Posted October 1, 2007 by CLC Staff

Legal Center Files Comments In WRTL Rulemaking – And Bob Bauer Agrees (At Least In Part)!

That title is not a typo or a joke.  The Campaign Legal Center filed two sets of comments in response to the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on “Electioneering Communications” (NPRM 2007-16, 72 Fed. Reg. 50261 [August 31, 2007]) in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Wisconsin Right to Life decision—one of which was cosigned by attorney Bob Bauer of Perkins Coie, who often disagrees with the Legal Center on matters of campaign finance reform.  The other, more detailed written comments were filed jointly by the Campaign Legal Center, Democracy 21, the Brennan Center for Justice, Common Cause, the League of Women Voters and U.S. PIRG.

The filings were submitted in response to the Federal Election Commission’s (FEC) request for comments on proposed revisions to its rules governing electioneering communications, in order to implement the Supreme Court’s decision in FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life, Inc.

Both filings urge the Commission to issue a rule limiting the new exemption for ads like those at issue in the WRTL case to the corporate/union funding restrictions, and not extending the new exemption to the existing disclosure requirements for all ads that meet the statutory definition of “electioneering communication.”  The “electioneering communication” disclosure requirements were not challenged in WRTL.

In the more detailed filing, the Legal Center not only explained in depth why the Commission should retain its disclosure requirements for all ads meeting the statutory definition of “electioneering communication,” but also urged the Commission to make some important modifications to its proposed rule, to make clear that “indicia of express advocacy” and language “condemning” a candidate’s record on an issue would constitute strong “red flag” evidence that the ads should not be exempt from the “electioneering communication” funding restrictions.

Comments were also filed today by Senators McCain, Feingold and Snowe, and Representative Shays—the principal authors of the BCRA provision at issue in WRTL—likewise urging the Commission to confine its new exemption to the corporate/union funding restrictions and not to extend the exemption to the “electioneering communication” disclosure requirements.