Net campaign spending limits attacked
By Will Rodger, USATODAY.com
Battle lines are being drawn over a House measure that, if passed, would
eliminate almost all spending limits on Internet politicking. The effect of an amendment
introduced by Republican House Whip Tom Delay last week would be to significantly broaden
First Amendment protections for political speech while lifting paperwork requirements for
campaigns and independent supporters alike, supporters say.
But critics charge that as it now stands, it will also gut election campaign
finance reform efforts.
Regulators are already split on the role of the Internet in campaign finance.
But one noted for his laissez-faire approach to the Net is already giving his endorsement
to at least the concept of the amendment.
"I can live with this," Federal Election Commissioner David Mason, one
of three Republicans on the six-member board of the FEC,
said Thursday. "Unlike television, where you have a rationed, limited
resource…that relation between spending large amounts of money and getting what you
want out of it is much less true on the Net."
"This is a mischievous amendment intending to kill reform," counters
Don Simon, executive vice president of Common Cause.
"This essentially repeals the ban on corporate campaign spending on the
Internet."
The amendment gets to the heart of campaign finance rules.
Under current regulations, individuals may donate no more than $1,000 to any one
candidate, while corporations and labor unions are banned from giving as much as a penny
directly.
Efforts that aren’t coordinated with official campaigns, meanwhile, face no
spending limits, but must disclose their funders. Congress established that rule in the
1970s after a series of campaigns sent out disinformation disguised as their
opponents’ positions.
But DeLay and others say regardless of who foots the bill, campaign finance
regulations assume communications are hard, expensive, and largely controlled by a few
outlets. If they are none of those things on the Internet, DeLay staffers say, that means
the power of big money goes away; suddenly the pauper is as powerful as the prince. Only
Web sites that explicitly ask for money for candidates would remain bound by the
regulations.
That argument dovetails neatly with current FEC proceedings that could open up
the Internet for individuals who want to promote candidates on their own time. Though now
anyone who spends as little as $250 on a Web site for or against a candidate is expected
to register with the FEC, a flurry of protest over the rules may carve out an exemption
for individual voters as early as next year.
Yet associating the two issues, Common Cause’s Simon says, is as wrong as
it is convenient.
In fact, he says, the DeLay amendment would lift all regulation as long as
spending can be linked to the Internet. Under that logic, companies and unions could give
directly to campaigns for Web expenses, political action committees could ignore $5,000
annual spending limits and give any amount they wished.
Even worse, Simon warns, candidates would have no requirement to track almost
any spending; in short order, Web sites could become all-purpose slush funds.
What’s more, he says, not everything on the Net is cheap; the DeLay
amendment would open the door to the purchase of unlimited advertising on the Net, for
instance.
FEC Chairman Scott Thomas, a Democrat appointee, agrees. "You’re
opening up an invitation for folks to set up all sorts of separate accounts accepting
money from all sorts of secret sources," he says. "I’d urge Mr. DeLay and
some of his folks to spend a little more time consulting with us at the commission."
Since few Hill watchers expect the current campaign finance bill to pass this
year, it may be a while before Thomas has to worry about the DeLay amendment. Even so, the
issue won’t go away soon; House Republicans are already working on narrower
legislation to clarify the Net’s role in campaign finance.
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