This file contains archived live captions of the open meeting of the Federal Election Commission held on September 15, 2022. This file is not a transcript of the meeting, and it has not been reviewed for accuracy or approved by the Federal Election Commission. [captions begin about 5 minutes into the meeting] Either before or after he becomes a federal candidate. Because the value of the information would exceed a complete applicable contributions to test the waters for federal currency. The proposal is contrary to the use of funds on contribution. Drafted be concludes that the request neither the act nor commission regulations private type activity but it may not do so after he begins testing the waters to become a federal candidate. If the information is provided after Governor DeSantis begins testing the water or becomes a federal candidate. We received for comments on the draft. Thank you, and I will be happy to answer questions. >> I am happy to do for you. I was going to ask for counsel for the requesters use on the alternate address. If you have questions, I think this makes sense to go first. I appreciate that. Good morning. Welcome again. I've got some questions here. We will see how they got it. The first is, why does ready for Ron wish to transfer not only the names on the petition, but also contact information for those names? What is the indicated value of that contact information ? If you are only transferring names, how do you know that that person is that person and not just the name on the certificate? The ability to verify or engage with that perfect person would be gravel. Does ready for Ron No. And including any conditions for contact information for verification, but not for solicitation? No. In part because should the organization be successful and should Governor DeSantis run for position, at which point he doesn't want to communicate with them. That probably answers my next question. Has ready for Ron or any member of his staff communicated? This is getting -- to set the table, question here is the status of Ron DeSantis at the time. And I have felt it was a lack of clarity on the process. So, my first question is, has ready for Ron identified a person to whom he intends to carry out the transmission? Ready for Ron side? If you're going to transfer this, you have to do it well somehow. I don't know if there is a plan in place. I would imagine a conversation or meeting with some of the senior level people handing over a bio. Presumably a large stack of paper . The intention is to deliver electronically ? One or the other, but probably both. >> Once the list is headed over, is ready for round intending to copy or is there a plan for after? Ready for Ron will retain the list as well. They will need it for various voter activities as well as volunteer activism in the group. Ready for Ron into to use this as a I wouldn't defined as an asset. There has been a fair amount of paper in this. I may have missed it. It is this intention to use this for internal and other purposes by Ready For Ron. Is that the quest? I don't know. But I imagine that it is in there somewhere. That the organization is looking to get the audience. Upon delivery of the list. Partly because, it delivers a list prior to testing the waters or any point. That it requires more petition signers to deliver the information to further encourage activity. And then subsequent, I hope for declaration of candidacy . The organization certainly doesn't give the reason for the list being in support of him. >> So, you pushed back on my use of the phrase asset. That is there. The position from Ready For Ron is that it doesn't have value and within the technical term value under our statute. My question is, you would agree that mailing list have been considered valuable almost since initiation. Are you aware of precedent that I am not that a mailing list would not be a thing of value? I don't know what the I would describe this is a mailing list. It is a list of people who support the candidate. It's not just by mail. There are phone numbers, there are emails, there are mailing addresses. But the fact that any piece of information can be commercially up pended and used for other purposes, it's just a list of individuals who so come support this candidate. We think it's impossible to reliably credible credibility . You don't intend to apply, you don't intend to apply on any restrictions for its use as a fundraiser? No we are not telling a candidate on what they can and cannot do on terms of communication with the public. The organization intends to conduct independent expenditure for candidate. You don't want to do that. My sympathies very much for the complexity of this area of the law. But, I guess what I'm struggling with is, this is a list of electronic mailing information and phone numbers, and yet, Ready For Ron is seeking the position that it is not, it is just a mailing contactless. I am wondering what is the best argument for the admission? It seems contrary. If there was president , I would be interested in. >> In on some level, it is common sense. If I went up to Governor DeSantis and said no, my name is Dan Becker, my email such and such and I want to run for president, please do. Now he has my email. If a lot of people do that, that isn't a membership list, and isn't a contributor list. It is a list of people who are expressing support. Can use the information otherwise, absolutely. Realistically, every piece of data is in some commercial database anyway. You can take any piece of information or number of people and use the information to generate and asset value. But it doesn't mean that the information in and of itself is valuable to begin with in the context of a thing of value. For example, everyone who attends a political rally, let's say you have an open air rally. You don't know is there. But you are using geolocation data for everyone cell phone, and get a complete list of every single person who's at the rally. And then append that data with commercially available data. Is there presence at the rally itself a thing of value? Or is it the fact that you're using the existing of political association to apply data to it and the data you're applying to and how user data become something of value? Yes, it is convoluted. We are using terms here. This is a list of people saying, I want you to run for office. And you're the one collecting the data and handing it over. I think that's right. And largely my concern. Leaving the side you feel about your geolocation example. You are right that a single piece of data of that sort is not value under the law. But it is precisely the process you just described that transforms it into a mailing list. And so, I guess I would be curious to the idea that Ready For Ron according to the request is spending 5 million a month trying to get this list. Assumedly, it is doing that because it has some kind of value. Because it has value to the organization. After it has been delivered to Ron DeSantis. At what moment during this creed process of the list doesn't have value? It seems like you would agree that at least once Ready For Ron uses it for its own purposes, that it would have value. I would say that Ready For Ron use of the list today has value for it today. It's not simply, there's an email ibis address and that's all there is. The value is contextual information related to the individual. And the ongoing engagement. Every single email you open, and in many cases outlook and the images appear on your screen when you're scrolling through. You've opened it. Every time you click on an email or open it, what time of day you click on it. Do you donate will not donate. That information is measured against your preferences in a commercial database. There is an enormous amount of activity that occurs. It's that subsequent activity that is a thing of value that is a valuable but is not the thing being giving to Governor DeSantis. It is directly provided by those individuals. Phone number, email, address, what ever that piece of the petition signing process is, that is the part that needs to be de-delivered to the individual they want to grab. Whereas all the things that Ready For Ron is going to use the information for and apply to the data, that is a massive amount of activity and data. It's a very valuable asset. Let me unpack that. Step one, this is all speech association. The part no one reads anymore. Explained that everything they do is speech association and not complex. There's a sense in which the tire mission of this agency is accepted an exception to it. I take that point. But I think it might prove too much. Back to the list. Let's put aside the way in which it is put together. Just from the point of view of the recipient. What is the difference to, I'm not going to characterize. Whoever the recipient is, once they get this list, what is the difference in the underlying forget asset, the object. The platonic thing we are talking about. That is being received. You have a list with contact information. How is that different from the point of view of the recipient from any other list of contact information that we would consider a mailing list? Because the are individuals who are signing a petition calling for the object of their affection to run for president. They are communicating that directly to the individual and providing a point of contact, address, phone number, email. That act, thanks taste of the context of, this is just a mailing list. I can go by and mailing list all day long. I remember vaguely about 20 years ago, you could go to Staples and add CD-ROMs of 20 million business contacts right there at the check out. Those are mailing list. Those are assets and things of value. I don't think there's a fundamental difference between the aggregation of all of these different forms of petition signings. For example, a volunteer taking and printing them by themselves on a clipboard and going down to the supermarket and asking people to signing the petition and mailing it in. There is a fundamental difference other than Ready For Ron is slightly more organized and approaching on a bigger scale. At the end of the day, he gets the same action. There is nothing that allows the commission can say, volunteers can't solicit the people who sign a petition for an election of a candidate to office at the supermarket. There is no real difference other than the fact that we are spending slightly more money than that piece of paper and the clipboard instead. I have one follow-up. I will for the other two Michael he. That's fair. But would you characterize Ready For Ron as the equivalent of volunteers? Given the large number of volunteers of all the organization, yes. When I do the soft activity is a college student, ironically , I was a volunteer. And there was a P person who was organizing this. But I was there and the presence of paid individuals doesn't mitigate the fact that it is still voluntary. People engage in personal political speeches and association and at a very expressive conduct. I appreciate that. Thank you. Mr. Bakker, you have made a lot of conversation about the list. The credibility of those. That's why we have the email addresses. Why wouldn't Ready For Ron and his volunteers check to make sure that the names on the list are credible and this turn the list over to you? We have a lot of volunteers. But we don't have that many volunteers. I would imagine that is a substantive question. And frankly, to ask the volunteers to do that, is not okay. But you don't intend to check the credibility dash back When we say credibility, the concern that I have it, is I can write a list of all the names that had over to you. That is not okay. Having that point of contact as part of the petition process is in some level, it is entering to us that this is somebody we want to communicate with. We are getting bounced email addresses, or phone numbers that don't respond. That is information we can use to strike names on the list if they are thinking. Of course, I have never done any form of political were somebody did right clever and profane on the list. But I don't think our ability to do that is the same as their ability to say hey, these people want you to run. Well okay, are you real people? I don't think we'll be in the business of telling them we personally added them. We can guarantee that every single one of the people are a real person. We call them up after. We are extending expending effort. You are expending effort to collect the names in their emails and their telephones and addresses so that people can continue to use that list afterwards. We are extending them to use to use that for the object of their affection. The goal here is to allow individuals who want to draft a candidate to communicate that desire to Ron DeSantis. I understand the goal, but you made the mention of the request. Will you continue to provide this list? Going through the election cycle, this will be an ongoing list that will be turned over to DeSantis ? We think that is permissible and appropriate. You are asking the question to make sure we are not ruining an election law. We felt confident it is permissible. Mr. DeSantis, if he should, get into the water at that time would he stop? I believe is that we are still able to can continue to believe provide the names of individuals. We are also forwarding along other information with it. Will you use your contribution account to do this? Probably one or both. We would have to if we were spending money. I can tell you the exact ratio spending. For one account or the other. I don't believe it's necessarily a dispositive consideration. All of these petition petitions signatures our efforts that we put out there >> Can we foster Mr. Bakker, I think a response to the question that we had presented to you, you said there was about a little under 50,000 signatures of our collective. On the petition. Does it change your evaluation of whether or not the names have a value if you attach the geographic data to those particular names in such a way that they become useful to somebody who is running for president? For example, if all 50,000 of those are in Iraq, where the caucuses will be held, and roughly 150,000 people vote in the Iowa caucus, just 50,000 names in I will have a different value to a presidential value candidate than 50,000 names spread out across the United States? Two-part answer. The first is, if we append information to a set of data. We go to a commercial vendor and pay whatever five or eight set a record to add that information, then yes, that makes it an asset and a thing of value. The fact that there are people in one particular state or more people in one state or another, I don't think changes the underlying nature however. Certainly as volunteers began to doing event, you have more volunteers in Iowa and New Hampshire , where people are more politically engaged, I don't think that really changes. Even if it was an effort to acquire more information in Iowa and New Hampshire, I would don't necessarily think that is a change for the underlying fact that this is an expressive act and conduct from individuals who want to tell a candidate they they want to run for president. We are simply conveying the information to the present. Thank you. Is even harder to moderate. Colleagues? Let me ask you a couple of follow-ups. Let me start with your response to Commissioner Traynor. We all agreed, that if you have something I'd have to go on the open market to supplement it, then the value, the price you pay to supplement is relevant to both with there is a thing of value and to the evaluation there appear but I guess my concern is, there is some port point in the supply chains were the original product has to be produced. To analogize, I'm making this up on the fly, the fact that you bring in iron ore and then you pay for the call and electricity, and pay for the labor of the smelting process, pay for the rent of the land. To make still, doesn't just affect the somewhere back in the process somebody had to mind or other than you did acquire the or on the market, you produce it. Through a production process. And so, I guess to me, again, by analogy, is it the other night underlying list of names and addresses, I agree you are producing years off. Your spending money for to do it. That is the iron ore. The fact that you are not purchasing it directly, you're just taking it from the bowels of the earth yourself, you are missing your labor with it. Doesn't change the fact, back to principles. The iron ore still has a valuable value what you started. I would use a different analogy. There is a thriving business you go to a commercial Honeybee, you break pay money, he breezes B's and pollen is your crop. And there still are plenty of people all around the country the world who don't do that. They pollinate the cross. And so in essence, these things exist in nature and a valuable processes occur whether or not you have anything to do with it. And then you go in you because flowers and if you have a pay for any of it. The iron ore now, it's analogy when you use, but so does the Honeybee analogy. And at the end of the day, within the confines of federal election law, this is political speech and a political association, and an expressive act. And the fact that we have involved or evolved a structure by which we are going to facility individuals communicating through the object of their affection the desire that he run, put the outside of the scope of the definition of a contribution or the thing of value under the act. And thinking about the common thread here, this goes on all day long. When rad required maximum metadata. They provide information on the scope of what is necessary for a simple FEC complaints. They get email addresses, they get phone numbers. Neither which of is required for reporting. Again, information on an individual who doesn't aggravate in excess of $200. They still get that information. None of that is a thing of value. Is just part of the expressive act. It is contingent or associated with the expressive conduct of making a contribution. And here, we are talking about not a contribution, but these are people who are saying I want you to run for president. And they have earned the right to say. The fact that there is a method is him to do so, efficiently, that has the money invested in the infrastructure, does that make it any less expressive conduct. Again, I don't disagree. That this is expressive conduct. Everything we do is. Especially outside. That's a problem with the argument. I agree with you. Very strongly that everything that we do here under the act is expressive and associational conduct. But I am bound by court order to say I had to draw these diseases. Going back to your Honeybee analogy, that's a good one. I really like that example because I think it's right. If you go up to Governor DeSantis and you say, I am backer, here's my email address. You are the solitary Honeybee. You are the wild Honeybee out there in the Commons pollinating flowers. Cool, good to go. But there is a market if you don't have enough wild Honeybee showing up to pollinate your crops. And that market is, you bring in more honeybees that are commercially owned and you spend money and order to make sure that there are enough. That seems like what is happening here. This is in solitary honeybees coming in to talk. This is someone spending $10,000 a month to bring in commercial honeybees to pollinate the crops. We're going sort of this one. As a former, I think we are the colony. And the farmer is the ultimate recipient who is the beneficiary of the pollinated crop. But we are we believe you should run for president. Your connecting with other people who believe the same. We are working to communicate that belief to him that he should run for president. It's interesting, you are bound by the statute. And the code, and court order. Here's the thing. There is nothing in the statute at all the talks about draft committee. There is only one match in the entire -- my version is four years of date. The only mention in the CFR about draft committee is this to pacifically exclude them from regulation when they use the name of the object of the drive. I'm not aware of any merger or court orders that specifically address this idea that you have to -- if you're trying to draw somebody, you can't be regulated. You can't do this. Principally the main reason we are registered as a political committee is part of the message of why we want Ron DeSantis to run for president, is that Joe Biden is awful. As part of the message that we needed to beat them, so let's get him elected. And when we spend money on it, that requires, I am not arguing we are subject to registration and independent expenditure recording requirements. That's part of the conduct. The fact that we had to register, that is one piece of the activity. It doesn't open up all the rest of this activity that where otherwise the nonregulated is not even brought here to the regulation. It is essentially saying, you can do this by yourself. You could do it collectively, but you can't do too much collectively, because when you do we have not. And I don't think there is any applicable law that goes toward that point. And I think that is the hard question here. I agree with you. I assume for purposes of the question I'm about to ask, that this is the thing about the act. I understand it's not your position. Assume for argument. I want to rephrase the question that I started to ask you which is, the problem here , the really hard problem here, the one that I am struggling with, is that we don't know Governor DeSantis status. I can only go by reports today. Being asked, and not saying he is a candidate or testing the waters. And that he has repeatedly said this. I'm not aware of any other human being who has heard them say yes, I'm running. Fair enough. That's not my question. Commissioner Reese hard asked you what happens when we start verifying these people? That is work that has to be done. My first question is, who did you mean by them? And relatedly, and I think this is fair to her question, I am curious for myself, is verifying the names and contact information of a list of people who support the run for president itself testing the waters? That would be the first part is easy, that means he is an individual and is created an organization for this purpose. Presumably he would do that for others people I don't know whether is? I don't know this is early testing the waters for information. You would love to run for president, it doesn't make you a candidate or testing the waters. There are a wide range of thinking about it, talking to people, that occurs before one is a candidate. And I remember mentioning this. A couple of years ago the commission at the old office had a rulemaking, and I remember being on the panel, we were talking about something unrelated. Was came up. During the 2015, and there was a lot of Internet rulemaking. And the question came up. Whatever petals's from the legal center said something Jeb Bush is a candidate. And that my point, I said , no he's not. He might be testing the water, but he's not a candidate. Whether they are testing the water, there are regulations about what you can do at that time. To a lesser extent as a candidate. But just because you're talking about people running for Ovid office, does not mean you're testing the water. 1 million people could sign the petition and we could hand it over today. Any good look at that, and it doesn't mean he's testing the water. He is just receiving information. The commission grappled with this a little bit in the matter. Information was provided to represent the Trump campaign in Trump Tower, and the pressure was whether this information constitutes value information? And my answer is, no, it's not. The fact that they were getting this information didn't suddenly make it campaign activity. At the end of the day, the fact that people talk about it, they were talking about him all day long. Is he running or is he not? It's a favorite sport in Washington and the media. None of it means he's testing the water. Testing the water means that he must at some level, affirmatively due. >> With the premise that are testing the waters regulation is are not a model of clarity, I will grant you that. But it doesn't change the fact that as you say, and I agree with you, Governor DeSantis's status as a candidate or status as someone testing the waters to become a candidate, is eight Governor DeSantis thing. It is not from the outside, necessarily, making that determination. It is a determination by he and his team, assumedly made at some point time. There are all sorts of difficult questions under our current regular regulation. That is a problem we have inherited. But for me and you and yours. But, the problem I have is that I am being to asked to make assumptions about his status. For purposes of this AO . And I don't have any representative of dissent is here or his view on how this transfer would work. I don't have any sort of declaration or any evidence of any kind as to his status. I agree with you that I haven't seen any press reports that he is running for president. But, I don't read every possible press report. I have a job. There is a large universe of press reports. There is an unknown unknowns problem. I'm a little uncomfortable that we are being very speculative about the status of the recipient here. So with that were in front of you, I'm curious to your response? I don't think that my rights and freedoms are that of anybody else. If he is a candidate, that is a known thing. You followed FEC form one and two, you announce. That is a noble. I grant you that there is a gray area around testing the waters. But it seems to me that the bulk of the regulations around testing the water was designed to keep the people from being candidates without being candid. It is limiting the activities he can do. You cannot do general public advertising. And you can only accept money for the act of engaging in this activity. Testing the waters is not a uniquely special status that was created other than a mechanism. By a candidate of potential contributions. I think that is probably right. That's why started this conversation by asking whether a particular activity would be testing the waters activity. It was a sincere question. Because I don't know the answer. Either under regulation or in terms of press release. I don't think it matters whether he's testing waters or not. I can still walk to them and say, my name is Dan backer, my emails as such, I would like you to run for president. Whether or not he is testing the waters, my right is still there. I can volunteer and put print of a petition and go to the Starbucks and get people to sign it and mail it to him. All of that is well within my rights. I'm spending money to do the do it. The gas money alone is at least $20 states. There is effort and expenditure being made. The fact that people work to other to do this and pool their resources to effectively engage in this conduct, does not mean -- should not make it impermissible nor are their rights to do so by whether or not he has achieved the status. We still have the right to engage in this activity. Again, I think we share some basic premises here. One of which is you are actually right. People getting together and pulling money and resources of volunteer time local politics are engages engage in protected rights. I am -- that doesn't answer why is this particular activity outside of the act? Let me has one final question. Can I cut that. The act does not talk about this at all. That is going to be my question. Which is, I appreciated you explaining why Ready For Ron is a political committee. Particular hybrid committee. But, the fact is, that was helpful. It clarified why Ready For Ron is structured the way it is. And I think it carries back to the fact that I did not come into this hearing understanding the postdelivery uses of the list to Ready For Ron. That may be a failure to research. My question is this, your client is a political committee. They may use funds for any lawful purpose. The best understanding of your legal hearing I think, is again assuming the thing about you, which I understand is not your position, but assuming that, and assuming you are right, and I think you are, that not everyone who receives something is testing the water for a candidate. That just means that the theory of the request is a political committee can make a gift of arguably a substantially valuable thing to just a private citizen. Just some guy. And I don't know what the legal basis is for that as a thing that a political community can do. I guess my question is to you, do you have authority for the concept that a political committee can make a gift to a private individual unrelated to any sort of candidacy or testing the waters? What is the theory? Two edges. First, to the extent that this private individual is not related to the organization and doesn't get a personal endorsement there. It is not unlawful. And so, the statue allows the organization and the rights to engage in and lawful pass lawful activity. It does make sense to just give a gift to somebody. In that context it would be odd to occur. Also, that's not what is happening here. As a part of the broader speech is telling an individual that they want him to run for office. And I think we are trying to put something into the statue and into the code and into the construct, when it is not. It's not in the code. The only reference is to excluded from covering the code. I imagine the commission has had opportunities to think about this in the past. It was drafted in 2016. There was the draft of Joe Clark. There have been other draft moments in the past. I'm saying that, there have clearly been efforts to end engage in draft activity. Despite that, there is nothing. There is no law for the ability to regulate what is a different kind of expressive conduct then what is the normal function of the political activity. Which is raising money for candidates. Expressing political messages. We are a political committee because we don't have a choice. You shouldn't include our ability to engage in this other thing. Would we even had to register? That is an interesting question. If we didn't have individual expenditures, would we have to register as a committee? There is an enormous value to the public to see all this. To have the transparency here. To be able to see exactly how the monies being spent. I for one, think, having seen the draft moments, I think it's a great thing to draft organizations where they had to turn this information over. It's better for the public and in general. People can say yes, plus draft Bobbitt, and they don't give Bob the name of people trying to draft them. My complement of the phrase. I'm not sure the answer my question. Let me take another list context. Pretend it's not something valuable to be kept at all. Imagine instead of a list of name and contact information, Ready For Ron spends 10 to $15,000 a month hiring a woodcarver to make a filigree plaque of the text of the First Amendment for presentation. I will get them from you later. And then just, they spent $50,000 on this. An original piece of wood work. And just give it to DeSantis. Totally useless for a presidential campaign. But we want you to run. And we think you are great supporter. Here's a object. Here is an expression of our affection. Can a political committee do that? Give a $50,000 wood carving to someone? He is not a federal candidate or office holder. There is not a prohibition in the statute against doing so. On one hand, it would be weird, on the other I would know a person who does the sinks for political people. It doesn't strike me as a normal thing to do. But yes, I think I can think off the top of my head that there is a requirement that a political committee cannot communicate that thought to someone. Having said that, there may be a state office or law that may apply as well that are independent of the federal law. But I don't think federal law prohibits that. Fair. And I guess my last question. Would state ethics bribery laws be read into for any lawful purpose restriction? That's interesting question. But I don't know that they necessarily wood. There probably some authority on this and I don't know it off the top of my head. There are states that prohibit the transfer of funds between committees. Some that don't. That has been an issue that has been passed over by the commission. They have a rule about one where the other. I don't know that that is going into the applicable any lawful purpose. On the other hand, if there's a law that prohibits that is scalable, there may be a strong presumption that it would be impermissible for the violator state law. I would have to think about it more. I'm not aware of any prosecutions to that effect. The Mac have you looked in the state law? We are comfortable that the course of conduct will not violate state law. Thank you very much. Colleagues? Going back to the wood carving. It was given for the purpose of influencing governor DeSantis to run. Isn't that the category? How did they get the word? They just gave it? Or did they say the they were giving this for the incentive for him to run for office? What is the purpose of the list, giving it over, if it is not to influence for his consideration to run for office? The purpose of giving over the petition is to precisely influence him to run for office. If he accepts that he is considering and evaluating. He is considering whether he's testing the waters. If he accepts it, he accepts it. Plenty of people except used as a courtesy and not to be rude. I don't think that means he's testing the water. Plenty of people are thinking about running for office all day long and they are not testing the waters. The mere acceptance by him of a list of people who wanted to run for federal office doesn't mean he's testing the waters. And even if he is, there is not a basis to prohibit individuals from communicating their desire they run for office. That's the point. If that is lawful activity, doesn't someone become unlawful because he's testing the water. There's not a substantial difference between a bunch of volunteers going to the supermarket and asking people to sign the petition and mailed to him. And an organization that is doing that and a slightly more proficient manner. Okay. It's also the in purpose of influencing him to run for office. If he society and in the process is deciding whether he is going to run or not, that is kind of testing the waters. I guess the corollary would be of Joe Biden testing waters. Were not talking about that. Here someone who runs and talked about running in 2024. Mr. Becker. What I asked you was in the field of what we are looking for in the fact that we have the answer that question based on the facts were talking about? I don't believe that there is anything that the fact that someone is thinking about running for audience office doesn't mean they are testing the waters. It involves more action. It involves raising money, engaging in activity that requires money in order to do. This is someone and receiving an expression of people's expressive conduct, saying hey, we want you to run for office. It doesn't make him a candidate or testing the waters. Minus question is, do we not have a concern about the two types. If it does, if he accepts this and goes into the category where he's decided he's going to run, do we have a problem now? No, I don't believe we do. Because how we pay for the communications of encouraging get people to sign for the position is separate from the act of them signing for the position. We are of the position that it is not a contribution. Thank you. Mr. washer? I did not think we were going to spend that much time on this on whether it was a thing of value. Do you acknowledge Mr. Becker, that we have a chairman that has rules about mailing lists and that under our regulations they are a thing of value. Yes. I am aware those rules exist. And it's your position -- what if you had street addresses. You mentioned emails and phone numbers. If you had street addresses would you say that is a mailing list? Not in the context in which the FEC uses that term. It's the value that it is a data. What we have here is the fact that it has addresses doesn't mean it's a I think it takes it out of the scope of regulations. You think a list of names and addresses is not a mailing list? In this context is it is an asset is by committee. We can nor the fact that this was existed for individuals because they signed the petition. They want him to run for office as it the right. Is there any precedent that when we are looking at a mailing list, we are looking at the reasons why people's name showed up on list? In terms of deciding whether it's a mailing list? I'm not aware the precedents. But it's not just a mailing list. It is not a mailing list. It doesn't exist for the purpose of being mailed to. It exist for the purpose of telling someone to run for office. There is no possible way to ever engage in draft conduct. You can't draft somebody if we can't draft the fact that they wanted to run for office. And you can do that because there is a mailing information on there. It is over broadly sweeping vast areas of activity other than the activity that would it was intended to cover which is on raising mailings. That is an interesting theory that there is no precedent for the interpretation. There is no precedence that a drafting committee is a mailing. >> This is a thing of value. A mailing list is a thing of value. I am interested in another issue which is the difference between the two drafts. And that goes to what can be provided to someone before they declare their candidacy. If you don't know whether they are testing the waters or not. Would someone give $1 million to a prospective candidate and that candidate then turns around the next day and says, well, you know, I wasn't going to run until I got that main dollars. Now that I have this million dollars, I'm going to at least test the waters to see, would that be legal? I'm not getting that. That's outside the scope of what we are discussing here. I'm not aware of that occurring. I think it actually is within the scope of what were talking about here. Within the scope of the grant. Because if one could provide a thing of value to a candidate who has not yet declared candidacy, I don't see what the legal distinction would be between one thing of value and another. Having said that, dash back I can address a point. The difference is that cash is cash and the Supreme Court says that giving money for political purposes is regulated whereas signing a petition and asking someone to run for federal office is conduct. There is such a thing. Having said that, I'm going to be supporting I have no the questions. Colleagues? Motions? By the vice chair I saw your hand? Sure. Happy to make a motion. In advisory of AO 2022-12 I move approval . Thank you. Discussion of motion? Let me preview where I'm going. I will not support the motion. I have sympathy, but I agree with Mr. Bakker the draft in my view, shortens the analysis on whether dash back it's not clear to me as a matter of law that giving a list to a candidate transformed that candidate into someone testing the waters. Discussion? All in favor? Motion fails with three in favor. Three opposed. For the motions? Mr. Cooksey. With respect to opinion AO 2022-12. Ready For Ron. I move to approval of the document which is draft be. Thank you, Commissioner. Motion on the draft? Let me Sam going to oppose this motion as well. The act talks about advisory opinions for a specific transition to activities. Discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Failed to in favor. Four opposed. Any further motions? Mr. Weintraub? Thank you. Not sure this requires a motion but, since there is some overlap between the two drafts, I was a plan on doing this. Fine. I move that the commission direct the staff to repair prepare a response that answers the parts of the question whether to dress overlap. Thank you. Discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Most impassioned for in favor. Two opposed. For the motions? Is not a motion it's a comment. The area of agreement is that the list or whatever you want to call it, could not be provided once Governor DeSantis if and when he is testing the waters, which is an open question at this point. If he is testing the waters, then you can't provide information to him [ Indiscernible ] To clarify, we will still have to go on the drive. We will handle that at a later time. Procedural question. When then there is a subsequent draft is that made public prior to its boat? Or is it done on a timely vote? Historically we have seen tally votes. But there are differences between the two drafts on this questions. I think we may want to comment on depending on the final version. My understanding, [ Indiscernible ] That's a crack. And if we need another public meeting we would need an extension from the requester. Which the requester will bring. Thank you. Any further discussion? Thanks to counsel for substantive discussion. Thank you very much. Let us turn to draft advisory Thank you. 22 dash 44 dash A1 are two versions of the draft advisory opinion by Warren Democrats. For Elizabeth Warren. The committee asked whether he may use campaign funds to pay for cyber security measures to protect the home of the senator which connects to heard electronic devices and other members of the household . In both versions the draft concludes that the committee may use campaign funds for this purpose because this was constitute an ordinary and necessary expenses in connection with the duties as a federal office holder. Revised draft a does not differ senses securely. It contains technical changes. We received no comments on the request or on either of the drives and I would happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Let me also welcome Sarah N. Mahmood, Esq. who is here to answer any questions. Questions? Motions? On the advisory opinion, on Warren Democrats, I move approval of the document which is resigned revised draft a. Too chair? Motion? All in favor? Motion carried unanimously. Thank you very much, counsel. About Thank you. With that, but that study in contrast, let me turn to the staff director. Are there any management or administrative attentions of this morning? Not that I'm aware of. Thank you very much, sir. Colleagues, we are adjourned. Standby. Counseling