There’s been a lot of attention focused lately on Super PAC’s and their influence in this year’s elections. Their impact has been debated from the hallowed halls of Congress to the late night comedy news programs ever since the Supreme Court opened the door to a new form of free speech.
Politicians and Super PAC’s are not allowed to work/collaborate with each other (wink, wink, nudge, nudge), but there is another surprising area which could cause a conflict of interest. Not between the candidates and the Super PAC’s, but with the broadcasters who air their advertisements and the revenue they generate.
Broadcasters are required by law to accept all advertising from any candidate running for a national office, but they don’t have to accept any Super PAC advertising. The dilemma is broadcasters can make a ton more money airing Super PAC ads vs. a candidate’s ads.
How so? Super PAC’s have to buy advertising at the going rate. Politicians, by law, can purchase broadcast time at a thing called the “Lowest Unit Rate”. Candidates are charged the lowest rate that any commercial advertiser paid for a spot of the same class. Broadcasters can’t bump up the rate on a candidates spot, but they can charge whatever they want to air the Super PAC’s ads. CBS President Les Moonves told a conference back in March that, “Super PAC’s may be bad for America, but they’re very good for CBS”.
That’s all well and good for CBS, except broadcasters are responsible to ensure ads they broadcast are truthful and not misleading (interestingly enough, this rule does not apply to candidates running for federal office, who can say whatever they want in their ads and broadcasters can’t do anything about it).
According to the Annenberg Public Policy Center, from the Iowa caucus through the Wisconsin primaries, over half of the 41.1 million dollars were spent on 19 ads containing deceptive or misleading claims. What could happen to broadcasters who aired those ads? They could be fined, or even get the death penalty (lose its broadcast license), but that is not likely to happen.
So can the media be trusted to substantiate claims made in Super PAC advertisements at the risk of losing revenue? I’m afraid we all know the answer to that question.