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Aug 3, 2007 -- Legal Center Weekly Report: August 3, 2007 House Passes Historic Lobbying and Ethics Reform Bill
This week, the House of Representatives passed a historic ethics and lobbying reform bill, the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007, by a vote of 411 to 8. In the lead up to the vote, the Campaign Legal Center, along with other reform groups including Common Cause, Democracy 21, the League of Women Voters, Public Citizen, and U.S. PIRG sent a letter to Members urging them to vote for the legislation. Prior to the vote House leadership crafted a strong compromise measure in order to attract enough votes to pass the bill. Meredith McGehee, Campaign Legal Center Policy Director, stated , "While no bill is perfect, this one will bring to light information that has never been available before about the way lobbyists use money and special benefits to influence the outcome of legislation."
After the bill was passed, McGehee stated , "The reforms passed today in the House by an overwhelming margin are historic but also long overdue. It should not have been this difficult to deliver on promises to voters in the last election."
The lobbying and ethics overhaul introduces a variety of much needed reforms, including restricting corporate-funded travel for Members, banning gifts from lobbyists, increasing the "revolving door" restrictions whereby senior Congressional staff cannot accept outside lobbying jobs within a certain time period, enacting reporting requirements for contributions bundled by lobbyists, and requiring the disclosure of earmarks.
Later in the week the Senate passed the same lobbying and ethics bill by the wide margin of 83 to 14. Reform groups, including the Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, Democracy 21, League of Women Voters, Public Citizen, and U.S. PIRG sent a letter to Senators asking them to vote for the bill and avoid any amendments or delaying tactics including a potential filibuster that was threatened by several Senators over language in the earmark disclosure provisions. The same reform groups sent a second letter to the Senate urging them to vote for cloture on the bill and pass the legislation without any changes to it. Believing amendments could water down the legislation or delay passage, reformers made the point that a vote against cloture would be a vote against this landmark legislation.
On August 2, the Senate passed the legislation. Meredith McGehee, Campaign Legal Center Policy Director, stated , "For too long the business of Congress has been shrouded in secrecy. This legislation will help shine a light in Washington's back rooms where special interests have been able to secretly buy access with bundled contributions and lobbyists have operated with little scrutiny." She continued, "The American people demanded a change in Washington at the polls last November. Certainly there is more to be done but this was the essential first step in restoring accountability to a growing fraternity of out of touch politicians."
Shortly after the passage of the ethics and lobbying reform bill this week, criticism of the measure emerged from the White House. "A presidential veto of the lobbying and ethics reforms passed by Congress this week would be a slap in the face to the American people," stated Campaign Legal Center Policy Director Meredith McGehee urging the President to sign the bill into law. She continues, "To suggest a presidential veto of this legislation based on supposed concerns about earmark language is a phony excuse to scuttle these reform measures. To hide behind such a smokescreen would only increase the public's cynicism about Washington and about the willingness of their elected officials to be held accountable."
Reform groups also released a statement urging President Bush to sign the landmark reform bill. According to the statement, "It is rare to see such overwhelmingly bipartisan votes in Congress these days and the votes reflect the understanding of members of Congress that citizens are deeply concerned about the corruption problems in Washington." Along with the Campaign Legal Center, the groups include Democracy 21, Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, Public Citizen, and U.S. PIRG.
GOP and Democratic Parties
The Campaign Legal Center filed comments in early July, together with Democracy 21, in response to an Advisory Opinion Request to the FEC by the California Republican Party and the California Democratic Party seeking guidance on whether a federal officeholder or candidate may be "publicized" on materials sent by the state party committees that solicit non-federal funds for the parties.
The Legal Center recommended that the Commission advise the state parties that Federal officeholders may not solicit non-Federal funds on pre-event materials, advertisements and other communications. The Legal Center argued that the narrow exception created by rule that permits a Federal candidate or officeholder to solicit soft money extends only to the candidate or officeholder speaking at the event itself and not to the written materials, invitations or publicity that precedes the event.
The Commission's office of General Counsel produced a draft AO 2007-11 consistent with the Legal Center's and Democracy 21's recommendation, for consideration at the Commission's meeting this week. The draft AO advised the California parties that two proposed mail pieces would be impermissible, because they contained soft money solicitations by federal candidates/officeholders; while one of the proposed mail pieces, which did not contain a soft money solicitation, would be permissible.
A motion to approve draft AO 2007-11 failed by a vote of 2-2, with Commission Chairman Lenhard and Commission Walther supporting the draft, and Commissioners Mason and von Spakovsky opposing it (Commissioner Weintraub was absent from the meeting). Unable to attain the four votes needed to issue an opinion regarding the two controversial proposed communications containing solicitations, the Commission ordered the Office of General Counsel to draft an opinion informing the state parties that the communication not containing a solicitation of nonfederal funds would be permissible, and that the Commission was unable to reach a decision regarding the two proposed communications containing solicitation of non-federal funds.
On July 31, 2007, Judge Emmet Sullivan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia heard oral argument in the case Shays and Meehan v. FEC (Shays II) - a lawsuit challenging the FEC's failure to regulate 527 groups. At issue was whether the defendant FEC had provided a reasoned explanation for its decision to regulate 527 groups by case-by-case adjudication, instead by promulgating a rule, and had thereby satisfied the standards of the Administrative Procedure Act.
Counsel for plaintiffs Shays and Meehan argued that the FEC's failure to issue a broadly-applicable rule on this subject was arbitrary and capricious, and based upon an erroneous interpretation of the law. Plaintiffs' counsel further urged the Court to order the FEC to promulgate a rule to clarify when 527 groups must register as "political committees" under the Federal Election Campaign Act ("FECA"). Counsel for the FEC argued that the agency has broad discretion to decide how to enforce FECA in this area, and urged the Court to dismiss the case.
Roger Witten, of the law firm WilmerHale, presented oral argument for plaintiffs. The Campaign Legal Center has participated in this case in support of plaintiffs as counsel to amici curiae U.S. Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Russ Feingold (D-WI).
Legal Center Blog Highlights
Each week, the Campaign Legal Center staff posts blog entries on its site, www.clcblog.org . Click to read this week's entries: " Hans von Spakovsky and the Last Straw ," or to sign up for the blog, click here .
To read a variety of this week's editorials and articles on a variety of Campaign Legal Center issues, please click here . |
