The Ethics of Political Campaigns
By Christian Bongiorno
A political campaign goes a long way for aspiring politicians to climb the mountain victorious over their opponent. However, there have been instances where organizations broke ethical guidelines to gain an advantage. Before I delve into some examples of this occurring, it’s essential to outline what is considered ethical in political campaigns.
The importance of political campaigning is to reveal the worst behind each candidate; therefore, they are willing to break boundaries for an upper hand during the general election (Nadler and Schulman 2006). Julia Nadler and Miriam Schulman argued that boundaries are meant to be broken because “Candidates feel that they are on top when elected to office, while others feel that ethics must be broken to stay afloat” (Nadler and Schulman 2006). Campaign ethics are classified as campaign communications and campaign finance.
Campaign communication consists of campaign advertising; this requires the campaign to be considerate of the other candidate while providing accurate information (Nadler and Schulman 2006). This is an ethical concern because campaign advertising is 50-50 -- not every advertisement is positive or reliable. During the 2004 Presidential campaign, a group of Vietnam War veterans (Swift Boat Veterans for Truth) discredited the Democratic nominee, Senator John Kerry, about his wartime service (Auerbach 2022). The group was rumored to have had close ties to former President George W. Bush’s campaign, going after the legitimacy of Kerry’s medals and his account of the Vietnam War. This tactic demonstrated how willing some political campaigns are to break the rules for an upper hand over the opposition because it was an attempt to motivate voters to pause and think about Kerry’s record. Bush prevailed over Kerry in the 2004 election due to similar jabs the campaign carried out against his record.
Campaign financing also presents challenges, as ethics are often compromised. Meta was fined $25 million in 2022 for violating Washington’s campaign finance laws (Gutman 2022) -- the technology giant violated this law 822 times. Washington’s transparency law mandates ad sellers to disclose the names and addresses of political advertisement buyers, the targets and the total number of views each advertisement tallied (Gutman 2022). Judge Douglass North deemed Meta’s actions as “intentional” due to the company’s track record with campaign finance law and “a lack of good faith” (Gutman 2022). This wasn’t Meta’s first encounter with Washington State’s court of law – Meta was sued in 2018 after the public was unable to access information about political ads displayed on the platform (Merrill 2024). The public has the right to know information about the origins of political advertisements to determine if the campaign is presenting truthful information about a candidate.
Dannebaum Engineering and Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA) were investigated for breaching campaign finance laws. In 2019, James D. Dannenbaum admitted to contributing over $300,000 in illegal campaign contributions by soliciting colleagues and family members to donate to candidates with the understanding that the DEC would reimburse them (Deutsch et. Al 2020). CTCA reimbursed its executives’ political contributions with corporate funds through a bonus program (Deutsch et. Al 2020). Both violations are based on the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act (FECA). FECA applies a blanket prohibition on corporate campaign contributions while reimbursements and contributions are prohibited (Deutsch et. Al 2020). Such violations hurt a company’s image because they expose an ethical breach. An ethical breach would happen because legal issues would arise. It’s worth mentioning that there are preferred practices for corporations to follow to monitor political contributions.
Attorney Aaron Hall lists some practices (VanBockel 2025):
1. Form a dedicated compliance team to oversee political contributions
2. Develop policies aligning with legal requirements and ethical standards
3. Providing training programs for employees on political contribution regulations and organizational policies
4. Implement a tracking system to monitor contributions and ensure accurate reporting
If corporations follow these suggested practices, they will reduce the likelihood that ethics would be compromised. The bottom line is that campaigns are destined to have unethical behaviors, even though the intent was to gain an advantage over the opposition.
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Nadler, J. and Schulman, M. (2006) Campaign ethics, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. Available at: https://www.scu.edu/government-ethics/resources/what-is-government-ethics/campaign-ethics/ (Accessed: 02 July 2025).
Auerbach, M. (2022) Negative political advertising: Overview: EBSCO, EBSCO Information Services, Inc. | www.ebsco.com. Available at: https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/religion-and-philosophy/negative-political-advertising-overview (Accessed: 02 July 2025).
Gutman, D. (2022) Meta fined for violating WA Campaign Finance Laws 822 times, The Seattle Times. Available at: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/facebook-parent-company-fined-25m-for-wa-campaign-finance-violations/ (Accessed: 02 July 2025).
Merrill, M. (2024) Meta faces $35m judgment for campaign finance violations in Washington State, Courthouse News Service. Available at: https://www.courthousenews.com/meta-faces-35m-judgment-for-campaign-finance-violations-in-washington-state/ (Accessed: 02 July 2025).
Deutsch, R. et al. (2020) Prohibited campaign contributions can put corporate donors behind bars, Pillsbury Law. Available at: https://www.pillsburylaw.com/en/news-and-insights/campaign-contributions-feca-doj.html (Accessed: 02 July 2025).
VanBockel, T. (2025) Corporate political contribution compliance rules, Attorney Aaron Hall. Available at: https://aaronhall.com/corporate-political-contribution-compliance-rules/#Best_Practices_for_Corporate_Political_Contribution_Compliance (Accessed: 02 July 2025).