JAKARTA - President-elect of the United States (US) Joe Biden received an anonymous donation worth 145 million US dollars or around Rp2.03 trillion in the election battle in November 2020. The value of the anonymous donation broke the record in the history of the struggle for the presidency in Uncle Sam's country.
However, with this anonymous donation, the US public could not know who was the backer of Biden in winning the race for the number 1 person in the country.
Quoting Bloomberg, Sunday, January 24, the anonymous donation increased the total fundraising for Biden to reach US $ 1.5 billion or around Rp. 21 trillion. This fantastic value is also a record of donations for the challenger for the incumbent presidential candidate.
The amount of Biden's anonymous donation is greater than the funds spent by Donald Trump, which amounted to 28.4 million US dollars. In fact, the fund goes beyond an anonymous donation in support of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in 2012, which amounted to US $ 113 million.
Yet for years, the Democrat Party has strongly criticized illegal fundraising. The reason is that it is considered unique corruption in that it allows supporters to secretly support candidates without supervision.
For example, the Priorities USA Action Fund, the super political action committee Biden appointed as the campaign fund management vehicle, used a US $ 26 million fund originally donated to a nonprofit to support Biden. The donor could not be disclosed.
USA Priorities Chair Guy Cecil does not feel guilty about the practice. "We will not unilaterally disarm Trump and the right wing forces that support him," he said.
Campaign finance laws are supposed to limit the huge influence money has on politicians. However, the system has a gaping gap, which is exploited by Biden's support groups and other candidates.
"He benefited from it," said Larry Noble, former general adviser to the Federal Election Commission.
The Biden campaign calls for banning some types of nonprofit organizations from spending money to influence elections and obliges any organization that spends more than $ 10,000 to influence elections to register with the FEC and disclose its donors.
Biden raised more than US $ 1 billion in campaign funds. Campaign funds can receive donations of up to USD 2,800 per election from individuals. That includes $ 318.6 million from donors who gave less than $ 200 each.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
