Benefactors of the defeated mayoral campaign in LOS ANGELES report confusion this week after learning that money given to a candidate is legally classified as a gift rather than an order. Nithya Raman, a Democratic Socialist, won the race here, the second major victory for the Democratic Socialists in a single year. Her opponent's principal financiers are left holding receipts for goods never manufactured, and several have asked this desk whether the gift can be exchanged for store credit. The store, for the record, is the city.
Local custom holds that a contribution purchases future consideration. Firms exist to broker this. "We gave $75,000 to the other candidate," said Marc Ellison, managing partner at a real estate investment fund. "That was not generosity. That was a deposit on zoning." Mr. Ellison confirms he has since received a handwritten thank-you note from the losing campaign, which he describes as "interest."
The industry's defense is coherent and deserves recording. "A donation is an option contract on attention," explained Dana Vreeland, senior counsel at Political Capital Partners, a firm that prices proximity. "Most options expire worthless. Our clients accept this about stocks. They refuse to accept it about mayors." Her firm discloses all positions quarterly on Form PF-9, Declaration of Proximity, valued at fair market price, or at sentimental if the candidate loses.
This desk obtained and reviewed the aggregate invoice. Line one: $75,000 from Mr. Ellison's cohort, delivered in full, redeemable against nothing. Line two: staff time, catering, and digital advertising for a candidate who lost, consumed at market rate. Line three: the winner's operation, funded by thousands of residents in small amounts, a figure so evenly distributed it resembles weather. Line four: the office of mayor, priced at zero, filled regardless. Four line items, one winner, zero buyers of record. Our ledgers carry no column for line three, transactions with no buyer being, by our doctrine, without value.
Several donors are now petitioning to contribute to Mayor Raman retroactively — to purchase, after delivery, a service they assumed they had already ordered. They are asking, in effect, to convert their gifts into invoices, and are surprised to learn the mayor's office will simply govern them either way. The ledger, as usual, balances. On Terra, the difference between a gift and a bribe is whether the goods arrive.
