Honest question:

If a candidate registers his or her name for ballot placement, and then does nothing for the entirety of the campaign (literally stays home and does nothing), and the Super-PAC funded organizers run every single aspect of the campaign – without any contact with the candidate – is it legal under current campaign finance laws?

perry smarty glassesIn theory, and, well, quite unbelievably, it sounds like it is perfectly legal.  However, beyond theory, in practice, we are about to find out thanks to Rick Perry.
Rick Perry has dispatched all of his official campaign constructs in Iowa with the exception of one paid campaign worker:

[Via USA Today] Presidential candidate Rick Perry now has just one paid staffer left on his Iowa team but plans to continue seeking Iowans’ votes for the GOP caucuses, aides told The Des Moines Register on Monday morning.

“We are continuing our Iowa campaign, with several September dates planned and other dates under consideration,” said Perry’s Iowa strategist Bob Haus, who remains on board as an unpaid advisory role, as he did for the former Texas governor in the 2012 election cycle.
It was reported in mid-August that Perry, who lags at the bottom of polling in the GOP race in Iowa, was short on cash and was no longer paying campaign staffers. Predictions quickly cropped up that Perry may be the first of 17 Republican presidential candidates to exit the 2016 Iowa campaign.  (link)

However, Super-PACs supporting Perry’s presidential campaign have around $14 million to use.   One of those Super-PACs is taking over the field effort in Iowa, the Washington Examiner reported today:

Perry is making a stand in South Carolina because 'he is not a quitter,' a source said.
Perry is making a stand in South Carolina because ‘he is not a quitter,’ a source said.

Opportunity and Freedom PAC announced the hiring of two top field hands to run caucus organizing and voter turnout operations in support of Perry in Iowa, host of the first nominating contest of the 2016 GOP primary. Marshall Critchfield was tapped as the political action committee’s Iowa state director; Beth Hamilton as Iowa deputy state director. Additionally, Opportunity and Freedom PAC plans to be on television in Iowa’s three largest media markets by early next week with ads touting Perry’s candidacy.
“We are in this race for the long haul, and thanks to the support of our donors we have the resources to run a state of the art grassroots effort in Iowa, and that is what Marshall and Beth have been hired to do,” Jordan Russell, a spokesman for the super PAC, said in a statement.
…The super PAC’s deeper involvement on behalf of Perry also is something of a test case: third party groups usually stick to advertising, with the GOTV work left to the official campaigns.
Critchfield comes to the super PAC from the Jasper County Republican Party. He stepped down from his position as chairman of the county GOP to assume the field director role. Hamilton, Critchfield’s deputy, is based in Jackson, Miss., where the super PAC’s top operatives are headquartered. She recently managed a winning GOP primary campaign for Mississippi Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney.
Opportunity and Freedom PAC says its Iowa field team will be fully operational on Tuesday. Meanwhile, it plans “targeted” statewide advertising in addition to the spots its purchasing in the three big Iowa media markets. The super Pac expressed confidence that Perry is primed for a comeback. Perry was languishing with 1.3 percent among GOP primary voters nationally according to the RealClearPolitics.com average.
“When the door opens for Gov. Perry this Fall/winter we will have put in place a foundation that will allow us to take full advantage of that opportunity,” said Austin Barbour, a top strategist for Opportunity and Freedom PAC.  (read more)

Rick Perry gets makeup
This is actually jaw-dropping affirmation of the entirety of how the GOPe Road Map was constructed to finance the individual “splitters” regardless of their ability to stay in the race.
Austin Barbour, nephew of Haley Barbour and chief architect of the 2014 GOPe primary assault against Chris McDaniels in Mississippi, is now taking control of the Rick Perry campaign exactly as described in the lead-in question.
This is a natural evolution of what the GOP began in 2012 (to save their incumbency), and later refined in 2014 to construct the financing of the Jeb Bush road map.
Rick Perry Cowboy

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