as well as the amount.
In 2009, then-President-elect Barack Obama “kept individual contributions at $50,000, refused all money from corporations, PACs, and from lobbyists and still raised a significant amount of money for a big inaugural event,” he added.
Unlike a campaign committee, which is subject to a $2,800 contribution limit and cannot take money from corporations or unions for federal contractors, the inaugural committee can take unlimited contributions from corporations, unions, and even federal government contractors.
“There’s certainly a long bipartisan history of big inaugural donors, at least appearing to get favorable treatment from the new administration, and there’s certainly a record of special interests making big donations to the inauguration, with the goal of currying influence with the administration,” Fischer said.
President Trump’s inaugural committee, which raised twice as much as any previous incoming president’s, is currently under investigation by the District of Columbia’s attorney general, Karl Racine.
Under the circumstances, Holman, of Public Citizen, said the president-elect’s inaugural committee has now lost a point of distinction with the “scandal-ridden” Trump administration. “The Biden-Harris team have wasted an ideal opportunity to distinguish itself,” he said.
