Harvard professor and potential 2016 White House hopeful Lawrence Lessig is grateful for Donald Trump.
Lessig may soon jump into the presidential race as a Democrat and deplores many of the things that Trump has said so far on the campaign trail. But Lessig is on a mission to make campaign finance reform the No. 1 fight of the 2016 race. And the academic-turned-activist loves that Trump is taking advantage of the copious media spotlight he's been afforded to attack the influence of money in politics.
"I'm happy to concede that he is the most influential person on this issue right now," Lessig told National Journal in an interview. "He has been the most influential because he's Donald Trump. I'm not Donald Trump. I haven't been on national television and some crazy reality TV show, I haven't had the success he has had ... What I'm saying is someone with that prominence taking on this issue has elevated it in a way that reformers who don't have that stage can't."
Trump has been quick to call money in politics a problem. The real estate mogul declared his "love" for "the idea of campaign finance reform" in New Hampshire on Friday. Standing on the main stage for the first GOP prime-time presidential debate, he proclaimed that "our system is broken" when asked about his own political donations. Trump has also gone out of his way to paint Republican rival Jeb Bush as "a puppet" beholden to mega-donors.