Rep. Hensarling’s (R-Tex.) bill to limit the impact of campaign f...
Rep. Hensarling’s (R-Tex.) bill to limit the impact of campaign finance laws on online political speech “simultaneously does too little and too much,” the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) said. In a Roll Call op-ed, CDT Exec. Dir.…
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Leslie Harris and Staff Counsel John Norris said the legislation, slated for a full House vote today (Wed.), does too little because it addresses only the narrow question raised by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) about the application of “public communications” rules to the Internet. But it also ignores Internet regulation that predated BCRA in the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA), they said. Even if HR-1606 were enacted, bloggers would face burdensome requirements under FECA to file reports on expenditures with the FEC, publicly post their home addresses when they advocate on behalf of a candidate and submit to “political committee” regulation if 2 or more bloggers or speakers collaborate on a site, Harris and Norris wrote. Hensarling’s bill is also silent on whether the “media exemption” can apply to bloggers and other online publications, CDT said. CDT prefers a bill (HR-4900) by Reps. Bass (R-N.H.) and Allen (D-Me.) that’s “essentially our proposal” for Internet campaign exemptions (WID March 3 p4), Morris told us: Legislative counsel in the House changed “2 or 3 or 4 relatively small points” in CDT’s proposal, adopted by Bass and Allen, to improve its clarity and rephrase some provisions. The Bass-Allen bill addresses all points left out of the Hensarling bill, “and it makes crystal clear that 99% of bloggers and other individual speakers on the Internet will be free from all campaign finance regulation.” The Bass-Allen bill creates a broad “safe harbor” level of $5,000 in spending below which no regulations apply, the said. CDT’s not alone in its advocacy of HR-4900. Six reform groups -- the Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, Democracy 21, the League of Women Voters, Public Citizen and U.S. PIRG -- support HR-4900 and oppose HR-1600, Democracy 21 said.