Money pouring into Montana Supreme Court race

HELENA — Outside money has been pouring in to influence Montana’s Supreme Court race between Justice Mike Wheat and challenger Lawrence VanDyke — and political observers say Montanans might as well get used to it.

“You’re going to see [national money] keep trickling down to local races,” says Montana State University political scientist David Parker, because they can have a big impact in what he calls “low-information environments” — where voters aren’t that familiar with the candidates.

So far, at least $730,000 has been spent by four groups trying to influence the race, with the majority of it favoring VanDyke, saying he’s the “conservative” choice and labeling Wheat a “liberal” judge.

The Republican State Leadership Committee, a 12-year-old group based in Washington, D.C., has chosen Montana as one of two states so far where it plans to spend thousands of dollars to elect “conservative” judges.

It reported last week having $400,000 to spend on VanDyke’s behalf and has paid for TV ads and mailers praising VanDyke and bashing Wheat as “dangerously liberal.”

“There has been overwhelming amounts of money flowing into state elections by leftist groups, who are trying to buy the elections,” says Jill Bader, spokeswoman for the group. “We are trying to offer a balance and give voters as much information as possible about the candidates.”

Another conservative group with national ties — Americans for Prosperity-Montana — weighed into the race last week, airing TV ads accusing Wheat of being an “extreme partisan.”

Wheat, a former Democratic state senator and Supreme Court justice since 2010, fired back with his own TV ad last week, talking to the camera as he pulls some of the groups’ mailers from a mailbox.

“Please vote to retain me, and tell these corporations that neither your vote, nor my seat, are for sale,” he says.

Wheat, in an interview last week, said some of the ads are a direct result of Citizens United, the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision that allows corporations to spend directly on independent ads to influence elections. The decision led to the striking down of a Montana law that banned such corporate expenditures here.

“I don’t believe corporations are people,” Wheat says. “I disagree with Citizens United that says corporations have a constitutional right to free speech and that they can spend any kind of money they want in this race. ...

“It can overpower anything that I can put out there. And for what purpose? They want to own the court. They’re coming in here and they want to try to buy a seat on the court.”

But Wheat has one group on his side: Montanans for Liberty and Justice, a group funded almost entirely by trial attorneys in the state.

This group reported raising $302,000 as of last week and has spent $266,000 on mailers and TV ads attacking VanDyke as being “in the pocket” of out-of-state corporate interests, citing his support from the conservative groups and his contributions from out-of-state attorneys who work for law firms that do corporate defense work.

VanDyke, in an email, said trial lawyers are supporting Wheat because he sides with them on many cases and has argued on behalf of higher fees for trial lawyers in certain cases.

“I am not surprised that they are spending huge sums of outside money to support their guy,” VanDyke wrote.

VanDyke declined to say whether he thinks Citizens United was a proper decision, saying it’s not relevant.

“Whether you like it or not, U.S. Supreme Court constitutional precedent is law-binding on the Montana Supreme Court,” he wrote. “Unlike Mike Wheat, I am not going to thumb my nose at directly, on-point U.S. Supreme Court precedent just because I don’t like it.”

A majority of the Montana Supreme Court, including Wheat, upheld Montana’s ban on corporate spending in the wake of Citizens United, but the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that ruling and threw out the ban.

The ban probably would have prevented the Republican State Leadership Committee from spending its money in Montana, because the group accepts corporate contributions. Its donors include health insurance, tobacco, oil, banking and drug companies, and many of the country’s largest corporations.

Parker says it’s not unusual for outside groups, be they business-funded or otherwise, to spend money to influence elections. However, he says it bothers him that some of the groups can conceal their donors, and that national groups are spending big money on a Montana court race.

“What’s to stop [these groups] from pushing the envelope and doing something that’s risky?” he says. “You might be willing to say certain things, because it’s not your home.”

Wheat says the groups are distorting his record, and that he considers the seven-member Montana Supreme Court to be “pretty fair and balanced right now,” reflecting the balance of society in Montana.

“These people who are trying to unseat me, they want to shift it in a different direction,” he says.

Distributed by MCT Information Services