May 8, 2008 -- CQ Politics: GOP's FEC Nomination Swap Leads to Charges of Political Reprisal
By: Emily Cadei and Alex Knott

After months of pressure from the Democrats to pull the plug on a Republican nominee to the Federal Election Commission, the White House finally did so this week. Trouble is, President Bush decided to dump the one nominee the Democrats haven't raised any concerns about.

Suddenly, David Mason — currently the presiding chairman of the FEC who had been renominated by Bush last year — was out, and Hans von Spakovsky was still in.

Democratic opposition to von Spakovsky's nomination is what led to the current four-month stand-off in the Senate over FEC appointments, a stalemate that has crippled the agency's enforcement ability by leaving it with only two sitting commissioners — Mason and Democrat Ellen Weintraub. But the announcement that the GOP seat currently held by Mason would be filled with National Republican Congressional Committee attorney Don McGahn, who was once a counsel to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, may have made things worse.

Campaign finance watchdog groups and election law attorneys were quick to label the withdrawal of Mason's name as pay back for a controversy earlier this year involving Mason and the presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain , R-Ariz.

As FEC chairman, Mason challenged whether McCain could withdraw from the public funding system during the primaries after allegations that he used it to help his campaign obtain a private bank loan. The McCain camp ignored the chairman's objections, and since the six-member FEC currently does not have enough sitting members to take formal action, there was nothing Mason could do about it.

"The failure to renominate current Chairman David Mason reeks of blatant political interference," J. Gerald Herbert, executive director of the Campaign Legal Center, said in a statement. "President Bush deemed Mr. Mason fully qualified for the FEC and put his name forward for that post (last year). Nothing has changed except, of course, Mr. Mason's legitimate questions about the circumstances that must be addressed when a candidate seeks to opt out of presidential public financing system."

They White House declined to comment on what led to Bush's decision, saying only that the president "appreciates Mr. Mason's long standing public service."

The McCain campaign, meanwhile, did not return phone calls requesting a comment on whether the presumed 2008 Republican presidential nominee had contacted the White House about Mason.

During a brief FEC meeting Thursday, Mason said he didn't have "anything to say about the situation in general." But he implied the president's decision was a surprise. He said the White House personnel office called him "the day they withdrew the nomination to inform me about that. And that was a pretty routine process, just a courtesy call to me. And they did not say anything substantive."

Senate Democrats are unlikely to drop their objections to von Spakovsky, which stem from his record as an assistant attorney general, continuing the standoff.

"The fact that President Bush withdrew the Mason nomination, while retaining von Spakovsky is a backwards mistake," said Sen. John Kerry , D-Mass., who had a hold placed on von Spakovsky's nomination in the fall. "David Mason stood to be confirmed by the Senate, assuming his position at the helm of the FEC and I question the motivation behind withdrawing this competent nominee."

Kerry did say he was hopeful the Senate would be able to hold up or down votes on each of FEC the nominees.

Republicans are coming under increased pressure to give in to Democratic demands for an up or down vote, instead of voting en block, as is customary, for the slate of nominees. McCain may have rejected public financing for the primaries, but he is eager to obtain public funding for the general election. And Senate Republicans are all too aware that for that to happen, a full slate of FEC commissioners will have to sign off on it.

"My guess now is that Republicans ultimately allow separate votes," Rick Hasen, an election law attorney and professor at Loyola, wrote recently on his Web blog. "They need the FEC to approve Sen. McCain's expected request for public financing in the general election portion of the campaign. They need that more than the Democrats now need a functioning FEC."