I mean, this is true, but a lot of that is because the issue keeps being framed as a technical violation of some obscure low-consequences law and maybe also a violation of some civic niceties norm https://twitter.com/JStein_WaPo/status/1298595594580250624

But folks forget why Hatch Act exists. It's more than just a technicality. It serves two important roles in keeping democracy functional.

First, it tries to stop tax dollars and the machinery of government being diverted from the actual business of government towards helping the incumbent's campaign.

That's not just some nice-to-have civic ideal that "taxes shouldn't fund the messy business of campaigns". It's that the alternative is a perverse incentive for the incumbent to divert the resources it should be spending on its real work to give the incumbent an unfair advantage

And the second thing Hatch seeks to prevent is party politics infecting the civil service itself. It protects career officials getting cajoled into doing "free" campaign work by their bosses, and keeps departments focused on doing the actual work that Congress intended them to do

These rules might seem obscure, but it is not some silly fussiness about decorum. This norm is one part of the concrete foundations of democracy that keep elections fair and the government open. And when too many of the foundations are corrupted, the house will fall in on itself.

There is a huge problem today in the media of framing these issues through a purely legal analysis and therefore completely missing the actual significance of these norms. Yes, Hatch violations get lowish penalties, and the chance of a correction pre-election is ~ 0.

But that doesn't mean it's unimportant, and doesn't mean readers outside the Beltway wouldn't also care about if you take the time to explain what the Hatch Act is /for/, or why a campaign violating it is functionally stealing their money to rig the election.