Today, the Campaign Legal and a group of reform organizations urged President Obama to break the gridlock at the Federal Election Commission by nominating new commissioners and in congressional testimony urged the complete overhaul of the dysfunctional enforcement agency.

“For years the FEC has ignored congressional intent and carved out loopholes in the laws passed by Congress, but has reached a new low and currently presides over a system of its own creation where money laundering has been legalized on a colossal scale,” said Legal Center FEC Program Director Paul S. Ryan.  “The FEC has broken down to the point that if it is to perform its duty to enforce the nation’s campaign finance laws passed by Congress, a housecleaning of commissioners must take place.”

Reform groups held a press conference on Capitol Hill to draw attention to a House Administration Committee’s sham ‘oversight’ hearing today, in which only the commissioners from the agency itself are being called to testify despite repeated requests for a broader spectrum of witnesses.  

In their letter to President Obama the groups urged him to quickly nominate qualified candidates who will enforce the laws on the books.      

In testimony submitted to the committee, the Campaign Legal Center along with Democracy 21 called on Congress to replace the dysfunctional FEC altogether with a differently-structured agency willing and able to enforce the campaign finance laws passed by Congress.

The groups signing the letter to President Obama include the Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, CREW, Democracy 21, League of Women Voters, Public Citizen and U.S. PIRG.

To read the testimony submitted to the House Administration Committee by the Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21, click here.

To read the letter sent to President Obama by the reform groups, click here.

Today the Campaign Legal Center, together with Democracy 21, filed comments with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), urging the Commission to reject an advisory opinion request  submitted by the Constitutional Conservatives Fund PAC (“CCF”), Senator Michael Shumway Lee’s (R-UT) Leadership PAC seeking to fundraise in a manner clearly prohibited by existing law.

Senator Lee’s Leadership PAC asks the Commission (AOR 2011-21) whether it can raise unlimited contributions from corporations, labor unions and individuals to use for “independent expenditures” supporting or opposing other federal candidates.  In other words, Senator Lee’s Leadership PAC asks the FEC if it can fundraise like a Super PAC.

“This is an easy question, which the Commission should answer with an unequivocal no,” said Campaign Legal Center FEC Program Director Paul S. Ryan. 

The “soft money” prohibition of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA) clearly states that a federal candidate or officeholder, or an entity directly or indirectly established, financed, maintained or controlled by a candidate or officeholder, shall not solicit, receive, direct, transfer, or spend funds in connection with a federal election unless the funds are subject to the limitations, prohibitions, and reporting requirements of the law.

“By its own admission,” Ryan said, “CCF is a Leadership PAC established by Senator Lee.  Therefore, it falls squarely within the BCRA soft money ban.  As such, CCF, like Senator Lee himself, may only solicit or receive contributions up to $5000 from individuals and federal PACs, and may not solicit or receive any corporate or union funds.”

“The answer to the Advisory Opinion Request submitted by Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) to the FEC is open and shut:  the federal campaign finance laws clearly and unequivocally prohibit the Leadership PAC of a Member of Congress from soliciting or receiving unlimited contributions,” said Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer. “Senator Lee’s Leadership PAC is flatly prohibited by law from raising unlimited contributions and Senator Lee should abandon this effort.”

The heart of the argument made by CCF is that recent court decisions permit federal PACs to accept unlimited contributions from individuals, corporations and unions so long as such contributions are used only for independent expenditures.  But these cases, which gave birth to Super PACs, apply only to PACs that are not established by federal candidates or officeholders.  These cases are inapplicable to CCF, which is established by a federal officeholder.

The FEC has already recognized precisely this distinction earlier this year, when two Super PACs, Majority PAC and House Majority PAC, sought an advisory opinion as to whether federal candidates and officeholders are permitted to solicit unlimited individual, corporate, and union contributions on their behalf.  By a unanimous 6-0 vote, the Commission correctly advised the Super PACs that the BCRA soft money ban was upheld by the Supreme Court in McConnell v. FECand remains valid since it was not disturbed by either Citizens United or SpeechNow.

The Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 urged the FEC to reaffirm its opinion that all federal candidates, officeholders and committees they established—including Senator Lee’s Leadership PAC, CCF—are prohibited from raising or spending funds in connection with a federal election unless the funds are subject to the limitations, prohibitions, and reporting requirements of federal law.

The Campaign Legal Center took the lead in preparing these comments.

To read the comments, click here.

Today, the Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 filed an amici brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in The Real Truth About Obama (RTAO) v. FEC.   This case currently concerns the much-contested “subpart (b)” definition of “expressly advocating” (11 C.F.R. § 100.22(b)), as well as the FEC’s methodology for determining when a group has campaign activity as its “major purpose,” an important step in the larger determination of political committee status.

“This appeal is just one of many cases filed nationwide in an attempt to undermine existing disclosure laws and remove any sort of transparency or accountability for those making ‘independent expenditures’ on behalf of candidates,” Legal Center Associate Counsel Tara Malloy stated.  “The unstated goal of these challenges is a system where the sponsors and the candidates know who is buying the television ads, but the public is left completely in the dark.  Were this goal to be achieved, it would represent a grave threat to the overall health of our representative democracy.”

“This lawsuit represents an effort to eliminate campaign finance disclosure requirements that have long been deemed essential to protect against corruption and to provide the public with information they have a basic right to know,” according to Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer.  “In our brief, we make clear that the plaintiffs in this case are attacking the constitutionality of campaign finance standards developed by the Supreme Court itself.  The Court of Appeals is bound to follow the law as developed by the Supreme Court and should do so by affirming the lower court decision and ignoring the frivolous claims made by the plaintiffs.”

The Fourth Circuit appeal is the latest stage of the long-running proceedings in RTAO v. FEC.   Originally, RTAO challenged a number of FEC rules, including the rule implementing the electioneering communications funding restriction that was adopted after the Supreme Court’s 2007 decision in Wisconsin Right to Life v. FEC (11 C.F.R. § 114.15).   The district court and Court of Appeals upheld all of the challenged rules in 2008 and 2009.  Subsequent judicial decisions, most notably Citizens United v. FEC, mooted the much of the case, however.  In April 2010, the Supreme Court vacated the 2009 Court of Appeals’ decision, and remanded the case for further consideration in light of Citizens United and “the Solicitor General’s suggestion of mootness.”  Upon remand, the district court again considered and rejected the two remaining claims relating to the “subpart (b)” definition of “expressly advocating” and the FEC’s “major purpose” methodology in June 2011.  The current Fourth Circuit proceedings are the appeal of this decision.

On October 18, 2010, the Legal Center, along with Democracy 21, filed an amici brief with the district court supporting the challenged regulation and policy.  Prior to the remand, the two organizations filed two other amici briefs in the case dating back to 2008.

The Campaign Legal Center took the lead in preparing the brief.

To read the brief filed today, click here.

Today, the Campaign Legal Center, along with Democracy 21, filed an amici brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in U.S. v Danielczyk, an appeal of a controversial district court decision overturning the century-old federal restriction on corporate contributions to candidates and political parties.

The corporate contribution restriction overturned in the case dates back to the Tillman Act of 1907, signed into law by President Teddy Roosevelt in the wake of the Gilded Age, an era awash in political corruption and campaign finance scandals.  Since that time the restriction on corporate political contributions has been upheld repeatedly by the U.S. Supreme Court, most recently in FEC v Beaumont in 2003.  The May 2011 lower court decision overturning the 104-year-old law, issued by Judge Cacheris of the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Virginia, failed to consider or even cite Beaumont.  Criticism of the action led to a rebriefing of the case, though Judge Cacheris eventually reaffirmed his earlier decision, refusing to abide by Beaumont and other controlling Supreme Court precedent.

“This judicial overreach, if left standing, will authorize large-scale circumvention of existing contribution limits and give rise to political corruption and the appearance of corruption,” said Campaign Legal Center Associate Counsel Tara Malloy.  “In the post-Citizens United world, corporate vehicles are already being misused to avoid disclosure and the district court’s Danielczyk decision invites the additional evasion of contribution limits.  We do not need another decision that will further undermine public faith in their elected officials and the judiciary.”

“The corporate contribution ban was upheld by the Supreme Court less than a decade ago in FEC v. Beaumont, and a federal district judge cannot overrule direct rulings by the Supreme Court,” said Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer.  “Furthermore, the district court judge was clearly wrong in saying that the ‘logic’ of the Supreme Court’s misguided Citizens United decision also requires the invalidation of the ban on corporate contributions.  The Supreme Court, which has long distinguished between contribution restrictions and spending restrictions, never addressed the corporate contribution ban in Citizens United and did not overturn the Beaumont decision which remains the law of the land.”

The case, U.S. v. Danielczyk, is a criminal matter concerning a number of alleged campaign finance violations, including that the defendants illegally directed corporate contributions to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 Presidential campaign.

The Campaign Legal Center took the lead in preparing the brief.

To read the brief, click here.