The campaign would have been obligated to report all donations, and to identify the donor if the contribution was over a threshold amount. The campaign would also have had to disclose all loans. Staff dutifully enters everything into a database and populates all the fields.
So far, so good. If a campaign gets a S1,000 check from you, it will record and report to the FEC a $1,000 contribution or loan from Greetings_Puny_Humans. You will not receive a phone call back asking where you got the money. It may have come out of your checking or savings account. You may have written it on a line of credit. (Gasp: the way the Cruz thing is being reported, if your line of credit is with BigEvilBank, the reporters would all run around saying BigEvilBank is loaning money to Cruz ....) There are any number of ways you could have come up with the funds. This is none of the campaign's business. Nor should it be.
There are apparently more stringent rules governing candidate loans to their own campaigns. I don't know. Cruz's personal loan to the campaign WAS reported to the FEC, as is SOP for all campaign receipts. What is being said now is that the candidate, unlike all other donors, had an obligation to disclose also the source of the personal funds being loaned. As I said before, I had never heard of this wrinkle. That's what campaign lawyers are for, but people make mistakes.
Since Cruz disclosed the Goldman brokerage loan in his financial disclosures, there was clearly no intent to conceal. Someone on the campaign made a filing error on the FEC form. But since the underlying activities were entirely legal, quite normal campaign business, and disclosed elsewhere, this is a trivial matter that should end with a corrected filing.
‘First, you need to recognize that a candidate for major office does not prepare and file his own FEC reports. This is delegated to staff, reporting to the campaign Treasurer.’
Outrageously complex — I’ll give you that. A minefield for any enemies of the Ruling Class, same as the income tax code.