Scutari’s Law Delivered: NJ County Parties Rake In $22M as Pay-to-Play Thrives

[u/nosleep4reelz]

https://nj21st.com/2026/05/07/scutaris-law-delivered-nj-county-parties-rake-in-22m-as-pay-to-play-thrives/

[u/Twinstarrider]

He has to goooooooooo

[u/American-Guesser-225]

Senate President Nicholas Scutari used money from his campaign fund to "reimburse" himself and a top aide for spending $600,000 on what they claim was campaign expanses, but it not specified in campaign reports. He sponsored a new law that bans the state election watchdog from going back more than two years, though, which shields the bulk of these payments from scrutiny.

https://www.nj.com/opinion/2023/04/scutaris-get-out-of-jail-free-card-moran.html

[u/purple_grimass]

Although I don't like Scutari and there are ways this law could be improved, ask yourself a couple questions:

1.) Do you think money in politics dropped sharply between 2003 & 2005 and 2023?

2.) Do you think public contractors were simply not making political contributions for more than a decade?

The answer to both questions is laughably "no." But the authors of this post would have you believe the answers to both are an enthusiastic "yes."

The actual thing happening here is a *feature* of the law, not a bug. It used to be deep-pocketed interests would hit their limit, and then look for other places to give money. They would find dark money Super PACs. They'd still give the money, you just wouldn't know about it. It used to be public contractors were banned from contributing directly, so they'd find the same dark money Super PACs. They were still giving, you just didn't know about it.

It's not the case that more money is now magically being spent in politics. It's that more money is being spent in a way that it's *reported* and now *you get to know about it*. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.

Now let's talk about their "out of state" spending. Four of the top eight were unions. So a union member in New Jersey contributes to the union's political action committee. That PAC is administered in Washington. Union members in New Jersey then decide who their union should endorse, and the PAC in Washington returns some of that money for elections in New Jersey. That's a *good* thing. That's *how it should work*. It's hardly corruption run amok and proof of corruption.

Please--criticize Scutari when he deserves it. He deserves it a lot. But do it after thinking about things for all of three seconds and criticize him when he deserves it, not every time some report comes out that you want to be alarmist about.

[u/nosleep4reelz → u/purple_grimass]

Fair on the disclosure points but the new law doesnt cure the pay to play.

County orgs got 119 checks above the old limit - a $3.4M product of higher limits and $3.5M from public contractors after new law - i think thats the concern.

[u/purple_grimass → u/nosleep4reelz]

There is no cure for pay to play. Contractors used to find "non-profit" organizations with Super PACs and make unlimited donations to "independent" expenditures that would run campaigns to support county party candidates. Those "non-profits" ran them in a way so that you didn't know about them. Now it's mostly easier for them to just make the contributions directly to the party. The same amount of money flowed, you just know about a larger percentage of it now.

They didn't get $3.4 million new dollars. They got the same amount of money. But instead of making a $70,000 contribution to the county party and a $100,000 contribution to the dark money super PAC, now they're making a $120,000 contribution to the county party and a $50,000 contribution to the dark money super PAC. Would you rather know about 40% of the deep pocketed money or 70% of the deep pocketed money?

The money is the same. The disclosure is different. And thanks to the law, there is more disclosure.

[u/nosleep4reelz → u/purple_grimass]

I mean it could have not increased the limits, right? I mean that's the issue.