“If a magazine ir network paid such a woman to share her story to influence an election, would that be a crime?”
I believe the newsmedia, such as the National Enquirer, is exempt.
(B) The term ‘‘expenditure’’ does not include—
(i) any news story, commentary, or editorial
distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting
station, newspaper, magazine, or other
periodical publication, unless such facilities
are owned or controlled by any political party,
political committee, or candidate;
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/USCODE-2015-title52/pdf/USCODE-2015-title52-subtitleIII.pdf
What about when the Democrats connected a wacko in Waco to CBS to air some forged National Guard documents to influence an election? Who went to prison?
What about when a Democrat connected the uncle of one of the perps from Abu ghraib to the media to leak photos of the perp’s crimes because he was unable to extort or blackmail a plea bargain deal? The goal was to take down bush in the 2004 election but all it did was get Nick’s Berg’s head cut off and wrapped up the terrorists believe that they were in the right