Political contributions: permission from employer?

[redheadbaker]

I work in the marketing department of a financial services company. I wasn't working at this office in 2016, and it hasn't come up in any of the election seasons since. But we got an email about a month ago that we have to get approval from Compliance before donating time or money because of the industry we work in. 

Anyone else subject to this as well? What sort of information does your employer ask of you? 

[fernweh]

The only thing I have heard of my company is that we shouldn’t wear anything with the company logo so as not to appear as an official representing the company. I assume this is common at most companies though.

[Beagle]

I don’t, but I have a few friends that work for a large financial services company (starts with a V) and they have to get permission to run for office or donate money. They usually have their spouse donate $, but definitely need to get permission to run for office.

I can’t do political things on company time or with resources, but I don’t have to ask permission.

[redheadbaker]

May 29, 2020 18:14:52 GMT -5 Beagle said:

I don’t, but I have a few friends that work for a large financial services company (starts with a V) and they have to get permission to run for office or donate money. They usually have their spouse donate $, but definitely need to get permission to run for office.

I can’t do political things on company time or with resources, but I don’t have to ask permission.

Yeah, that V company is one of our clients. 

[Smolinsk]

I work in financial services as well and we have to request approval before we can make a political contribution. We have to provide our home address, who the recipient or organization we're donating to is, and how much we're contributing and we're capped at a $150 donation per candidate per election. I believe it's an SEC regulation, not a company policy.

[VillainV]

Nope! In the military we are permitted to donate our time or money however we choose as long as we don’t use our rank or wear our uniform. Any political statements or endorsements on social media should include that it is our personal opinion and does not reflect endorsement by our Service or by the DoD. The obvious caveat is that we can’t endorse overthrow of the government or have ties to any organization that does.

[jaybird]

Yes, my husband does before he or I give to candidates or PACs. It's never been an issue - - it's normally approved within an hour or two.

[susquehanna]

May 29, 2020 18:04:08 GMT -5 redheadbaker said:

I work in the marketing department of a financial services company. I wasn't working at this office in 2016, and it hasn't come up in any of the election seasons since. But we got an email about a month ago that we have to get approval from Compliance before donating time or money because of the industry we work in. 

Anyone else subject to this as well? What sort of information does your employer ask of you? 

I work in the insurance industry.

We received a communication several years ago that staff classified under certain roles need to receive approval from our compliance department before they contribute to political campaigns.

For instance, if a staff member underwrites municipal bonds, it might be a concern if they contribute money to government officials who make the decisions to obtain the municipal bonds from our organization. 

[Beagle]

May 29, 2020 20:05:21 GMT -5 susquehanna said:

May 29, 2020 18:04:08 GMT -5 redheadbaker said:

I work in the marketing department of a financial services company. I wasn't working at this office in 2016, and it hasn't come up in any of the election seasons since. But we got an email about a month ago that we have to get approval from Compliance before donating time or money because of the industry we work in. 

Anyone else subject to this as well? What sort of information does your employer ask of you? 

I work in the insurance industry.

We received a communication several years ago that staff classified under certain roles need to receive approval from our compliance department before they contribute to political campaigns.

For instance, if a staff member underwrites municipal bonds, it might be a concern if they contribute money to government officials who make the decisions to obtain the municipal bonds from our organization. 

I couldn't think of a good example as to why certain companies required this, but yes, this.

[Michelle]

Not sure how this might affect a Marketer but they probably just want to make sure they evaluate your job against the requirement.

www.brokerdealerlawblog.com/2017/political-contribution-limitations-now-also-mandatory-broker-dealers/

And

www.sec.gov/rules/final/2010/ia-3043.pdf

[doxies]

I work in the financial industry and we have to get pre-approval. If I remember correctly, it only applies to certain donations - PACs and state and local elections and candidates for federal office that currently are in state government. So if Biden picked a state governor as his vp, we’d need pre-approval, but you don’t need it to donate to Biden now.

[JayTea]

May 29, 2020 18:04:08 GMT -5 redheadbaker said:

I work in the marketing department of a financial services company. I wasn't working at this office in 2016, and it hasn't come up in any of the election seasons since. But we got an email about a month ago that we have to get approval from Compliance before donating time or money because of the industry we work in. 

Anyone else subject to this as well? What sort of information does your employer ask of you? 

I'm a dirty lurker, but thought I'd chime in since this is what I do for a living. We ask individuals who are at a certain paygrade - vice presidents and above - and individuals who work on government contracts to pre-clear their contributions.  This is done because of pay to play laws in certain states.  If an officer of the company or someone who works on contracts in some states, makes a political contribution - limits vary, this could be seen as paying to get a certain contract.  In some states it also applies to spouses, minor children, and in some extreme cases, older children who are living on their own.  If these pay to play laws are violated, it could cause the company to be banned from doing business in that jurisdiction - in other jurisdictions, we just have to report the contributions.

We rarely tell someone that they can't make a contribution, but they may have to limit it depending on the jurisdiction.  We do get questions on privacy, etc. - but since the contributions are public information, there's no standard for privacy.

[froggy76]

I was subject to approval at a prior job (insurance/financial services). It was extremely strict and all my requests were denied. My spouse also could not contribute. Other companies (V company, for example, which is local to me), seem more forgiving and just make the appropriate company disclosures. My company did not want to have to disclose any employee contributions, so there was not even a de minimis amount they'd approve.

The issue was related to pay-to-play and related more to state and local races than federal. I could contribute to Trump or Clinton in 2016 without company approval, for example, because it was a federal race and neither candidate was a sitting state or local official. One of our businesses was retirement plan services, and we'd frequently win contracts with state and local plans. So there couldn't be any appearance that an employee contributed to a candidate/elected official that had decision-making authority on which company to hire to administer their retirement plan.

I couldn't even donate to my local dems organizations even though I had no influence on how the organization allocated funds to the different candidates.

Also, be careful about attending events - I attended a county dems dinner (Chester County) and later realized the ticket price ($100 or something) would be considered a donation. I reported it to my company and it was a big deal - outside counsel involved, etc. I'm not joking. Ultimately, they requested I get a letter from the party confirming that no funds had been used to support candidates in Lehigh County. I don't remember the exact issue there but pay-to-play rules differ in different areas and I think there was some particular concern about Lehigh County.

[redheadbaker]

Jun 1, 2020 8:36:46 GMT -5 froggy76 said:

One of our businesses was retirement plan services, and we'd frequently win contracts with state and local plans. 

The company I work for does recordkeeping for retirement plans, among other savings vehicles. 

I do understand the reasoning behind the policy, I was more interested in exactly what information they would ask of me. 

[froggy76]

Jun 1, 2020 8:46:11 GMT -5 redheadbaker said:

Jun 1, 2020 8:36:46 GMT -5 froggy76 said:

One of our businesses was retirement plan services, and we'd frequently win contracts with state and local plans. 

The company I work for does recordkeeping for retirement plans, among other savings vehicles. 

I do understand the reasoning behind the policy, I was more interested in exactly what information they would ask of me. 

Candidate, amount... not sure there's much else to it.

ETA: For volunteering, I never had an issue. I'm a committeeperson, and asked if I needed permission to do that but was told that was ok, as long as I was not engaged in fundraising activities.