A West Texas pastor who used his parish’s resources to campaign for office and several pastors from other churches who donated to him were fined after the state’s ethics commission determined that each violated election law.
The fines, some of which were issued last month, are the latest sanction from the commission following reporting from ProPublica and The Texas Tribune, which revealed that three churches donated to the campaign of Scott Beard, founding pastor at Fountaingate Fellowship church, despite state and federal prohibitions on such activity.
Beard, who was fined $3,500, showed a “lack of good faith” in accepting the donations and in posting campaign signs on church property for his unsuccessful Abilene City Council race despite the commission’s warnings against doing so, it found.
“Because the respondent committed extensive corporate contribution violations in defiance of the applicable law, a substantial penalty is required,” the commission wrote about Beard. He did not respond to a request for comment.
That’s why you can’t do a flat fee; a minimum with exponential scaling. By the time you get to anyone in the top, say, 10% of income it should to become life crippling. For the top 1% it should be life destroying. For the top 1% of 1%, they should be fined so hard they can’t even afford a box to shelter in.
If we didn’t make them suffer in the only way they seem to understand - the wallet - then they’ll never, ever stop.
The ultra rich will show up with close to zero income, because they don’t actually deal in cash. This isn’t the master plan you think it is.
Issuing a fine that is some multiple of the damages ensures that it doesn’t become a “cost of doing business”.
Issuing a fine based on the income of the person receiving it makes sense for a handful of civil violations, if you can keep it from being exploited, but it is very exploitable especially if you have a lot of non-cash capital that you can leverage without ever generating any legally recognized income.