Congressional Republicans are trying yet again to use the appropriations process to roll back campaign finance regulations. This time the target is the limit on coordinated spending between candidates and political parties, money that a party spends to support a candidate in consultation with that candidate.
A rider to the Senate’s Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill would eliminate the limits on coordination between candidates and political parties.
This move to further gut campaign finance laws comes months after Republicans and Senate Democrats inserted a rider to the omnibus budget legislation passed in December to significantly raise the ceiling on contributions to national political parties.
Thus far, only Republicans have taken advantage of those new, more generous limits.
On Thursday, Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) attempted to strip the coordination rider in committee, but the effort failed on a 16-14 party-line vote, with all Republicans opposed to removing the rider.
“The American people are sick and tired of big money in politics. It is a major reason that public approval of Congress is so low,” Udall said in a statement. “They do not see us working for the vast majority of people, but instead see big money exerting most of the power. People will be shocked to learn that the Senate is trying to eliminate the few rules that are left.”
Under current campaign finance law, political parties are allowed to spend a limited amount of money on campaign-related activities like advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts with the consultation of the candidate's campaign. Those limits range from $96,000 for a House candidate as of this year to $21 million for a presidential nominee as of 2012.
McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky, has long been the most vocal opponent of campaign finance regulation in Congress. His ascension to Senate majority leader was viewed as a bad portent for campaign finance rules.
It's possible, then, that the appropriations rider gutting coordination limits between candidates and parties is a sign of things to come.
The Democratic National Committee will lift its ban on donations from political action committees and lobbyists for it convention fund-raising and for the accounts it shares with presidential campaigns, highlighting the coming shift within the party as it moves from being led by an incumbent president to its next nominee.
The committee’s current policies, put in place by President Obama’s team when he was the nominee in 2008, reflected his desire to change the culture of Washington. Under those rules, the party committee could not accept money from PACs or lobbyists, even so-called leadership PACs of major elected officials.
Allowing PAC and lobbyist donations to the joint fund-raising committee was something that Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign encouraged, people briefed on the discussions said. Mrs. Clinton has spoken openly about her frustration with the way that Jeb Bush, one of her Republican rivals, raised funds for his so-called super PAC by delaying his formal campaign declaration, even as he toured the country as an all-but-official contender.
But officials at the White House this week approved of two carve-outs to the ban, one for the committee for the party’s nominating convention in Philadelphia next year, and the other for the joint fund-raising agreements. Holly Shulman, a spokeswoman for the national committee, confirmed the changes, and added that the policy would remain in place for other committee fund-raising.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker
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