Campaign finance and election law experts have been weighing in on Musk’s new plan to hold a daily lottery in which he awards a $1 million to a random registered swing state voter who signs a petition from his pro-Trump super PAC (which is handling much of the Trump team’s GOTV efforts).
NBC News spoke to law professor Rick Hasen, who thinks the scheme is clearly illegal:
Hasen told NBC News on Sunday that Musk’s PAC is only offering the payments to registered voters, not the general public at large, which is what could make the scheme illegal.
“Essentially what you’re doing is you are creating a lottery. You’re creating a lottery where the only people eligible to participate in the lottery are people who register to vote, or are registered to vote, and that’s illegal,” Hasen said.
He noted that the general intent behind election laws prohibiting bribery is to prevent people from buying votes, but “you don’t have to say you have to vote for a particular candidate in order to be breaking this law. … It can be to either incentivize people to register or vote, or it can be to reward them,” Hasen told NBC News on Sunday.
Another expert who spoke with CNN agreed:
“This isn’t a particularly close case — this is exactly what the statute was designed to criminalize,” said David Becker, a former Justice Department official handling voting rights cases and founder of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research.
Becker said the fact that the prize is available only to registered voters “in one of seven swing states that could affect the outcome of the presidential election” is strong evidence of Musk’s intent to influence the race, which could be legally problematic. “This offer was made in the last days before some registration deadlines,” Becker said, bolstering the appearance that the cash prizes are designed to drive up registration.
The New York Times notes that Musk may have some legal wiggle room:
Federal law says it is a crime for someone who “pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting.” Guidance from the Justice Department says that includes “anything having monetary value, including cash, liquor, lottery chances, and welfare benefits such as food stamps.”
But some benefits to help people vote are legal and common: Groups can offer voters rides to the polls, for instance, and companies often offer paid leave to allow Americans the time to vote, according to the guidance. And, crucially, Mr. Musk’s allies have argued that because Mr. Musk is not directly paying for voter registration — but rather for a petition signature that happens to be open only to registered voters — it is not illegal.
Former FEC chairman Brad Smith agreed with that. “He’s paying them to sign a petition — and he wants only people who are registered to vote to sign the petition. So I think he comes out OK here,” he told the Times.
Musk himself stressed the lack of strings on Sunday without mentioning the registration requirement:
