Federal Election Commission demands that Bernie Sanders explain mystery $10 million

For the third time in less than three months, the Federal Election Commission is demanding that the Bernie Sanders campaign explain an ongoing litany mystery donations which have been labeled as “excessive” and “impermissible” among other rules violations. The first time around there were hundreds of unexplained contributions. The second time around there were thousands of such violations. And now the FEC wants to know where Sanders got more than ten million dollars in mystery money from.

The Sanders campaign tried to report $3,279,505.25 in individual contributions for the reporting period. But the FEC has determined that the actual contributions were $13,745,417.64, meaning that more than ten million dollars in mystery money has been taken in by Bernie Sanders. Where did it come from? Was it legal? Is this just historically shoddy record keeping, or is it historically shady corruption? There’s no way to tell by looking at the paperwork, but it’s one or the other, and that’s why the Feds are demanding answers.

The ongoing FEC violations have received zero coverage by the biggest media outlets despite being historically egregious. The consistent violations by Sanders have raised the question of why the candidate who is talking the most about tighter campaign finance laws has been breaking the existing campaign finance rules more consistently and blatantly than anyone on record.

Bernie Sanders has been given until May 4th to respond and explain where the mystery millions in cash came from, and to prove that no laws were broken. At this point the precedent is unclear in terms of punishment or forfeiture of funds. The previous two FEC violations had response deadlines that have already passed, and we have no way of determining what the Sanders campaign’s response was to either of them – but it looks like they’ll now have to prepare to explain themselves for a third and most egregious time. More reporting from The People’s View. Read the official letter on the FEC website.

Spandan Chakrabarti April 5, 2016
This is becoming a monthly event.

For the third time this year, the Federal Election Commission has served notice to the campaign of Sen. Sanders for making a mess of their [campaign] financial house. In the last two notices, the FEC noted over-limit and potentially illegal foreign contributions to the campaign, both with warnings of an audit.

But those egregious violation seem like typographical errors compared to the newest FEC notice to the Sanders campaign. The regulators have spotted more than $10 million that snuck into Sanders' campaign coffers from with no apparent accounting as to what it came from. Ten. Million. Dollars.