There’s a Good Reason Campaign Donations Are Public

Joaquin Castro’s tweet listing the names of maxed out Trump donors in the San Antonio area has come in for intense criticism, with multiple Republican congressmen sticking to the talking points that by publicizing these names, Castro was “targeting” private citizens. What is fascinating to me is the intuition that there is something inherently wrong with tweeting out information that is already mandated by law to be in the public domain. This feeling transcends partisan politics: Remember when Democrats were upset when Trump tweeted that special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigative team contained “13 hardened Democrats” based on publicly available voter registration information?

Is there, in fact, something wrong or worrisome about a public official actively publicizing this kind of information? Federal election law already requires public disclosure of all donations to candidates for federal office. It doesn’t matter whether you’re donating $200 or the current legal maximum of $2,800. If it’s over $200, you have to provide your name and address. And that information is publicly available—including to anyone who takes the trouble to Google it.