Trump and Campaign Finance - WSJ

Trump and Campaign Finance - WSJ
"...Mr. Trump is correct that such payments are not campaign expenses and he’s also correct that many lawyers in the field agree with him. 

Many people in the press likely also know he is correct—even if it’s hard to tell from current coverage.
Here’s how the Associated Press reported in 2012 on the results of the Justice Department’s effort to claim that such payments were campaign expenses in the case of a former Democratic senator:

A jury’s refusal to convict John Edwards was less a redemption of the former White House hopeful than a rejection of the Justice Department’s boldest attempt to make an example of someone in the name of enforcing campaign finance laws.

Thursday’s verdict of not guilty on one count and a mistrial on five others bore out criticism from the earliest stages of the case that it was a reach...

“As noted by nearly every campaign finance lawyer who considered the matter, this was a lousy case,” ... Before Edwards’ prosecution, no federal candidate had been tried over payments from a third party that flowed to a mistress.

After the Edwards verdict, 

• Chris Matthews of MSNBC opened his television program by saying, “Let me start with this John Edwards trial, this waste of time, money and public attention.”
• The Los Angeles Times reported it this way...
• The New York Times also called it “a case that had no precedent.” The Washington Post observed...

...If a judge decides that campaign expenditures no longer mean what they obviously mean—printing yard signs, buying ad time on television channels, etc.—and come to be defined as anything helpful to a politician running for office, some may wonder where it could lead. 

When Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D., Texas) collects a slew of media endorsements during his campaign against Mr. Trump in 2020, must they be reported as in-kind contributions and limited by some estimate of their worth to the campaign?

Perhaps more likely is that an impossible standard will be applied to Mr. Trump alone."