FEC Republican Commissioners Defend Themselves

The Federal Election Commission (FEC) has released more information on cases that have been dismissed against 527 organizations. The groups were accused of violating federal campaign laws by acting as political committees. FEC Republican commissioners have issued a very interesting Statement of Reasons [1] in a case involving the Economic Freedom Fund (EFF) from the 2006 election. The statement addresses two mailers that the FEC Office of General Counsel (OGC) identified as containing express advocacy. Once again, they question the constitutionality of the definition of express advocacy. Given this pattern, the 2010 election season is bound to have some interesting ads.

Democracy 21 and the Campaign Legal Center sent Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen and Commissioner Carolyn Hunter a letter [2] calling on them to correct the statement because it misrepresented their views. The groups charge that in their statement on EFF, the commissioners mischaracterized statements in a way "that egregiously distorts and misrepresents our own past comments and then claims, inaccurately, that we have been inconsistent in our views."

The FEC also dismissed a second investigation against Majority Action [3]. The vote was 2-2, with two members, a Republican and a Democrat not voting.

Meanwhile, Republican commissioners sent a letter to the editorial [4] defending their decisions in response to a previous Washington Post editorial [5] that blames them for the 3-3 splits.

Newly appointed John Sullivan is expected to receive a quick confirmation to the FEC, but whether or not a new face at the FEC will change anything is hard to tell. While the press has acknowledged the increasing number of cases either being dismissed or dropped at the FEC, some [6] call it a scandal.

Calling these events a "scandal" might inaccurately place blame, rather as we have said before [7], the underlying problem is the vagueness of the law.