CCP’s Legal Director Allen Dickerson has this reaction to the ruling: The First Amendment protects Americans from being imprisoned by their government for political activity. Here, overzealous prosecutors tried to put Tom DeLay in jail because he solicited entirely legal campaign contributions. The state of Texas called this money laundering, but the Court of Appeals saw through their rhetoric and the lamentable complexity of campaign finance regulation, and ordered an acquittal. In doing so, it restored some clarity to the law and some restraint on political prosecutions. It appears our amicus brief may have had an impact on the Court’s thinking. Here is an excerpt from pages 3-4 from our brief: Two recent cases, EMILY’s List v. Federal Election Comm’n and Carey v. Federal Election Comm’n, have ruled that separate, segregated accounts for hard- and soft-money work to protect against corruption or its appearance without infringing upon First Amendment rights. 581 F.3d 1 (D.C. Cir. 2009); 791 F.Supp.2d 121 (D.D.C. 2011).
Appeals Court Acquits Tom DeLay - CCP
