Hello there, I'm Chuck Todd and this is the Chuck Todd cast.

It is widely known in Washington that the Federal Elections Commission is stuck in neutral

and has been for years.

And that's probably a bit generous.

The FEC is supposed to be the government agency that's responsible for enforcing the

federal campaign finance laws and it's led by an equal number of Republicans and Democrats

and theory and should create a spirit of cooperation.

But in today's environment, a divide like that creates more deadlock than bipartisan

enforcement.

Now Democrats on the panel are using that deadlock as a strategy to get the courts involved

essentially turning dysfunction into a feature not a bug.

So joining me today to explain all this is Shane Goldbacher, he's a national political

reporter for the New York Times and he wrote about the Gamesmanship on this committee and

it's so bizarre that it felt worth trying to unpack a little bit.

So Shane, welcome to the Todd cast.

This is bold of you to unpack the complexity of the FEC.

I know it is, but this is the power of the podcast.

I'm convinced that the beauty of podcasts is you can take something like this and at least

attempt to a explain it and be make it a bit more understandable.

Right?

So I guess that should be the goal.

Look, let's just talk about campaign finance laws in general.

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