S. Hrg. 111–1125 

COMPILATION OF HEARINGS AND MARKUPS 

HEARINGS AND MARKUPS 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON RULES 

AND ADMINISTRATION 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

February 2, 2010; April 15, 2010; May 5, 2010; May 25, 2010; 

and July 20, 2010 

( 
COMPILATION OF HEARINGS AND MARKUPS 
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001

67–685 2012

S. HRG. 111–1125 

COMPILATION OF HEARINGS AND MARKUPS 

HEARINGS AND MARKUPS 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON RULES 

AND ADMINISTRATION 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

FEBRUARY 2, 2010; APRIL 15, 2010; MAY 5, 2010; MAY 25, 2010; 

AND JULY 20, 2010 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Rules and Administration 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York, Chairman 

* ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia 

DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

BEN NELSON, Nebraska 

PATTY MURRAY, Washington 

MARK L. PRYOR, Arkansas 

TOM UDALL, New Mexico 

MARK R. WARNER, Virginia 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

MITCH MCCONNELL, Kentucky 

THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi 

KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

JOHN ENSIGN, Nevada 

PAT ROBERTS, Kansas 

JEAN PARVIN BORDEWICH, Staff Director 

MARY SUIT JONES, Republican Staff Director 

JENNIFER GRIFFITH, Deputy Staff Director 

JASON A. ABEL, Chief Counsel 

ADAM D. AMBROGI, Administrative and Legislative Counsel 

VERONICA GILLESPIE, Elections Counsel 

CAROLE BLESSINGTON, Administrative Assistant to the Staff Director 

SONIA GILL, Counsel 

JULIA RICHARDSON, Counsel 

JOSH BREKENFELD, Professional Staff 

LAURYN BRUCK, Professional Staff 

SHAUN PARKIN, Republican Deputy Staff Director 

PAUL VINOVICH, Republican Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL MERRELL, Republican Elections Counsel 

ABBIE PLATT, Republican Professional Staff 

TRISH KENT, Republican Professional Staff 

RACHEL CREVISTON, Republican Professional Staff 

LYNDEN ARMSTRONG, Chief Clerk 

MATTHEW MCGOWAN, Professional Staff 

* Senator Robert C. Byrd, West Virginia, was a member of the Committee during 

the 111th Congress until his death on June 28, 2010. Senator Carte P. Goodwin, 

West Virginia, was a member of the Committee during the 111th Congress from 

July 20, 2010, until November 15, 2010. Senator Joe Manchin III, West Virginia, 

was a member of the Committee from November 15, 2010, until the end of the 

111th Congress. 

In addition to this compilation of hearings, the Committee on Rules and Administration also published a hearing compilation entitled, ‘‘Examining the Filibuster’’ (S. 

Hrg. 111–706). This publication included hearings the Committee held during the 

Second Session of the 111th Congress that are not included in this compilation. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG-111shrg62210.pdf) 

Note: Archived webcasts of all hearings and an electronic version of this report are 

available at http://rules.senate.gov. 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

February 2, 2010 

HEARING—CORPORATE AMERICA VS. THE VOTER: EXAMINING THE 

SUPREME COURT’S DECISION TO ALLOW CORPORATE SPENDING IN 

ELECTIONS 

OPENING STATEMENT OF: 

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York ....................................................................................................................... 1 

Hon. Robert Bennett, Ranking Member, a U.S. Senator from the State of 

Utah ...................................................................................................................... 3 

TESTIMONY OF: 

Hon. Russ Feingold, a U.S. Senator from the State of Wisconsin ....................... 4 

Hon. John Kerry, a U.S. Senator from the State of Massachusetts .................... 5 

Mr. Steve Bullock, Attorney General, State of Montana, Helena, Montana ...... 9 

Ms. Allison Hayward, Professor, George Mason University School of Law, 

Arlington, VA ........................................................................................................ 11 

Mr. Edward B. Foley, The Robert M. Duncan/Jones Day Designated Professor 

in Law, Moritz College of Law, The Ohio State University, Columbus, 

OH ......................................................................................................................... 12 

Mr. Steve Hoersting, Center for Competitive Politics, Alexandria, VA .............. 13 

OPENING STATEMENT OF: 

Hon. Tom Udall, a U.S. Senator from the State of New Mexico ......................... 15 

TESTIMONY OF: 

Mr. Fred Wertheimer, President, Democracy 21, Washington, DC ..................... 16 

Ms. Heather Gerken, J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law, Yale Law School, 

New Haven, CT .................................................................................................... 18 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF: 

Mr. Steve Bullock, Attorney General, State of Montana, Helena, Montana ...... 40 

Ms. Allison Hayward, Professor, George Mason University School of Law, 

Arlington, VA ........................................................................................................ 45 

Mr. Edward B. Foley, The Robert M. Duncan/Jones Day Designated Professor 

in Law, Moritz College of Law, The Ohio State University, Columbus, 

OH ......................................................................................................................... 52 

Mr. Steve Hoersting, Center for Competitive Politics, Alexandria, VA .............. 70 

Mr. Fred Wertheimer, President, Democracy 21, Washington, DC ..................... 102 

Ms. Heather Gerken, J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law, Yale Law School, 

New Haven, CT .................................................................................................... 118 

MATERIALS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

Memorandum Submitted by Senator Charles E. Schumer entitled ‘‘2008 Campaign Finance Data’’ written by the Congressional Research Service, February 1, 2010 ........................................................................................................ 133 

Editorial Submitted by Senator Russ Feingold in the Janesville Gazette, 

‘‘Court decision opens floodgates for corporate money in campaigns,’’ January 31, 2010 .......................................................................................................... 138 
Page

IV 

Editorial Submitted by Senator Russ Feingold in The Washington Post, ‘‘Who 

is helped, or hurt, by Citizens United decision,’’ January 24, 2010 ................. 140 

Editorial Submitted by Senator Russ Feingold in USA Today, ‘‘High court 

opens the floodgates’’ ........................................................................................... 141 

Statement Submitted by Senator Robert C. Byrd ................................................. 143 

Statement Submitted by Brennan Center for Justice .......................................... 146 

Statement Submitted by Center for Responsive Politics ...................................... 195 

Statement Submitted by Common Cause .............................................................. 199 

Statement Submitted by Mr. Jonathan Cocks, Richardson, Texas ..................... 202 

Statement Submitted by Organization for International Investment (OFII) ..... 204 

Statement Submitted by People for the American Way ....................................... 209 

Statement Submitted by Public Campaign ........................................................... 212 

Statement Submitted by Public Citizen ................................................................ 216 

Statement Submitted by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) ......... 221 

Statement Submitted by Sunlight Foundation ..................................................... 224 

Statement Submitted by U.S. PIRG ...................................................................... 228 

Statement Submitted by Former Senators Bill Bradley, Bob Kerrey, Warren 

Rudman, and Alan Simpson, Co-Chairs of Americans for Campaign Reform 230 

Statement Submitted by Campaign Legal Center ................................................ 232 

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD: 

Hon. Mark Pryor, a U.S. Senator from the State of Arkansas, to Committee 

witnesses ............................................................................................................... 239 

April 15, 2010 

HEARING—NOMINATION OF STEPHEN T. AYERS TO BE ARCHITECT OF 

THE CAPITOL 

OPENING STATEMENT OF: 

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York ....................................................................................................................... 249

Hon. Robert Bennett, Ranking Member, a U.S. Senator from the State of 

Utah ...................................................................................................................... 250 

Hon. Thad Cochran, a U.S. Senator from the State of Mississippi ..................... 251 

Hon. Mark Pryor, a U.S. Senator from the State of Arkansas ............................ 252 

TESTIMONY OF: 

Mr. Stephen T. Ayers, AIA, Acting Architect of the Capitol ................................ 253 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF: 

Mr. Stephen T. Ayers, AIA, Acting Architect of the Capitol ................................ 260 

MATERIALS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

Statement Submitted by Advisory Council on Historic Preservation ................. 265 

Statement Submitted by American Institute of Architects .................................. 266 

Statement Submitted American Institute of Architects, New York State .......... 273 

Statement Submitted by American Institute of Architects, Utah ....................... 274 

Statement Submitted by Construction Management Association of America .... 276 

Statement Submitted by National Conference of State Historic Preservation 

Officers .................................................................................................................. 277 

Statement Submitted by U.S. Green Building Council ........................................ 279 

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York, to Mr. Ayers ................................................................................................ 280 
Page

V 

April 22, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: HISTORY OF THE FILIBUSTER 

1789–2008 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

May 5, 2010 

HEARING—VOTING BY MAIL: AN EXAMINATION OF STATE AND LOCAL 

EXPERIENCES 

OPENING STATEMENT OF: 

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York ....................................................................................................................... 293

Hon. Pat Roberts, a U.S. Senator from the State of Kansas ............................... 295 

TESTIMONY OF: 

Hon. Ron Wyden, a U.S. Senator from the State of Oregon ................................ 296 

Hon. Susan Davis, a U.S. Representative from the State of California .............. 298 

Hon. Kate Brown, Oregon Secretary of State, Salem, Oregon ............................. 303 

Mr. John Fortier, The American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC ............ 305 

Mr. Rokey W. Suleman, II, Executive Director, DC Board of Elections and 

Ethics, Washington, DC ....................................................................................... 307 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF: 

Hon. Ron Wyden, a U.S. Senator from the State of Oregon ................................ 318 

Hon. Susan Davis, a U.S. Representative from the State of California .............. 321 

Hon. Kate Brown, Oregon Secretary of State, Salem, Oregon ............................. 326 

Mr. John Fortier, The American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC ............ 331 

Mr. Rokey W. Suleman, II, Executive Director, DC Board of Elections and 

Ethics, Washington, DC ....................................................................................... 351 

MATERIALS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

Statement Submitted by Senator Ron Wyden—Incident in Curry County ........ 355 

Statement Submitted by Representative Susan Davis—Michigan Association 

of County Clerks .................................................................................................. 359 

Statement Submitted by Senator Ron Wyden—History of Vote by Mail in 

Oregon ................................................................................................................... 360 

Statements Submitted by Election Assistance Commission ................................ 361 

2008 Election Administration and Voting Survey ......................................... 361 

Election Management Guidelines Chapter 7: Absentee Voting and Vote 

by Mail ........................................................................................................... 477 

Absentee Voting and Vote by Mail Quick Start Guide .................................. 488 

Statement Submitted by American Association of People with Disabilities ....... 500 

Statement Submitted by Fair Elections Legal Network ...................................... 503 

Statement Submitted by Fleet Reserve Association (FRA) .................................. 504 

Statement Submitted by County of Santa Barbara, California Clerk ................ 505 

Statement Submitted by Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law ....... 507 

Statement Submitted by Professor Michael P. McDonald, George Mason University ................................................................................................................... 509 

Statement Submitted by National Association of Counties (NACo) .................... 521 

Statement Submitted by National Association of Postal Supervisors ................. 522 

Statement Submitted by the National Conference of State Legislatures ........... 525 

Statement Submitted by People for the American Way ....................................... 528 

Statement Submitted by Postal Regulatory Commission ..................................... 530 

Statement Submitted by Honorable Sam Reed, Oregon Secretary of State ....... 532 

Statement Submitted by Verified Voting ............................................................... 534 
Page

VI 

May 19, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: THE FILIBUSTER TODAY AND 

ITS CONSEQUENCES 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

May 25, 2010 

HEARING—NOMINATION OF WILLIAM J. BOARMAN TO BE THE PUBLIC 

PRINTER 

OPENING STATEMENTS OF: 

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York ....................................................................................................................... 535

Hon. Robert Bennett, Ranking Member, a U.S. Senator from the State of 

Utah ...................................................................................................................... 536 

TESTIMONY OF: 

Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin, a U.S. Senator from the State of Maryland .............. 537 

Mr. William J. Boarman, of Maryland, nominee to be Public Printer ................ 538 

Hon. Steny Hoyer, a U.S. Representative from the State of Maryland .............. 540 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF: 

Mr. William T. Boarman of Maryland ................................................................... 550 

Hon. Barbara A. Mikulski, a U.S. Senator from the State of Maryland ............. 555 

STATEMENTS FOR THE HEARING RECORD: 

Statement Submitted by Representative Robert A. Brady .................................. 556 

Statement Submitted by American Library Association ...................................... 558 

Statement Submitted by International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Graphic 

Communications Conference ............................................................................... 562 

Statement Submitted by American Association of Law Libraries ....................... 566 

Statement Submitted by Buffalo News .................................................................. 569 

Statement Submitted by International Brotherhood of Teamsters ..................... 570 

Statement Submitted by Sun Times Media .......................................................... 573 

QUESTIONS FOR THE HEARING RECORD: 

Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman, a U.S. Senator from the State of New 

York, to Mr. Boarman .......................................................................................... 575 

Hon. Thad Cochran, a U.S. Senator from the State of Mississippi, to Mr. 

Boarman ................................................................................................................ 580 

Hon. Lamar Alexander, a U.S. Senator from the State of Tennessee, to 

Mr. Boarman ........................................................................................................ 583 
Page

VII 

June 23, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: SILENT FILIBUSTERS, HOLDS 

AND THE SENATE CONFIRMATION PROCESS 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

July 20, 2010 

MARKUP—NOMINATION OF WILLIAM BOARMAN TO BE PUBLIC 

PRINTER .............................................................................................................. 586 

July 28, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: LEGISLATIVE PROPOSALS TO 

CHANGE SENATE PROCEDURES 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

September 22, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: LEGISLATIVE PROPOSALS TO 

CHANGE SENATE PROCEDURES 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

September 29, 2010 

HEARING—EXAMINING THE FILIBUSTER: IDEAS TO REDUCE DELAY AND 

ENCOURAGE DEBATE IN THE SENATE 

Hearing record published in S. Hrg. 111–706, Examining the Filibuster. 

(http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg62210/pdf/CHRG111shrg62210.pdf) 

(1) 

CORPORATE AMERICA VS. THE VOTER: EXAMINING THE SUPREME COURT’S DECISION 

TO ALLOW UNLIMITED CORPORATE SPENDING IN ELECTIONS 

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2010 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION, Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:04 a.m., in Room 

SR–301, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Charles E. Schumer, 

Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Schumer, Feinstein, Durbin, Nelson, Murray, 

Pryor, Udall, and Bennett. 

Staff present: Jean Bordewich, Staff Director; Jennifer Griffith, 

Deputy Staff Director; Jason Abel, Chief Counsel; Veronica Gillespie, Elections Counsel; Adam Ambrogi, Counsel; Sonia Gill, 

Counsel; Julia Richardson, Counsel; Lauryn Bruck, Professional 

Staff; Lynden Armstrong, Chief Clerk; Matthew McGowan, Professional Staff; Justin Perkins, Staff Assistant; Mary Jones, Republican Staff Director; Shaun Parkin, Republican Deputy Staff Director; Paul Vinovich, Republican Chief Counsel; and Michael Merrell, 

Republican Counsel. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SCHUMER 

Chairman SCHUMER. The Rules Committee shall come to order. 

Good morning. 

First, I would like to thank my friend, Ranking Member Bennett, 

for joining me here at this hearing so quickly after the important 

Supreme Court decision on January 21st in the case of Citizens 

United v FEC. Since the decision was handed down, most of us 

here in this room, including myself, have been carefully examining 

its implications. And today we are here to further examine its implications and listen to our distinguished panels. 

Put bluntly, I believe that the Supreme Court’s opinion in Citizens United is corrosive to our democracy. I feel that strongly 

about it. And I believe that the title of our hearing, ‘‘Corporate 

America vs. the Voter,’’ really accurately describes the immediate 

ramifications of this decision. Perhaps my colleague would want an 

addendum to that, I realize, but we will leave that to him. And 

while this is the first congressional hearing to be held in response 

to this ruling, it is certainly not going to be the last, as other committees have already announced plans to have their hearings. 
2 

Furthermore, concern over this decision is obviously not just limited to Members of Congress. Last week, President Obama voiced 

his concerns about the impact of the ruling in his State of the 

Union address. It is rare, in fact, for a Supreme Court opinion to 

attract so much attention from all parts of the country. 

The changes that are likely to result from the Citizens United 

case have the potential to be disastrous to the health of our democracy, inviting unprecedented spending and influence by wealthy 

special interests. The ruling encourages them to get involved in 

races large and small; in primaries and general elections and runoffs; and in Federal, State, and local contests. It goes across the political spectrum. 

So get ready. If this ruling is left unchallenged, if Congress fails 

to act, our country will be faced with big, moneyed interests spending, or threatening to spend, millions on ads against those who 

dare to stand up to them. The threat alone is enough to chill debate and distort the political process in ways that hurt the voice 

and influence of the average citizen. 

Stopping those big bonuses by bailed-out firms? Forget about it. 

Pushing back against polluters to protect the health of our children? Maybe no more. Regulating dangerous chemicals in drugs 

and children’s toys? Much less of a chance. 

This opinion can allow foreign interests to influence our elections, special interest spending to go unchecked and undisclosed, 

and corporate America to rule the day. It did not have to be that 

way. 

I believe the Supreme Court took a tortuous path to expand the 

Citizens United case. It chose to review, and then strike down, the 

earlier Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce decision, and to 

overturn more than a century of campaign spending policy stretching back to the Tillman Act of 1907. 

The Supreme Court turned its back on previous rulings and went 

out of its way to broaden its decision in service to a particular policy goal. That should make all of us—regardless of where we are 

on the political spectrum—deeply concerned and determined to act. 

The Roberts Court has turned its back on stare decisis—respecting 

and following the precedents set by earlier Court opinions—simply 

because five Justices did not like the way previous opinions went. 

I look forward to hearing all of our witnesses who have come to 

share their views at this hearing. I am not going to prejudge the 

best way going forward. We are not going to issue—we are talking, 

of course, and thinking seriously about what to do, but we are not 

going to talk about that today. We are here to listen and get people’s suggestions. 

I am very interested, of course, in what both Senators Feingold 

and Kerry, who have had long history here, believe. And while 

Congressman Van Hollen and I will be introducing a bill shortly, 

today is a day to listen to ideas and the sharp analysis that will 

be presented. 

And before we get to our distinguished first panel, I know my 

good friend and colleague, Ranking Member Bennett, would like to 

say a few words. 
3 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BENNETT 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to respond, and I look forward to the information that we will get as a result of this hearing. 

As I think everyone knows, I am a First Amendment hawk. I am 

one of a very small number of conservative Republicans who voted 

against the flag-burning amendment simply because I felt it 

intruded on our First Amendment rights. I feel very strongly about 

protection of the First Amendment, and as you indicated, my interpretation of the Supreme Court’s ruling was different than yours. 

And let me give you this to think about as an example of what I 

think they did in their decision. 

Let us go back just a few weeks ago to the eve of a Federal election. A corporate employee went on the air to describe a candidate 

in that election as, among other things, and I quote, ‘‘an irresponsible, homophobic, racist, reactionary, supporter of violence against 

women and against politicians with whom he disagrees.’’ 

Now, this statement was made in a corporate studio, broadcast 

with corporate money, directed to the voting public, clearly designed to influence their opinion of the candidate—which it may 

have done, but perhaps not in the way the employee had intended. 

Now, in spite of this clear intent to influence an election with 

corporate money, the corporate employee responsible for these 

statements was able to broadcast them without any fear of violating our election laws. He did not have to hire counsel to advise 

him if the statement could be legally broadcast. And he did not 

have to check with the FEC to see if they would permit him to 

make the statement before doing so. 

These statements were made before the Citizens United decision 

was handed down, and they could be made with the full confidence 

that there would be no legal consequence because the corporation 

for which this employee worked was a media corporation. 

Had any other corporation used their treasury funds to broadcast 

a similar statement on the eve of an election, they would have been 

guilty of a crime. 

Now, that was on a Monday. But by Friday of that week, things 

had changed: the Supreme Court said that the First Amendment 

applies to all Americans, and not just those who own their own TV 

shows. 

And with this decision, all Americans can know they are free to 

speak their minds on issues of public concern without having to get 

the permission of the Government. 

All Americans can make their views known about Federal elections without having to hire counsel to vet their words and make 

sure they are abiding by the law. 

All Americans can praise or criticize office holders without having to worry about committing a crime. 

And if I may, as a comment on this statement I have quoted, all 

Americans have the right to make fools of themselves by going over 

the top, if they want to, without worrying about having the Government come in and say, ‘‘You cannot do this.’’ 

That is the essence of the First Amendment, that everybody 

should be treated alike, everybody should have the same rights, everybody should be able to speak freely and boldly, and sometimes 
4 

foolishly, with respect to an election. That is a good thing. It should 

not be feared. It should be cheered and celebrated. 

So for that reason, I am supportive of the Supreme Court decision and look forward to the testimony of our witnesses. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Bennett. 

Senator Feingold has to chair a hearing very shortly, so we are 

going to, with Senator Kerry’s permission, call on Senator Feingold 

first, despite seniority. And I know Senator Udall wanted to make 

a brief statement. We will let members—we will give a little extra 

time so members can make brief statements before their questioning, if that is okay with you, Senator Udall, Senator Feinstein. 

Senator Feingold? 

STATEMENT OF HON. RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, A UNITED 

STATES SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF WISCONSIN 

Senator FEINGOLD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ranking 

Member, and for your courtesy, Senator Kerry, for allowing me to 

testify at this point. 

The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United was a tragic 

error. The Court reached out to change the landscape of election 

law in a drastic and wholly unnecessary way. By acting in such an 

extreme and unjustified manner, the Court has badly damaged its 

own integrity. More important, it has harmed our democracy in 

ways that may not be fully understood today, but will likely become 

clear over the next few election cycles. 

There is, of course, a debate about how much impact the Court’s 

decision will have. The Wisconsin Right to Life decision in 2007 

had already significantly undermined the electioneering communications provision of McCain-Feingold. But by completely removing all restraints on political spending from corporate treasuries, 

Citizens United has unleashed a threat of enormous spending that 

simply was not possible before. And as we all know, a threat of retaliation at election time may be all that is needed to make a legislator think twice about opposing the already powerful voice of corporate America. 

All it takes is one Senator losing a close election because of a 

last-minute corporate advertising barrage, and everyone will constantly have one eye on what might happen to them. That is why 

this decision is so dangerous. It will result in legislators being even 

more responsive to corporations rather than voters. 

Now, the underlying rationale for the Court’s decision—that corporations must have First Amendment rights in the political process equal to those of citizens—makes no sense. Corporations cannot 

vote or run for office, they do not have feelings or thoughts. They 

do not speak or make decisions except through individuals—their 

corporate officers, their boards of directors, and their lobbyists. 

What they do have is the ability to make huge amounts of money, 

thanks in part to laws passed by the people’s representatives. So 

the Court’s ruling has, in effect, produced a Frankenstein—the people created corporations, but the Court has denied the people the 

power to prevent corporations from dominating the entire political 

system. 

Mr. Chairman, I have published several op-eds in the last few 

weeks concerning what I feared might be the likely effects of the 
5 

Citizens United decision. I ask that they be put in the record of the 

hearing. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Without objection. 

[The op-eds – Appendix A:] 

Senator FEINGOLD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Now, one bright spot in the Court’s ruling was its recognition 

that disclosure requirements do not violate the constitutional rights 

of corporations. I have long believed that disclosure is a necessary, 

though not sufficient, ingredient of campaign finance regulation. 

After all, Americans have much more important things to discuss 

around the kitchen table than the latest expenditure reports filed 

at the FEC or the even the latest news story based on those reports. But at the very least, we must make it possible for people 

who have the right to cast votes to know exactly who is trying to 

influence their votes. 

You and I have discussed other components of possible legislation: a new definition of ‘‘coordination,’’ a prohibition of election 

spending by Government contractors and recipients of bailout 

funds, a tightening of the provision in existing law concerning contributions and expenditures by foreign corporations. And I support 

these kinds of measures. They certainly do not reverse the Court’s 

decision; no legislation can. But they may diminish some of the decision’s worst effects. 

Let me note one final thing as you begin your work on a bill. 

When we developed the McCain-Feingold bill, we paid close attention to previous First Amendment and campaign finance decisions 

of the Supreme Court and tried very hard to ensure that it would 

be upheld. Major decisions like Shrink Missouri, FEC v. Beaumont, 

and Colorado Republican II came down during the 7 years we 

worked on that bill, and we took a hard look at the legislation in 

light of each new decision. We knew our bill would be challenged, 

but we felt we had strong and good-faith arguments in support of 

the constitutionality of each and every provision. And we were 

right. The Court upheld the bill almost in its entirety. It took a 

change in membership on the Court to reverse that decision. Even 

today, of course, the centerpiece of our bill—the prohibition on softmoney contributions to political parties—is still in place. And I am, 

of course, pleased about that. 

As legislators, we have a duty to carefully consider the constitutional questions raised by legislation. But we are not mind readers, 

nor can we predict the future. So I urge you to do your duty and 

not be dissuaded from acting by fear of the Court. This terrible decision deserves as robust a response as possible. Nothing less than 

the future of our democracy is at stake. 

I do thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Feingold, and we understand that you have to go chair a hearing, so thank you for 

being here, and we will follow your orders. 

Senator Kerry? 

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN F. KERRY, A UNITED STATES 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS 

Senator KERRY. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Bennett, and 

members of the Committee, I am delighted to be able to be here, 
6 

and thank you for the opportunity to share a few thoughts with 

you. I appreciate your swift attention to this issue. 

In my judgment, The Supreme Court has issued a decision—and 

I would say this particularly to you, Senator Bennett, based on 

your comments a moment ago, where you talked about how everybody deserves the same rights, everybody deserves the opportunity 

to speak. ‘‘Everybody’’—that is a person. That refers to people. That 

is who rights attach to under our Constitution. A corporation is not 

a person, and from what I remember in law school, it was never 

intended to be. It is a fictitious entity under the law created specifically for the purpose of giving it certain protections and rights 

within the business world, within transactions. Never intended to 

give it speech rights. 

Now, over the course of time, obviously, we have had distinctions 

of commercial speech and so forth, but no reading that I know of 

of the Constitution suggested that we should inflate the speech 

rights of large, faceless corporations to the same level as hardworking average Americans. And that is precisely what this decision has done. In doing so, the Court has struck at the very heart 

of our democracy, a democracy in which corporations already have 

too much influence. 

I think Justice Stevens’ words in dissent really summarize it. 

This is what he said: ‘‘The Court’s ruling threatens to undermine 

the integrity of elected institutions across the Nation. The path it 

has taken to reach its outcome will, I fear, do damage to this institution’’—referring to the Supreme Court itself. And I strongly hope 

that the Senator and others will read those dissents and measure 

them against the far-reaching, extra-legal decisionmaking that the 

majority has chosen to engage in. 

I have seen this system get more broken, Mr. Chairman, over the 

25 years that I have in the United States Senate, and I have seen 

it as the nominee of my party. I think I understand as well as anybody the influence of money in American politics. 

In 1998, in our national elections, a cycle of election cost 

$1,618,000,000 and change. In the year 2004, when I ran, it cost 

$4,147,000,000. And just this past cycle, it cost $5,285,680,883. 

Mr. Chairman, we cannot simply become the prisoners, as we are 

today, of the perpetual campaign and of constant fundraising. The 

increased influence of money—big money—in our politics is robbing 

the average citizen of his or her voice in the setting of our Nation’s 

agenda and the determining of what the Congress will take up or 

not take up. It distracts from the real business of the Congress, 

and it requires extraordinary time commitment from Members of 

Congress who are the prisoners of this perpetual campaign. Worse, 

it limits access and influence to those who can raise or contribute 

large sums of money. 

Nobody knows this better than Senator Feingold, whose name is 

synonymous with campaign finance reform. I appreciate his tireless 

work to rid our democracy of special interests. And I appreciate 

Senator Durbin’s efforts to reinvigorate what is left of our public 

financing system. 

I have testified before this Committee on the influence of special 

interest money in elections in 1985, after I ran a PAC-free Senate 

race for the U.S. Senate. I testified again in 1987 and again in 
7 

1990. I joined then with Senator Boren and Senator Mitchell in authoring legislation which had public financing as a component in 

a voluntary system that met constitutional requirements. We 

passed it in the United States Senate. And President George Herbert Walker Bush vetoed it. 

I am back here again today because two decades later, we have 

yet to successfully attack the problem. And I am here to ask this 

Committee to take bold action before the system deteriorates even 

further as a result of the Supreme Court’s dangerous decision. 

Before the Court stepped in, a corporation encouraged employees 

to contribute to a political action committee or to make individual 

donations to favorite candidates. Because of corporate power, that 

had some effect on donations. But now, thanks to the Supreme 

Court, Senator Bennett, the system has been tilted inexorably towards those who have the most money. Now a corporation can simply just budget corporate funds—they do not have to request anybody to contribute, just budget the funds as a matter of corporate 

policy to oppose a candidate and then actively campaign all the 

way up until the polls close at 7:00 or 8:00 in the evening on election day. 

Our Republican colleagues often complain about activist Federal 

judges. But in this case, this Supreme Court went out of its way 

to unleash the power of corporations in our politics, way beyond 

what the decision needed as a matter of strict adherence to the law 

and to the issue before the Court. Even Ben Ginsberg, a long-time 

lawyer for Republican conservative causes, has warned of the consequences of this ruling. He says future campaigns are ‘‘going to be 

a wild, wild West.’’ 

Indeed, now all CEOs have to do is turn over millions of corporate dollars to lobbyists to run media campaigns to help their 

friends and defeat their opponents in Congress. The sums of money 

that we are talking about will mean little to the corporations compared to what they might get in return—maybe a special interest 

bill or blocking a regulation. And the loser will be the American 

public and the public interest. 

Make no mistake about it. The Supreme Court’s ruling also 

clears the way for the domestic subsidiaries—notwithstanding Justice Alito’s shaking of the head and mouthing of the words ‘‘Not 

true,’’ it does clear the way for domestic subsidiaries of a foreign 

corporation to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence our 

elections. 

Now, yes, foreign nationals and foreign-controlled corporations 

are barred from contributing directly to Federal and State elections. But nothing in the law bars foreign subsidiaries incorporated 

in the U.S. from doing so. And those subsidiaries answer not to the 

American people, but they answer to their corporate parents way 

off in some other country. That means in no uncertain way that a 

foreign corporation can indeed play in American elections, and clever people will not have a hard time covering their trail. 

We face two challenges: first, to mediate the impact of the 

Court’s decision and stop the bleeding through immediate countermeasures; and, second, to think boldly about the best way to free 

our democracy from the dominance of big money. 
8 

Mr. Chairman, the reform ideas already circulating are promising—mandating shareholder approval of spending since it is, in 

fact, the shareholders’ money; prohibiting spending by domestic 

subsidiaries of foreign corporations and Government contractors; 

giving candidates prime-time access to the public airwaves at the 

lowest rates, which we have been fighting for years. 

We must do these things quickly to protect the integrity of the 

elections this fall. But we may also need to think bigger. I think 

we need a constitutional amendment to make it clear once and for 

all that corporations do not have the same free speech rights as individuals. 

Amending the Constitution is a serious endeavor. I know it is not 

this Committee’s direct jurisdiction. And some of the sharpest 

minds in the country are working together right now to construct 

language for an amendment that would solve the problem and get 

to the heart of the issue. And I am ready to work with them and 

with the activists it will take to get an amendment ratified. 

Mr. Chairman, there is no bigger step to achieve big change than 

such an amendment. But the big issues of fairness and justice 

sometimes demand more immediate action. less. 

I think it is time for everyone who wants a Government that 

works for people to stop tinkering around the edges of a system 

that is broken beyond repair. Mr. Chairman, I know that ultimately a constitutional amendment will have to begin in the Judiciary Committee, but this Committee now has the opportunity 

under your leadership to pass many of the proposals in front of it 

now that can immediately help ensure that in the next election 

millions of our fellow citizens are not disenfranchised because of 

the concentration of money and power. I think that is an important 

responsibility, and I look forward to working with this Committee 

to try to help enact it. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Kerry, and we look forward to working with you. That is just what we intend to do. 

Okay. We are now going to call our witnesses, our remaining witnesses to the table. Would they please come forward? 

Let me just briefly introduce each of our witnesses and ask them 

to—their entire statements, every one of your entire statements 

will be read in the record—if you could, limit your testimony to 5 

minutes so we will all have some time for questions. 

Mr. Steve Bullock is currently the Attorney General for the State 

of Montana. He was elected to this position November of 2008, 

served in the Montana Justice Department for over a decade, and 

was executive assistant attorney general and acting chief deputy 

legislative director. From 2001 to 2004, he practiced law with the 

firm of Steptoe & Johnson while serving as an adjunct professor at 

GW University School of Law. 

Allison Hayward is an assistant professor of law at the George 

Mason University, and she served as chief of staff and counsel in 

the office of former FEC commissioner Bradley Smith. She has 

practiced election law in both Washington, D.C., and California. 

Mr. Edward Foley is the Robert M. Duncan/Jones Day Designated Professor in Law at Ohio State University’s Moritz College 

of Law. He is the director of Election Law at Moritz, a publication 

that provides information and analysis of the changes in election 
9 

law. He clerked for Justice Blackmun and Chief Judge Patricia 

Wald of the Court of Appeals. In 1999, he served as the State Solicitor in the office of the Ohio Attorney General’s Office. 

Stephen Hoersting is vice president and co-founder of the Center 

for Competitive Politics. Previously he served as General Counsel 

to the National Republican Senatorial Committee under its Chairman, Senator George Allen, during the 2003–04 election cycle. He 

was also counsel to FEC Commissioner Bradley A. Smith. 

Fred Wertheimer is the president and CEO of Democracy 21 and 

the Democracy 21 Education Fund, which he founded in 1997. He 

was previously the president of Common Cause and has also served 

as a Fellow at the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and 

Public Policy at Harvard University and as the J. Skelly Wright 

Fellow and Visiting Lecturer at Yale Law School. 

Heather Gerken is the J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law—J. 

Skelly Wright is in the house—at Yale Law School, where she 

teaches an advanced course on election law. Previously she served 

as a clerk for Justice David Souter. She was also granted tenure 

as an assistant professor at Harvard Law School, where she won 

the Sacks-Freund Teaching Award. 

Ladies and gentlemen, your entire statements are now in the 

record. You may proceed, and we will just move from left to right, 

starting with the Attorney General. 

STATEMENT OF STEVE BULLOCK, ATTORNEY GENERAL, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, STATE OF MONTANA, HELENA, 

MONTANA 

Mr. BULLOCK. Chairman Schumer, Senator Bennett, members of 

the Committee, thank you for the invitation to appear today to address some of the States’ interests in the matters that you are 

grappling with today. 

Last summer, Montana led more than half the States in asking 

the Court to address the narrow Federal issues presented by Citizens United. Instead the Court reached a broad decision that questions more than a century of law in Montana and across the country. Yet the case and reactions on both sides of the political aisle, 

have largely overlooked the decision’s impact on the vast majority 

of elections in this country: those that are held at the State and 

the local levels. 

And there is historic meaning in a Montanan’s appearance here 

today. One hundred and ten years ago, a predecessor of this Committee—the Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections—‘‘expressed horror at the amount of money which had been poured into 

politics in Montana in elections from 1888 onward.’’ The setting 

was the investigation into the infamous bribery of the Montana 

Legislature by Senator William A. Clark, which led to its refusal 

to seat him. 

But the corruption of Montana politics was by no means limited 

to bribery. Senator Clark and his fellow ‘‘Copper Kings’’ dominated 

political debate in Montana and drowned out Montanans’ own 

voices. This was corruption as it was understood since the framing 

of the Constitution: not mere theft or bribery, but harnessing government power to benefit a single corporate faction at the expense 

of the broader and more diverse interests represented by the people 
10 

themselves. In an 1884 election establishing Helena as the State 

capital, for example, Clark and his arch rival, Marcus Daly, combined to spend between $35 and $70 million in today’s dollars to 

influence 52,000 voters. That is about $1,000 per vote. 

Mining money reached every campaign—legislators, judges, sheriffs, county commissioners, and assessors. And the result was best 

described by Clark in his own testimony here before the Senate 

Committee. He said many people have become so indifferent to voting there by reason of the large sums of money that have been expended in the State heretofore that you have to do a great deal of 

urging, and it takes a lot of men to do it, to go around and round 

them up and stir them up and get them out. 

Fed up, in 1912 our citizens through the initiative process passed 

several political reforms. One prohibited corporations that could 

most benefit from government action from ‘‘pay[ing] or 

contribut[ing] in order to aid, promote or prevent the nomination 

or election of any person.’’ The law represented nothing less than 

the voters taking back a government that belongs to them, and 

only to them. 

Montanans know their history as well as they know their political officials and their public officials. Over nearly a century, our 

limit on corporate campaign spending in candidate elections has 

served us well and has never been challenged. Corporations are 

represented in Montana campaigns, but on equal terms alongside 

other political committees, all of them speaking through voluntary 

associations of their money, ideas, and voices. It is a system Montanans continue to believe in. 

We did not want this fight in Montana, but the Citizens United 

decision will likely invite a challenge to the people’s law of 1912. 

And we do not want to be set back a century. I am principally concerned about the ways State elections are especially vulnerable to 

corporate corruption and ask you keep these concerns in mind as 

you consider reforms. 

First, our campaigns are small compared to the corporations that 

would corrupt them. In 2008, the average Montana State senator 

won on $17,000 of spending; the average Senator in this body won 

spending $8.5 million. That is more than the combined amount 

raised by all 327 candidates running for State office in 2008. With 

the floodgates opened to corporate spending, it will not take a Copper King to buy a $17,000 election. 

Second, the ‘‘foreign corporations’’ that can corrupt our elections 

are more likely to come from Delaware than offshore. While we can 

legislate to hold Montana corporations accountable to their shareholders, our State laws may not always reach businesses incorporated elsewhere. As you protect Federal elections from foreign influence, understand that federalism requires room for States to 

protect their elections from foreign influence too, whether that influence be international or interstate. 

Third, Montana’s history shows the special damages arising from 

corporate corruption in judicial elections. Like the majority of 

States, we hold our judges accountable through elections. Supreme 

Court justices in Montana campaign on as little as $100,000, far 

less than the stakes in the cases they are asked to decide. As 

Caperton recognized, independent expenditures can have a ‘‘signifi-
11 

cant and disproportionate influence’’ in corrupting the administration of justice. 

Finally, I am encouraged by the Supreme Court’s nearly unanimous affirmation of disclosure and disclaimer laws and hope more 

can be done. By amplifying disclosure and disclaimer requirements 

for corporations, voters can know the identity of the wizard behind 

the curtain. We may not be able to stop Acme, Inc. from using 

other people’s money to campaign, but we can ensure voters know 

it is Acme speaking in their elections, not ‘‘Citizens for Motherhood 

and Apple Pie’’ or some other front group. We can also protect the 

shareholders who are just trying to save for retirement and want 

nothing to do with some CEO’s politics. 

In Montana we have ensured that the voices of our candidates 

and those of the natural persons that support and vote for them 

are not displaced by the treasuries of corporations. The Supreme 

Court has challenged all of us to find new ways to keep those 

voices heard. I look forward to working with our legislature and 

Congress in doing so. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bullock – Appendix B:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Attorney General Bullock. 

Professor Hayward. 

STATEMENT OF ALLISON HAYWARD, PROFESSOR, GEORGE 

MASON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW, ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA 

Ms. HAYWARD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, for having me here today. I would like to just amplify a couple of the points I have made in my submitted testimony, and I 

welcome any and all questions that you have. 

In my view, the holding in Citizens United fits soundly within 

the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on this question. The independent expenditure ban has been controversial from the beginning. Enacted in 1947 in part of a little debated 11th hour amendment to the Taft-Hartley Act, it has been a source of contention 

among prosecutors as well as scholars since that time. 

When the Court has squarely faced limits on expenditures, it has 

found them unconstitutional. Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce from 1990 falls outside that trend. But if for no other reason, 

this Court ought to be applauded in Citizens United for bringing 

some coherence to the constitutional doctrine in this area. 

Going forward, it would seem appropriate—to me, anyhow—that 

we should observe how corporations—and, by the way, labor organizations, which are equally beneficiaries, if you want to look at it 

that way, of Citizens United. We should see how they react. It 

might well be that corporations engage in spending that they would 

not have before, but I am not sure. I am not sure that the experience in States that allow corporate expenditures would suggest 

that corporations will go and participate in campaigns in ways differently than they do now. 

I can see corporations that have concerns about market goodwill 

maybe engaging in some soft focus voter education type messages 

that they might not have before out of fear of violating 441(b). But 

I am not really sure that is the kind of thing that is something that 

should trigger concern, at least at this point. 
12 

It is the task of Congress, based on experience and sound logic, 

to see what happens and then regulate appropriately to preserve 

the integrity of this institution and its members. But until we see 

some evidence, I think it will be very difficult for any law enacted 

in Congress to pass the strict scrutiny examination that the Court 

is serious about applying to restrictions on political speech. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Hayward – Appendix C:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Professor Hayward. 

Professor Foley? 

STATEMENT OF EDWARD B. FOLEY, THE ROBERT M. DUNCAN/ 

JONES DAY DESIGNATED PROFESSOR IN LAW, MORITZ COLLEGE OF LAW, THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY, COLUMBUS, 

OHIO 

Mr. FOLEY. Chairman Schumer, Senator Bennett, members of 

the Committee, thank you for giving me the honor of being here 

today. 

Citizens United was a case about a statute—a statute that prohibited any campaign spending by any corporation. Citizens 

United, therefore, tells us very little about different statutes that 

are narrowly targeted at specific categories of corporations or statutes that involve ceilings on the amount of campaign spending 

rather than an absolute ban. 

The concept of narrow tailoring is deeply embedded in First 

Amendment law, and Citizens United explicitly recognized it as the 

controlling standard. The Court called the statute there an ‘‘asymmetrical’’ response to the problem of corruption. ‘‘Asymmetrical’’— 

that was the Court’s word, and it means the opposite of narrow tailoring. Therefore, after Citizens United, the question is what new 

statutes would pass the narrow tailoring test. 

The oral argument confirms this reading of the Court’s opinion. 

During argument, Justice Scalia essentially invited Congress to 

come back to the Supreme Court with a different statute, a more 

narrowly tailored one. In other areas of constitutional law, oral argument can show that a new precedent is unlikely to be as farreaching as might first appear. The well-known Lopez case, concerning Congress’s Commerce Clause power, is an example, and 

Citizens United, in my judgment, fits this pattern, and its scope 

likely will be circumscribed in future cases just like Lopez was. 

Citizens United must be read in relation to other cases concerning the distinction between public sector and private sector corporations as well as, potentially, an intermediate category of corporations that are public-private hybrids. Citizens United itself recognized that entities engaged in ‘‘government functions’’ do not 

have the First Amendment rights of purely private sector speakers. 

The Court’s concern there was with the private sector as shown by 

its invocation of the famous Federalist Papers. Accordingly, Citizens United should not be seen as applicable to public sector corporations or even those that may fall into a middle public-private 

hybrid category. 

The 1995 Supreme Court case involving Amtrak called Lebron illustrates this point. That case was an 8–1 decision written by Justice Scalia, and it ruled that Amtrak is part of the Federal Govern-
13 

ment, even though the relevant statute said that Amtrak was a forprofit corporation that was not part of the Government. But in rejecting that statutory classification, the Supreme Court in Lebron 

adopted a functional, rather than formalistic, approach for identifying when a for-profit corporation properly belongs in the public 

rather than private sector. Given Lebron, Amtrak may not use its 

own money for express campaign ads, just like the Government 

itself may not do so. 

So the question is: What other for-profit corporations are like 

Amtrak? Or, in other words, using the functional approach of 

Lebron, what other corporations are sufficiently engaged in Government functions that Congress is entitled to say that they, too, 

should be ineligible for the private sector First Amendment right 

to engage in express campaign advocacy. 

Consider the banking industry. Obviously, the Federal Reserve 

itself cannot engage in express campaign speech. The same should 

be true for major banks that are deeply entwined with the Federal 

Reserve System or which received TARP funds. The essential role 

of these banks in our Nation’s economy means that Congress 

should be able to say that they are public sector entities or at least 

public-private hybrids, to which the Citizens United ruling simply 

does not apply. They are not restaurants or clothing stores or other 

kinds of small business corporations, which is what Citizens United 

had in mind. On the contrary, these major banks that undergird 

our financial infrastructure are much closer to the Amtrak end of 

the spectrum. 

Thus, to wrap up, Citizens United, together with Lebron and 

other precedents, showed that Congress has considerable latitude 

to regulate the campaign spending of corporations that have a public sector character. Besides the banking industry, other examples 

may include public utilities, defense contractors, or corporations 

deemed ‘‘too big to fail,’’ like General Motors, whatever line of industry they may be in. Congress again has even greater latitude 

if it uses ceilings on large-scale expenditures, rather than absolute 

bans. 

Finally, the concern expressed in Citizens United for the private 

sector in the United States does not apply to foreign entities. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Foley – Appendix D:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. 

Next we have Mr. Hoersting. 

STATEMENT OF STEPHEN M. HOERSTING, CENTER FOR 

COMPETITIVE POLITICS, ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA 

Mr. HOERSTING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today on behalf of 

the Center for Competitive Politics. The Citizens United opinion is 

a landmark in First Amendment jurisprudence. Nonetheless, there 

is some consternation over the opinion that has resulted in 

mischaracterizations that need correcting. 

First, corporations are not mere creatures of the State that lack 

First Amendment rights. The Trustees of Dartmouth College case, 

cited erroneously for this proposition, discusses clear distinctions 

between private corporations established by individuals and munic-
14 

ipal corporations established by governments. Indeed, Professor 

Foley rightly acknowledged this distinction, this private-public distinction, in his testimony moments ago. 

Second, foreign participation in our elections is a crime, whether 

done directly or indirectly. Even the giving or receiving of foreign 

advice is a crime. 

Now, domestic subsidiaries with a majority of foreign directors 

may establish PACs, so long as the decisions are delegated to U.S. 

nationals. PACs, after all, allow American employees to participate 

in politics no matter their employer. But domestic subsidiaries with 

a majority of foreign directors will not make corporate political expenditures going forward, even as they continue to allow their U.S. 

employees to fund a PAC. The reason is that doing so would be a 

crime under existing law. 

Therefore, any tightening of the existing ban can only prevent 

U.S. nationals from participating in U.S. elections with funds 

earned within the United States. This would violate the rights of 

U.S. nationals. Likewise, any belt-and-suspenders approach that 

merely restates existing law and achieves little or nothing would 

be a statute unworthy of U.S. Senators. 

Proposals to silence corporations with 5 percent foreign ownership are likely unconstitutional, as Professor Gerken acknowledges 

in her testimony, not least because it is burdensome for corporations to know just who owns 5 percent of shares at any particular 

point in time. 

Corporations with a majority of foreign shareholders are already 

covered by existing law, and legislation that would clarify the point 

must apply equally to non-profits with a majority of foreign membership and to labor unions. 

The Supreme Court just said in Citizens United that any association of Americans may speak about politics no matter their 

associational form. And it is possible that a majority of the D.C. 

Circuit in just a few weeks may permit multiple organizations to 

pool funds for these purposes. This would mean that the Children’s 

Defense Fund may team with the teachers’ unions, and that the 

right-to-life organizations may team with right-to-work groups and 

small businesses. This ultimately will be healthy for our democracy, and in any event, there is little you can do now but adapt to 

it. 

Some wish to slow the effects of the opinion with legislative 

measures. Professor Laurence Tribe wants all corporate political 

ads to feature the name of the corporation’s CEO and the percentage of the treasury funds spent on the ad. But what benefit would 

that provide the public? The apparent goal is simply to deter 

speech. 

Others propose shareholder votes for corporate expenditures, but 

these raise First Amendment and federalism concerns and may 

suppress corporate speech. Instead of delaying the inevitable, Congress could mitigate these concerns by freeing the political parties 

of the few remaining McCain-Feingold provisions that have not 

been struck down by the courts. 

Most of the organizations I am aware of, after all, would rather 

give some of their resources to the political party committees than 

go it alone under the Citizens United opinion. And you should per-
15 

mit them to do so. Lift some restrictions or I fear you will face second-tier budgets that garner second-tier operatives, resulting in 

second-tier campaigns. 

If this trend persists, it is possible even that the people may go 

elsewhere, not because they disagree with your message, but because current law makes it comparatively impossible to affiliate 

with anything that has Democrat or Republican in the title and almost effortless to engage now with outside organizations. 

Mr. Wertheimer, respectfully, would exacerbate your problem by 

tightening existing restrictions on coordination, keeping flat the 

amounts the party committees can accept, even as he recognizes 

that outside organizations will likely spend relatively more resources with this opinion. 

My overall point to you is this: If it is really your position that 

accepting the support of your political allies somehow corrupts you, 

well, then, the Supreme Court will always take you at your word. 

What the Court will no longer take, correctly and for the foreseeable future, is any variation of the argument that outside groups 

can be silenced because they speak more effectively than some 

might prefer. 

Your choice, then, is to awaken to this new reality or not to do 

so. I, for one hope that you do. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hoersting – Appendix E:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Before we move on to Mr. Wertheimer, Senator Udall has to leave by 11:00 and had asked to make a short 

statement. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR UDALL 

Senator UDALL. Thank you, Chairman Schumer, and I need to 

preside at 11:00, so I appreciate you doing that. And I would like 

to thank you for holding this hearing. 

Campaign finance reform is an issue you and I both care about 

deeply, and I know we share strong concerns about financing elections in the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision. Fifty years 

ago, when my father, Stewart Udall, and my uncle, Mo, were in office, money had a minimal impact on the electoral and political system. It was about connecting with people and about the marketplace of ideas. Right now, it is just as much about the biggest 

checkbooks, if not more so, than it is about the best ideas. 

Unfortunately, we are about to see a lot more big checkbooks in 

the election process. Last month’s Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC was a victory for special interests at the expense of the average American. We have seen firsthand the impact 

special interests like big oil and big banks and health insurance 

companies have had on the legislative process. Now with this decision, already powerful corporations and unions will be able to further open their bank accounts, further drowning out the voices of 

everyday Americans in the political process. 

Members of both chambers and the administration are working 

on legislation to address the Citizens United decision. I commend 

their efforts, but I believe that a comprehensive overhaul of the 

campaign finance system is necessary in order to restore public 

faith in our elections. The Supreme Court has shown its willing-
16 

ness to rule broadly and ignore longstanding precedent when it is 

reviewing the constitutionality of campaign finance laws. The best 

long-term solution is a constitutional amendment that would prevent the Court from overturning sensible campaign finance regulations. I would welcome the opportunity to join my colleagues in introducing such an amendment. 

While I believe that a constitutional amendment is the ideal solution, I also think that comprehensive reform legislation is a step 

in the right direction. As a Member in the House for 10 years, I 

joined Representative Dave Obey as an original cosponsor of the 

Let the People Decide Clean Campaign Act, a bill that would fundamentally change how House elections are conducted. Mr. Obey 

reintroduced his bill in this Congress, and I intend to introduce a 

companion bill in the Senate in the coming weeks. 

The act does not attempt to fine-tune the existing congressional 

campaign finance system or tweak the edges; rather, it makes fundamental, wholesale changes to fundraising by candidates, regulations of outside groups, and the role of political parties. It contains 

a finding that America’s faith in the election system has been fundamentally corrupted by big money from outside interest groups. It 

establishes a system of voluntary contributions to provide public financing of campaigns for Senate candidates in general elections. It 

provides more funds than the current system for the vast majority 

of challengers to mount their campaigns. It empowers voters with 

the knowledge that their vote affects the outcome of the current 

election and also affects the amount of funds distributed to nominees in future elections. 

It bans all independent expenditures so that only the candidate 

is responsible for his or her message. It provides for expedited consideration of a constitutional amendment allowing these changes if 

the Supreme Court rejects the plan. It provides a process by which 

third-party candidates can also participate in the system. 

Money can have a corrosive effect on the political process. We 

have seen evidence of that in campaigns at all levels of Government. We have long needed substantive campaign finance reform, 

and it is my hope that the high Court’s disappointing decision will 

provide the push we need to put elections back in the hands of average Americans and not the special interests who can use their 

unlimited bank accounts to railroad the process to their preferred 

conclusion. 

With that, Mr. Chairman, I would yield back, and I thank you 

very much for the opportunity to give my statement before heading 

out to preside. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. Thank you for your excellent 

statement. 

Senator UDALL. I look forward to working with you very closely. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. 

Mr. Wertheimer? 

STATEMENT OF FRED WERTHEIMER, PRESIDENT, 

DEMOCRACY 21, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Bennett, 

and members of the Committee, for the opportunity to testify. 
17 

The 5–4 Supreme Court decision in Citizens United is the most 

radical and destructive campaign finance decision in the history of 

the Court. The decision threw out a century-old national policy to 

prevent corporate wealth from being used in Federal elections, and 

it threw out similar policies in many States. 

The decision also threw out two decades of precedents upholding 

that national policy without any relevant changed circumstances 

from the time the precedents were adopted, except for the composition of the Court. As Justice Stevens pointed out in his dissent, or 

as I think of it, a future majority opinion-in-waiting, the only thing 

that matters here is the make-up of the Court. When this Court 

make-up changes again sometime in the future, I expect the Citizens United decision to be thrown out. 

The decision represents breathtaking judicial activism by five 

Justices who are commonly considered as conservative Justices. 

The decision also represents an enormous transfer of power in our 

country from citizens to corporations. It opens the door to the use 

of immense aggregate wealth of corporations to directly participate 

in campaigns and thereby to buy influence over Government decisions. 

Under this decision, insurance companies, banks, drug companies, energy companies and the like, and their trade associations, 

each will be free to run multimillion dollar campaigns to elect or 

defeat Federal candidates, depending on whether the officeholders 

voted right or wrong on issues of importance to those groups. 

Now, this also opens the door to labor unions to undertake those 

same efforts, but it is quite clear that the resources of labor unions 

are dwarfed by the resources of corporations. 

Prior to the decision, former Senator Hagel, a Republican from 

Nebraska, pointed out the consequences if this Court overturned 

the ban. Senator Hagel said in an interview with a Washington 

Post reporter that if restrictions on corporate money were lifted, 

‘‘the lobbyists and operators would run wild.’’ Senator Hagel also 

said that reversing the law would magnify corporate power in society and ‘‘be an astounding blow against good government, responsible government,’’ and ‘‘would debase the system, so we would get 

to the point where we couldn’t govern ourselves.’’ 

We believe it is essential for Congress to move swiftly to enact 

legislation effective for the 2010 congressional elections that can 

mitigate the damage done by this decision. We have submitted a 

list of proposals that we would hope Congress would consider. I 

would like to briefly address two of them. 

Congress should adopt broad new disclosures requirements to 

cover campaign-related expenditures by corporations and labor 

unions—disclosure to the shareholders, disclosure to the public, 

disclosure to the members of labor unions. While other campaign 

finance reforms have resulted in strong differences of opinion, there 

has always been a strong bipartisan consensus around the importance of disclosure laws. This has not been a partisan issue in the 

past, and it should not be a partisan issue now. 

The Supreme Court affirming by 8–1 the disclosure provisions involved in the Citizens United case said, ‘‘With the advent of the 

Internet, prompt disclosure of expenditures can provide corpora-
18 

tions and citizens with the information needed to hold corporations 

and elected officials accountable for their positions and supporters.’’ 

Now, we also believe that Congress should fix the lowest unit 

rate and make it available as soon as possible. The Senate in 2001 

voted for such a provision by a large bipartisan majority, 69–31. Of 

the 14 members of this Committee who were in the Senate at the 

time of that vote, 11 voted for the provision, including the Chairman and Ranking Member of this Committee, Senate Republican 

Leader McConnell, and Assistant Democratic Majority Leader Durbin, and Senator Durbin has taken the lead in legislation in this 

area. We believe it was bipartisan then, it should be bipartisan 

now, simply to fix an existing lowest unit rate provision that provides the ability to Senators and Representatives now to get the 

lowest unit rate. 

We urge you to move swiftly to enact legislation that can promptly address the problems created by the decision. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Wertheimer – Appendix F:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. 

Professor Gerken. 

STATEMENT OF HEATHER K. GERKEN, J. SKELLY WRIGHT 

PROFESSOR OF LAW, YALE LAW SCHOOL, NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT 

Ms. GERKEN. Senator Schumer, Senator Bennett, and distinguished members of this Committee, thank you for letting me testify before you today. 

The witnesses thus far have presented a starkly different portrayal of Citizens United and its aftermath, but I want to talk 

about something that I think is quite crucial and has nothing to 

do with whose ox is gored by this decision, and that is the stark 

fact that the Supreme Court overruled its own precedent in utter 

disregard of its criteria for departing from the grand principle of 

stare decisis. It did so simply because it thought the original decision was badly reasoned and had prompted dissent within the 

Court. 

Whatever you think about campaign finance, that is a remarkable and dismaying fact because if badly reasoned decisions accompanied by dissents are hereby subject to reversal, the Court is 

going to have an awful lot of work to do. 

All of the efforts of some of the prior witnesses to show that Austin was an outlier or that bans on corporate expenditures were 50 

years old rather than 100 years old—all of that seems to me quite 

beside the point. Austin was an outlier among the Court’s precedent. But the Supreme Court does not engage in a tit-for-tat approach to its own precedent. Five votes is not a license for vengeance. Five votes is also not a license to do anything that you want 

to do. 

As the Court recognized in Casey, we trust the Court with the 

precious task of interpreting the Constitution because we expect 

the Court to accord the same respect to its prior decisions that we 

accord to its present ones. The fact that a decision was poorly reasoned is not enough to overturn precedent, at least prior to Citizens 

United. 
19 

The fact that a decision prompted controversy is not enough to 

overturn it, at least prior to Citizens United. The Court has always 

required a good deal more before reversing itself, and with good 

reason. No matter what we think of this decision, we should be dismayed by the Court’s disregard of its own precedent. 

Now, while I wish that the Court had either adhered to its own 

precedent or at least offered a more compelling reason for overturning Austin, overturn Austin it did. Senator Feingold is correct 

that no legislation can fully respond to this decision, but several 

paths, nonetheless, remain open and let me discuss them quickly. 

First, Congress may strengthen existing disclosure and disclaimer rules. There is only one issue on which the Court achieved 

near unanimity in Citizens United, and that was that transparency 

matters. With respect to Mr. Hoersting, it seems to me that he has 

mischaracterized the Court’s opinion. The Court told us that democratic debate works best when voters know the source of the political messages they receive, and it said that Congress may take the 

steps necessary to provide that information. The Court told us that 

disclaimers and disclosure promote First Amendment values rather 

than undermine them. 

Now, disclosure and disclaimer requirements will fail if they are 

easy to evade. Corporations will be tempted to hide behind vaguely 

named shell organizations to shield their identity. They can also 

evade disclosure rules simply by the way they earmark donations. 

But there are existing State and Federal precedents that suggest 

good ways to deal with these questions. In my written testimony, 

I mentioned, for instance, the Washington State approach which 

requires expenditures to list the name of the top donors who funded the ad so that people know the source of the speech they are 

listening to. 

In my view, disclaimer and disclosure rules stand on firm constitutional footing. Congress’ power here is well established, and 

the Court merely reinforced it. 

Second, Congress may take steps to protect shareholders from 

wasteful spending. Indeed, one of the main reasons that the Court 

enthusiastically endorsed disclosure rules was to protect corporate 

shareholders. While I leave the details of such provisions to experts 

in corporate law, I should urge Congress to keep in mind here that 

the problem here is not American democracy, but shareholder democracy. Shareholder elections are connected to Federal elections 

in this one respect: Citizens United vindicated the right of corporations to speak, and shareholders are the corporation. 

And, again, if I just may correct what I think is a misstatement 

of my position, I made no comment on the constitutionality of the 

5-percent rule. To the contrary, because I am not an expert in corporate law—and I am under the impression that none of the witnesses here is either—I leave the decision about what is the right 

percentage here to experts in corporate law. But I will just note 

that if you start to look at State law cognates and Federal 

cognates, the numbers range from 10 percent to 20 percent to 25 

percent. So I do think that there is room here for Congress to do 

something with regard to shareholder protection. 

Finally, I believe that Congress has the power to protect U.S. 

elections from the influence of foreign nationals. Again, there are 
20 

many rules for doing this, but I believe that they stand on firm 

constitutional footing. Although there is no direct Court precedent 

on this issue, the distinction between citizens and non-citizens in 

elections is well established in constitutional law. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Gerken – Appendix G:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Well, thank you. I want to thank our panel 

for their testimony, diverse and thought-provoking. 

As you know, we are looking seriously at introducing legislation 

in the not-too-distant future. I am working with Congressman Van 

Hollen on a House side bill. So my questions are aimed in that regard rather than to have discussion and argument, which, of 

course, we could easily have and it would be fun. 

First, I would like to ask Professor Gerken and maybe Mr. 

Wertheimer about this: Since the decision allows corporate spending to be much more freely done, those corporate dollars can end 

up being given to 501(c)(4)s, (c)(5)s, and (c)(6)s, so changing their 

nature as well. Should we consider whatever type of legislation 

that we want to address for direct corporate spending to apply to 

these units as well—disclosure, disclaimer, lowest unit rule? You 

could go through all of them. Professor Gerken, what do you think, 

or Mr. Wertheimer, whoever wants to go first. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Absolutely. I think it is essential when you get 

to the disclosure questions to ensure that the disclosures cover organizations who either are making direct corporate expenditures or 

are indirectly making corporate expenditures. Many (c)(4)s are corporations already. 

But if you are going to make sure that the public knows what 

is happening with who is responsible for making expenditures, you 

have to carefully be able to trace the money and have it all out on 

the table. I mean, the Court was as clear as could be here that disclosure and prompt disclosure is an appropriate way to deal with 

this situation. The trick is to make sure you get all the information, and I think it is absolutely essential to do that. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Do you agree, Professor Gerken? 

Ms. GERKEN. Yes, I agree. There has been a large debate about 

what exactly will be the effect of the Supreme Court’s decision, and 

I think much will depend on what you do on this front. That is, 

if corporations have the ability to fund 501(c)(4)s and (c)(6)s that 

are named Americans for America, you could imagine they would 

be quite tempted to spend that money. 

On the other hand, if corporations knew that that money is simply going to be identified as associated with them, I think that the 

power of corporate spending is much reduced. And here I should 

note that there are two things that you need to worry about—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. Can I ask you, the power or the likelihood? 

Ms. GERKEN. The likelihood, yes. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. 

Ms. GERKEN. Which I do think, though, translates, for the reasons that Senator Feingold articulated, into power. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. 

Ms. GERKEN. There are two things that you need to keep track 

of in my view. The first is simply identifying with a disclaimer on 

the ad who it is that is really behind the speech. And the second 
21 

is to make sure that corporations, by giving what are called nonspecifically designated donations to organizations like the chambers of commerce – which do both political work and non-political 

work that by just failing to earmark it, they can get around having 

it designated as a political contribution under a current FEC interpretation. That, it seems to me, must be corrected for this to work. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. Thank you. 

Lowest unit rate, which was mentioned, I think, by a few, does 

anyone here think if we were to legislate lowest unit rate, for instance, after a certain amount of this corporate money comes in, 

the candidate against which this is used gets lowest unit rate. Does 

anyone doubt the—whether you agree with it or disagree with it, 

doubt the constitutionality of that? Go ahead. I take it the only person then who doubts it is Ms. Hayward because she is the only one 

who raised her hand. Go ahead briefly. 

Ms. HAYWARD. Well, I would be concerned with the Davis v. FEC 

precedent, that that could be seen as something like in Davis 

where speech was being punished in a way or burdened in a way 

by giving the person for whom the speech was, you know, directed 

a benefit. Then, you know, the independent expenditure maker 

would be saying, well, look, if I make an independent expenditure, 

this person who I do not like gets a benefit. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. 

Ms. HAYWARD. That is more or less the logic of Davis. I am not 

saying that I have a crystal ball, but I think that would be the 

thing that you would want to look at. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Well, if I could comment on that. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Go ahead, Fred. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. I do not know that you have to have a dollar 

figure to trigger this. You already have a lowest unit rate provision 

that has been provided to Federal candidates for many years. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. It just does not work. There have been efforts 

to fix it in the past. I think it now becomes essential to fix it, and 

I do not know that you need a dollar figure. And, therefore, you 

would be providing all candidates the same benefit, and I do not 

think the Davis case would come into play. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Well, it might be triggered for other types 

of spending, party spending or other types of things. 

Professor Gerken? 

Ms. GERKEN. Yes, I agree that if you extend it to all candidates 

and you are careful about its functioning, you can avoid Davis. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And what about letting party committees or 

others get the lowest unit rate should this certain level of corporate 

money come in against a candidate? 

Ms. GERKEN. It is always difficult to predict the Supreme Court’s 

decisions on this front, but there is a sound constitutional argument that can be made. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Yes, okay. Let me ask you—I am sorry. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Mr. Chairman? 

Chairman SCHUMER. Please. 

Mr. HOERSTING. May I make a comment about disclosure for 

(c)(4), (c)(5), and (c)(6) giving? 

Chairman SCHUMER. Yes. 
22 

Mr. HOERSTING. Express advocacy expenditures will be disclosed 

under existing law, and they will be attributed to the people who 

actually further that expenditure, the same with electioneering 

communications, as the Court reaffirmed in Citizens United. But 

the compelled disclosure of donations for issue advocacy, there may 

be a constitutional problem with compelling the disclosure of those 

donations. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Does anyone agree with Mr. Hoersting on 

that? I thought the Court was pretty clear on that issue. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Well, I think the Court explicitly said that disclosure for express advocacy, the functional equivalent of express 

advocacy, and electioneering communications was appropriate. And 

there are some disclosures now, but they are not comprehensive, 

and they certainly do not capture where the money is coming from, 

so they are not adequate. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. A final question to Mr. Bullock, Attorney General Bullock. Do you think disclosure and disclaimer 

would be sufficient—not sufficient, but would make a—let me put 

it a different way—would have a significant impact on limiting 

what you fear would happen as a result of this decision in your 

State of Montana? In other words, if those who sought to spend lots 

of corporate money in Montana were either forced to disclose or 

even disclaim on an ad, would that have a significant effect? Do 

you think that is enough in the legislation? Would we have to go 

further? Give me just your feel for that? Because some are saying 

we should limit our legislation to disclaimer and disclosure; others 

are saying we should go further with some of the things that have 

been outlined here. 

Mr. BULLOCK. Yes, Chairman Schumer, twofold, one of which is 

I think disclosure and disclaimer is critical for our State elections. 

It needs to go beyond that which we have currently, though, because I think that there is substantial masking even under the extant system. And people do not really know who is behind these 

ads. 

Second of which, I do not believe that that is from a State’s perspective sufficient. We need as much sunshine, as much openness 

as possible, but there needs to be more in order for us to address 

the rest of the implications of this decision on Montana and other 

States. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Attorney General. 

Senator Bennett. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and 

thank you all for your testimony. This was an interesting panel 

and an interesting balance of reactions and comments on the decision. 

I come at this issue with a little bit different aspect because I 

am not a lawyer, but I have been a candidate and I have managed 

campaigns. And the first general comment I would want to make 

is that he who has the most money does not always win. Indeed, 

many times he who has the most money spends it stupidly and 

ends up helping the other side. Just because someone has the right 

to speak does not mean that he or she will speak intelligently or 

effectively. And not to touch anybody in a way that might be 

wounding or create problems, the election in New Jersey for Gov-
23 

ernor was not decided on the basis of who had the most money or 

who ran the most ads. 

I realize I am a Neanderthal on this view, but I still believe that 

in an election the candidate matters. And when you have a good 

candidate, yes, you need money and all the rest of it, but you are 

more likely to prevail than if you had a bad candidate. 

And I have spent enough time in the corporate world to know 

that corporations spend money on ads that do not work. Trying to 

sell their product, they produce ads that are stupid. Can anybody 

say ‘‘New Coke’’? Any demonstration of a corporation that spent a 

whole lot of money in a campaign that turned out to be really, really dumb demonstrates that many of the fears we are hearing, that 

the fact that corporations can now do what corporations connected 

with a media outlet do, is not, I do not think, the end of the world. 

I am reminded of the comments that occurred some years ago, 

you may remember, when people on the right said to all of their 

followers, ‘‘Buy CBS stock so you can become Dan Rather’s boss 

and tell him what has to happen.’’ And, of course, CBS is a corporation. The New York Times is a corporation. The Washington Post 

is a corporation. Fox News is a corporation. CNN is a corporation. 

And they all have the right under the Constitution to say in their 

editorial pages or in the people that they put on the air vote for 

or against this candidate, and they do it every day—not every day. 

Every election. 

We had a newspaper change hands in Salt Lake, and the new 

owner—the previous position of the paper was we do not endorse 

candidates, we just do editorials. And the new owner said we do 

endorse candidates, and he said he was going to—as a result of 

that, the paper was now going to have huge influence that it did 

not have before. And the sudden mention of candidates’ names did 

not change the power of the paper to influence things that it had 

previously. 

Mr. Wertheimer, do you support disclosure for your supporters? 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. I support whatever disclosure this Congress 

thinks should apply across the board. 

Senator BENNETT. All right. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. I think we have always had separate rules for 

campaigns because they deal with elected officials who are raising 

and spending the taxpayer’s money so that the public has a direct 

stake in knowing who your backers are. But if this Congress wants 

to adopt across-the-board rules for 501(c) organizations, we will 

comply with them. 

Senator BENNETT. I did not ask if you would comply, because I 

am sure you will comply. Would you support such a—— 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Well, it depends what the rules are. 

Senator BENNETT. Exactly, and I think we need to look at what 

the rules are elsewhere with these other items that you are talking 

about. 

References were made to PACs, which are a terrible thing, at 

least in some people’s comment. I remember Watergate and PACs 

were the reform. PACs were the way we were going to get away 

from some kind of corporate challenge and put money in the hands 

of people. 
24 

Do any of you feel that PACs are an improper way of financing 

elections? 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. If I could comment, having worked on that legislation, I disagree that PACs were the reform. The effort back 

then was to enact public financing of Presidential and congressional elections. The Senate passed legislation supporting Presidential and Senate public financing, and the House failed to pass 

it by 41 votes, and we were off to history. PACs were not a reform. 

They were codified because people were concerned that the Justice 

Department was going to take action against unions and corporations, but particularly unions, for having PACs as a violation of the 

corporate ban and labor union ban. So I very much disagree that 

they were viewed as the solution during the Watergate period. 

Senator BENNETT. Your memory and mine are different on that 

issue. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Senator Feinstein. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

I am one that believes the decision is really catastrophic, and it 

is catastrophic, I think, on the practical impact of day-to-day life 

of an elected official. 

I think Mr. Wertheimer hit it on page 6, and I want to quote 

him: ‘‘It would not take many examples of elections where multimillion corporate expenditures defeat a Member of Congress, before 

all Members quickly learn the lesson: vote against the corporate interest at stake in a piece of legislation and run the risk of being 

hit with a multimillion dollar corporate ad campaign to defeat you.’’ 

Let me give you an example. Right now, committees of this 

House are looking at financial regulation. Should hedge funds be 

regulated? A huge financial activity out there with no regulation. 

Credit default swaps, position limits, clearing—all of these things 

will affect the financial community in a dramatic way. Go against 

them, and you provide an opportunity for wealthy investment 

banking firms to pool funds, put them into an independent expenditure campaign against you. And the chilling effect on courage, I 

think, over time will be enormous. 

You can use this on guns, on abortion, on offshore oil drilling, on 

virtually any issue where the corporate interest is diametrically opposed; corporate or labor union or any other organization’s interest 

is diametrically opposed to what the member stands up and advocates. 

And one of the reasons why we have 6-year terms is so that we 

can be courageous, so we can say what we believe is in the best 

interest of all of the people of this great country. 

Mr. Chairman, I salute you, and the Ranking Member, with 

whom I have worked for a period of time. I hope we have a bill that 

has broad new disclosure requirements, approval by stockholders, 

has a CEO standing up on the disclaimer. If a company is going 

to put $5 million into an attack ad, the CEO ought to stand up and 

say, ‘‘I, the CEO of XYZ company, approve this ad.’’ A ban on Federal contractors making contributions, and a ban on foreign interest contributions. 

I see this as extraordinarily serious on courage in the bodies of 

Congress. So I just want to say that I think Mr. Wertheimer has 
25 

it right. I think we need to take action. And, incidentally, the 

United Kingdom took some action. I would just like to submit their 

bill for the record so that the Committee might have it. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Without objection. 

[The bill – Appendix H:] 

Senator FEINSTEIN. And I have no questions. I thank you. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Senator Durbin. 

Senator DURBIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I salute your efforts on this bill. I think disclosure and disclaimers are a good idea. 

We tried this, though, when we said that candidates had to stand 

up in the ads and say, ‘‘My name is Dick Durbin, and I approved 

the contents of this ad.’’ And we thought that that might lead to 

a more genteel and rational debate when it came to the media. The 

jury is still out. People are still skeptical. 

Historically, Attorney General Bullock, your reference to Senator 

William Clark of your State is one that I identify with because I 

am reading a book called ‘‘The Big Burn’’ by Tim Egan. It talks 

about the great forest fire of 1910 and William Clark’s efforts to 

stop the creation of the Forest Service and Federal forest lands. 

And he really did throw the money around very effectively, and 

your State passed some reforms as a result of it. 

I think back also, John Roberts when he came before the Senate 

Judiciary Committee told us he was just going to be an umpire, 

just going to call balls and strikes. Well, this Citizens United decision makes it clear he is an umpire on steroids because what they 

have done is overturn 100 years of precedent, at least 50, and basically allow corporations to have their will when it comes to political 

discourse, to give them First Amendment rights to come out for 

candidates. 

And I agree with Senator Feinstein, it will have a big impact on 

campaigns. It will have a big impact on Congress because it really 

will increase the pressure which can be put on Members of Congress for critical votes. There is pressure already, but the pressure 

will be increased dramatically knowing that the corporation you 

say no to, trying to fight off a new tax, is the same corporation that 

can now spend $1 million to beat you. 

And, Senator Bennett, I agree with you. The wealthiest candidates do not always win, but we all scramble for our power hours 

and our dialing for dollars and our trips all around the United 

States when we run, because we know if you do not have money 

to get your message out, you are going to lose. No matter how good 

you are, there is a limit to how far it will take you. 

I do have a personal interest in this because several years ago 

I introduced a bill on public financing. I really think that that is 

what we have to do. We have to break away from this model that 

we have for political campaigns which has created so much cynicism and so much distrust among the American voters. This Fair 

Elections Now bill that I have introduced is a voluntary bill, funded by a tax on the corporations that do business with the Federal 

Government, and basically says you cannot raise any contribution 

larger than a hundred bucks. If you raise enough of them, you 

qualify, you will get matching funds. You do not have to spend your 

life at the other end of a telephone hearing secretaries make excuses about why the boss cannot take another call from you. 
26 

I think that that would be a dramatic change, and I thought, I 

really thought, honestly, Mr. Wertheimer, that it would not go anywhere unless there was a major scandal. That is usually what 

leads to a reform. But I think this case may be the trigger. This 

case may be the catalyst. We say now we are going to give voters 

an alternative, they can choose between a candidate who opts for 

public financing on a voluntary basis with limited contributions of 

$100 or the other guys. And the other guys are going to be wallowing in money, and I do not think that they will be able to explain it away very easily when the contrast is made. So I think 

there is a possibility here that we can renew this debate. 

Some of my critics even in the Senate say, you know, the American people are interested in a lot of issues. They are interested in 

jobs and the economy and health care and so forth. They are not 

that interested in this issue. This is kind of an intramural issue 

as far as they are concerned. They think we are all going to be 

crooked and take too much money no matter what we do. So they 

are pretty skeptical when you talk about reform. 

But I really think they show that they care when given a chance. 

They did it in Arizona when they had a chance for a statewide referendum on whether or not they would go to public financing. They 

have done it in other States as well. 

I would like to just ask Attorney General Bullock and anyone 

who would like to comment, What do you think of the idea of public 

financing of campaigns? 

Mr. BULLOCK. Senator Durbin, I have not looked at the bill draft. 

Conceptually, I have always believed that there is some merit in 

public financing in campaigns. When I look to the Montana experience, the maximum I could raise by contribution limit was $310. 

I had to make a lot of calls. 

In a lot of respects, for States like mine there is still going to be 

the concern of the independent expenditures. And in State races, 

the independent expenditures can far dominate what I can raise. 

I agree with Senator Bennett that the candidate matters, but I 

have 147,000 square miles that I have to travel in Montana. But 

unless you could somehow make some system of financing sufficient to address or counter address the independent expenditures 

that will still flow into the election, I am not sure it will ever be 

sufficient to actually make it so that those good candidates can be 

heard. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Senator Durbin, I testified in this Committee 

room for the first time in 1973 urging then-Chairman Howard Cannon and the rest of the Committee to pass congressional public financing, and I have been working for it ever since. 

There was a young freshman Senator who had just gotten here 

who came up to testify and pleaded with his colleagues to pass congressional public financing. His name was Joe Biden. 

So I think it is the only fundamental solution to the problems 

here, fixing the Presidential public financing system, creating a 

system for Congress. 

I do think we have got to respond as quickly as we can right now 

in whatever ways are appropriate to this monumental decision. 

And I agree with Professor Gerken here. If the only standard for 

the Supreme Court is when the make-up of the Court changes, we 
27 

will change decisions we do not agree with. I truly can see Citizens 

United being overturned. 

But in the end, we have to have public financing of elections if 

we are going to give citizens their opportunity to have a voice that 

is not drowned out by large amounts of private money. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Senator Durbin—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. Do you want to say something, 

Mr. Hoersting? 

Mr. HOERSTING. Yes, please, if I could. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Please. 

Mr. HOERSTING. As the Attorney General mentioned, public financing will not do anything to dampen the relative spending of 

outside organizations as protected by this opinion. And there is one 

other point I would like to make about the Fair Elections Now Act. 

I would respectfully suggest that the Committee fully understand 

the decertification provisions in the bill. We have heard lots of talk 

about lobbyists or large interests going to a Congressman’s office 

and saying, ‘‘I hope you are with me in the coming election cycle.’’ 

But in Arizona, the clean elections commissions go so far so to nullify election results; they have the ability to invalidate elections 

after the fact based on whether they thought the provisions were 

followed or not. 

While the FENA proposals do not have election-nullification provisions, I worry that if the decertification provisions are not carefully studied, you may owe your elections and your financing not 

so much to constituents who may or may not support you, but to 

the administrative grace of a fair elections commissioner. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. 

Senator DURBIN. Mr. Chairman, if I could just respond. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Please. 

Senator DURBIN. That is not in my bill. Are you saying it is? 

Mr. HOERSTING. Yes, Senator, my understanding of FENA is that 

it has decertification provisions based on inability to comply. 

Senator DURBIN. No, it does not. 

Mr. HOERSTING. I will look into that, and I apologize if I have 

that incorrect. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. We are going to go to a next round 

for anyone who wants to. I have two more questions aimed at 

crafting the best piece of legislation that we can. 

The first, I would address to Professor Gerken. This is on foreign-influenced corporations, which we touched on. The Court discussed the prohibition on foreign nationals financing American 

elections, and we all know that there is already a provision that 

prevents foreign citizens and foreign corporations from invading 

our election process. Yet the Supreme Court did not fully address 

that area of the law in their opinion. The opinion said that 441(e) 

is on the books. It did not address the vital aspect that I would like 

you to talk about. 

Will this decision open a loophole in that foreign provision for 

multinational corporations or foreign-influenced corporations to be 

heavily involved in our elections? And if so, can you explain one or 

two ways a foreign-influenced company or government might do so? 

Ms. GERKEN. Senator, I think the key concern is the way that 

foreign nationals might work through the domestic subsidiaries of 
28 

foreign corporations. Now, there are rules in the FEC that address 

that question, although I will just say, with all due respect to the 

FEC, it has not been a model of an enforcement agency at all times 

in its history. And so Congress may wish to consider whether or 

not to put the FEC’s regulations into the statute to ensure that 

they have more muscular enforcement. One can also use disclosure 

and disclose rules to address the question of foreign nationals. 

The key problem, I think, for you is that there really is not much 

precedent on this from the Supreme Court, and so we are sort of 

feeling our way through the questions of what would be constitutional. But I do not believe that the Supreme Court is going to say 

that it is illegitimate for Congress to consider whether foreign nationals are influencing our elections. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. And if we had an ownership rule— 

5 percent, 20 percent, 30 percent; we know 51—we have heard Mr. 

Hoersting on that—do you think how high it goes affects the constitutionality? I mean, if there were one foreign-owned share somewhere of a huge corporation, obviously you are getting into violating the spirit of the Supreme Court’s decision as much as we 

may not like it. But let us say it was 5 percent or some relatively 

low number. Do you think that would get into a constitutional 

issue? 

Ms. GERKEN. So you have two questions here. One is the Court’s 

intuitions about this, and one is what is actually the practice of 

corporate law. 

On the side of the Court’s intuitions, the Court used the phrase 

‘‘predominantly’’ in the opinion in sort of an offhand statement. I 

do not believe that the Court will take that sort of seat-of-the-pants 

estimate, made in passing, to be the rule here. So I do think Congress has leeway to go below 50 percent. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Right. 

Ms. GERKEN. However, I would strongly encourage you to go with 

the practice of corporate law. Corporate lawyers have been thinking for a very long time about what constitutes influence. Moreover, you have federal cognates as well. So this Congress has considered this question at least twice: one in worrying about the foreign control of airlines where it chose a 25-percent number; and 

one in the Communications Act—which is, you know, quite similar 

to this situation—where it also chose a number that was well 

under 50 percent. So I think with an adequate factual record supported by corporate expertise, you can go below 50 percent. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. Next, this is to Professor Foley about 

quasi-government agencies and quasi-involvement. I just want expand on your comments on the Amtrak case. If I am hearing you 

right, it seems that how a company interacts with the Government 

should determine the public-private balance, not how it is organized. 

Mr. FOLEY. Correct. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. So if you agree, what other similar 

entities could fall under that category? And what types of Government involvements could fall under that category as well if, let us 

say, 80 percent of their contracts were with the Federal Government, something like that? 
29 

Mr. FOLEY. Exactly. And I encourage members of this Committee 

and others to read the Lebron opinion because it is quite rich in 

the history of its discussion of quasi-governmental corporations 

going all the way back to the First National Bank, all the way 

through World War II and the Great Depression, and the myriad 

different ways that Congress has used these various types of entities to achieve different public purposes. So there is a lot in there. 

For example, the Court differentiated between Amtrak on the 

one hand, which was the company in front of it, from COMSAT, the 

Communications Satellite Corporation, which has different ownership rules and had a little bit different relationship. So the Court 

says there is a spectrum here and different companies fall in different parts of the spectrum. 

But as, Chairman Schumer, you suggest, degrees of Government 

ownership matters. The 20-percent figure came up in that case because that was the percentage of ownership that the U.S. Government had in the First National Bank, contractual relationships between the Government and the corporation, the nature of the industry—you know, there has been a long history of understanding 

that public electric utilities, for example, have the characteristic of 

natural monopolies and, therefore, need a certain kind of regulation, maybe rate regulation and the like. 

So I think that industries that perform those public functions 

would have this character. That is why I think the language in 

Citizens United is actually encouraging on this point in relationship to the Lebron case and other precedent because Citizens 

United itself used that term ‘‘Government functions.’’ And so there 

will be corporations that undertake this role. 

For example, there has been a debate in American history from 

time to time over privatizing prisons. You know, if the Federal 

Government just hypothetically decided it wanted to privatize prisons because they thought that a for-profit company would run a 

prison better than the Government itself, that would still be doing 

a Government function; and even if it was set up as a for-profit corporation, under this analysis it would be quasi-governmental, 

which means that the Citizens United free speech rights that belong to Americans and private citizens, it would not apply because 

that would be a Government entity or a quasi-Government entity. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, and we may consult you further 

as we move the legislation. 

One final question, and then I will turn to Senator Murray. We 

are in the second round here, so we go right next to you. But this 

is to Mr. Hoersting and maybe to Ms. Hayward, not judging the 

constitutionality, but let me give you a hypothetical and just ask 

you if this bothers you. Okay? 

Congressman Smith has been the leading fighter against what 

he sees as abuse in drug companies. He wants to shorten the patent period. He wants to have tougher FDA rules. Call it what you 

will. 

Drug Company B says publicly, ‘‘We are going to go after Smith. 

He is against what we believe in.’’ It spends $5 million, defeats 

Smith, and they say, ‘‘Now, anyone else who does this again is 

going to be up against the same thing.’’ Five million dollars is nothing to this company. 
30 

A, do you think that would have an effect on how Congress behaved? Because you seemed to allude to the fact before that it 

might now. And, B, would it be a good thing, forgetting the constitutionality right here, or is this just a necessary price we pay for 

the First Amendment like people telling untruths? 

Mr. HOERSTING. I think what I would say, Senator, is, first of all, 

if there were any sort of collusion or threats, something like that, 

that might be something addressed elsewhere. But, generally 

speaking, let me say—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. There is no collusion or threats. It is a public statement: ‘‘We are going to defeat Congressman Smith because 

he vehemently disagrees with us. We are going to spend $5 million.’’ They do their own disclosure, whatever the laws are, and 

they defeat him. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Thank you for the clarification—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. And then they say, ‘‘We are going to work 

to defeat anyone else who has similar views.’’ That is their right. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Yes. I think what you have there is you have an 

organization saying, ‘‘We are against this candidate and we are 

prepared to spend vociferously to do so.’’ That will raise the ire of 

competing factions who think, ‘‘That is not right, and I happen to 

want patents shortened, so I will speak on behalf of this particular 

Congressman or on behalf of this particular Senator.’’ And, furthermore, at the end of the day, all of this speech is taken into account 

by the voters who determine, ‘‘Do I agree with the position taken 

by that $5 million spender? And do I think it is valid? Or do I disagree’’—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. Well, wait a minute. Just let me change the 

hypothetical now. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Sure, sure. 

Chairman SCHUMER. The $5 million they spend is not on drug 

issues. It is on the worst vote that Congressman Smith has taken. 

Mr. HOERSTING. That is fine—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. They announce they are going against him 

because of the drug issues—because this is how—you know, I know 

how the world works here. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Sure. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And you are living in an idyllic world, I 

guess, where someone else would say, first, the ad is always on the 

issue that really motivates the contribution; and, second, that other 

speaking out can equal $5 million of negative ads. Don’t you agree 

that is unrealistic? 

Mr. HOERSTING. I do not agree, Senator. What I would say is 

that—what they say now is that the best ad these days is a response ad, a quick response ad. So I think you are always going 

to have competing voices, and at the end of the day—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. Smith does not have $5 million. He does 

not have a competing response ad. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Okay. I see this is a floating hypothetical. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Well, it is—no, you are just trying to take 

the typical situation and make it atypical. I am giving you the typical situation. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Yes, and I think Smith would have friends, and 

I think people might be turned off by certain ads. And I think at 
31 

the end of the day the idea here is that sovereign citizens have the 

ability to determine is this valid and am I for it or is this invalid 

and am I against it. And that is the bedrock principle really of our 

system, and I think that is where we are. 

Chairman SCHUMER. You know, in all due respect, I think you 

are living in a different world than we all live in. It would be nice. 

Okay. 

Do you want to say something about this, Professor Hayward? 

Ms. HAYWARD. Yes, Mr. Chairman, if I could real quickly. This 

is not a hypothetical. This really happened. The Anti-Saloon 

League spent buckets of money in its era on initiatives as well as 

on candidates. It was not organized as a corporation and was able 

to do that under the Corrupt Practices Act. The people who were 

responding to the good folks being attacked by the Anti-Saloon 

League were the brewers. The brewers in 1916 were prosecuted. 

The Anti-Saloon League never was. 

So I do not look at this so much as, ‘‘Oh, now we have got people 

who are spending and we did not have them before.’’ They were 

there before. But now you have got more who have the ability to 

muster their resources, and I think you have a—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. You would agree that not on every issue 

there is an equal balance of resources. Correct? 

Ms. HAYWARD. I think you find that in heavily regulated contexts 

like what Ned is talking about where you really do not have—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. You think there is an equal balance of resource in every issue? 

Ms. HAYWARD. No. I said I do not think so. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. 

Ms. HAYWARD. But if I could just add, I think the hypotheticals 

are fun. I am a law professor, and I engage in them all the time. 

But I would really urge the Committee to see what happens, because it may be that the trouble you are anticipating right now is 

not the trouble that you are ultimately faced with responding to, 

but something else over here that you could never foresee. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. 

Mr. FOLEY. Senator Schumer? 

Chairman SCHUMER. Go ahead. I just wanted to get to Senator 

Murray. Go ahead, please, Mr. Foley, and I think Mr. Bullock 

wanted to say something. 

Mr. FOLEY. I was just going to add really quickly that if the concern is the large-level expenditures of $5 million and so, again, I 

believe my reading of the opinion and the oral argument is that 

Congress has considerable room to address those large-level expenditures. I think that was specifically what Justice Scalia was 

addressing in the oral argument. And, in fact, there are other passages of the Court’s opinion that are in my written testimony that 

I will not quote here—unless you would like me to—that talk about 

that issue. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Do you agree with that, Professor Gerken? 

Ms. GERKEN. I take a somewhat more skeptical view. It is a serious constitutional position, but I read the Court’s opinion as being 

slightly more doctrinaire on this question. 
32 

Chairman SCHUMER. Yes, so do I. I wish Mr. Foley were right. 

Last word, Mr. Bullock, just to respond to Mr. Hoersting’s and Professor Hayward’s characterization of what might happen. 

Mr. BULLOCK. Chairman Schumer, I think that campaigns would 

be much more fun in academia than in the real world. I think of 

outrageous claims in my campaign, like soft on sexual predators. 

I do not see the opposite side of that running to find the money 

to make a difference there. 

I think that when we get to the real world of political affairs, 

there is not going to be an equalizing force. And we can say that 

and know that without waiting for a decade of elections to pass to 

see that happen. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Senator Murray, thank you for your indulgence. 

Senator MURRAY. Absolutely. Well, thank you very much, Mr. 

Chairman. I apologize for being late. We have a Budget hearing as 

well this morning, and this is an important hearing, and I thank 

all of you for being here. 

I just want to say first—I just have to say it. I am appalled at 

the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United and the majority’s 

inability to understand what most Americans do today, that we already have too much corporate influence in American politics. That 

decision really undid a century of work to make sure that the 

voices of individual voters are not drowned out by special interests 

that are more interested in their own bottom line than the welfare 

of American citizens. And in my judgment, it will be much harder 

now for grass-roots campaigns, ordinary people to take on entrenched corporate power, on Wall Street, on health care, on issues 

like environmental regulation. And so I really appreciate your having this hearing and trying to determine what our role is now and 

what we can do at this point. 

I did want to ask a question. It seems that at a basic level the 

Supreme Court has now equated the freedom to speak with the 

freedom to spend. And I wanted to ask if constitutionally does it 

matter if a corporation could afford to buy all the air time on the 

TV channels most Americans watch on election day. Is that what 

we are constitutionally protecting here? It is my understanding 

that the Citizens United decision allows a corporation to do that, 

buy all of the air time before an election and somebody would not 

be allowed to even speak back. I wondered if anybody had a comment on that. Mr. Foley? 

Mr. FOLEY. Again, it goes back to my reading of the opinion as 

being about a facial challenge. There has been discussion today 

about how the Supreme Court, the majority opinion reached out to 

invalidate the statute on its face, whereas it could have decided the 

case more narrowly as a so-called as-applied challenge. To me, that 

is a very important point in terms of looking forward as to what 

sort of issues are left open and have not been decided by this case. 

So your scenario of buying all the airwaves to me is not addressed in the Citizens United opinion at all. It is a different fact 

pattern. It is a different circumstance. I think it would raise very 

different constitutional questions. 
33 

I would say that the only thing that the Citizens United opinion 

does as a technical ruling is says that one statute is invalid because it was so broad, it was so sweeping, it was an absolute ban. 

Now, there is, of course, language in the opinion that hints at 

other things that would be constitutionally problematic. An extremely low ceiling as opposed to a zero-level ceiling would also be 

constitutionally problematic, and we could discuss other examples. 

But it seems to me that if there—and, again, this goes back to Professor Gerken’s correct point about developing a factual record. If 

in the Supreme Court litigation the record showed that kind of monopolization of the airwaves, that would be a factual predicate for 

a different kind of constitutional ruling. 

Senator MURRAY. So would we have to wait for an election to 

occur, see that happen, and then be able to proceed? 

Mr. FOLEY. No, not necessarily. There are different kinds of factual records, and Congress can build a factual record on its own, 

and then the U.S. Solicitor General obviously takes the record that 

Congress builds into the courtroom. That could be supplemented by 

evidence from elections as well, and obviously the more evidence 

and the more focused the evidence, the easier it is for a lawyer like 

myself whose had to appear in court to defend these kinds of statutes. 

But congressional evidence is a key point in the Court’s deliberations about whether a statute meets the strict scrutiny standard, 

for example. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. If I could add, the Federal Communications 

Act requires stations to sell reasonable amounts of time to candidates, but that time could be dramatically squeezed depending on 

how much money was being spent by outside groups. So I do 

not—— 

Senator MURRAY. Does it say specifically candidates? Because—— 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. It says Federal candidates. 

Senator MURRAY. Well, I just know in these economic times, 

when broadcasters are looking for top dollars, sometimes that time 

could be squeezed a lot. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Yes, it could, and one of the predictions that 

was written about after this decision was that the biggest winners 

here were broadcasters who are now going to get substantially 

more advertising by outside groups and benefit and profit from it. 

Senator MURRAY. Does anybody else want to comment on that? 

Mr. HOERSTING. Senator, if I may, I think at some point the Supreme Court—what I think you are going to have to do eventually 

is put yourself in a position where you can afford your campaigns 

more so than you already can and for the party committees to be 

able to afford their activities more than they already can under 

McCain-Feingold provisions. I think at the end of the day that is 

probably the better way to go. 

Senator MURRAY. You mean to allow candidates to all of a sudden spend a whole bunch of money? 

Mr. HOERSTING. To increase the amount that the party committees are allowed to take in for issue discussion—— 
34 

Senator MURRAY. So we are flooding a whole bunch more money 

into this by equality, so we are back to the question: Is this about 

money or is this about voices? 

Mr. HOERSTING. Well, it is about—I think what I would say, you 

always hear the analogy that travel is not about money, but yet 

you cannot travel without money. I think you can very easily see 

that if there were a limit on airline tickets or gasoline, that would 

be an infringement on one’s right to travel. And the Court has always said that while money is not speech, it is necessary to speech. 

So limiting expenditures without some basis for corruption is unconstitutional now, and that is always the inquiry. Is there a basis 

of corruption? 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. If I could comment on this point that Mr. 

Hoersting has made twice, the notion of solving this problem of 

opening the door to influence-buying corruption by corporations, by 

going back to a corrupt soft-money system that was closed down by 

a bipartisan majority vote in the House and Senate in a law signed 

by President Bush and then upheld by the Court in my view is simply an argument that says, well, we ought to respond to this influence-buying corruption problem by opening the door to much more 

influence-buying corruption. 

We cannot go back to what was a $500 million national scandal 

in the soft-money system. We have to find ways without opening 

the door to more influence-buying and corruption to respond to this 

decision. And I think there are going to be ways that will have effect. It will not solve the whole problem, obviously, but there are 

things that can be done, and I think Congress has to move immediately with first steps so that there will be some protections in 

place in the 2010 congressional elections. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Murray. 

Senator MURRAY. I think we have our work cut out for us. I 

think the question becomes: Do we want to open up the floodgates 

and have, you know, a whole lot more money that this Congress 

has worked their way through? Or do we want to make sure that 

now that the Supreme Court decision has been made, we say 

what—how do we have laws that we put on individual candidates 

in campaigns apply to corporations? 

Chairman SCHUMER. Senator Bennett gets the last round. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Just a 

comment about the effectiveness of McCain-Feingold to taking big 

money out of politics, and I go to the numbers we were given by 

Senator Kerry, that in 1998 the elections all cost $1.6 billion, and 

10 years later, after the passage of McCain-Feingold, it was $5.2 

billion. So somehow the goal of taking big money out of politics was 

not achieved by passing that law. 

Let us go back to this whole question of how dramatic this decision is and how it is overturning so many years of precedent. Is 

there anyone on the panel who believes that if a corporation in 

1908 that was critical of a Federal candidate at the time—ran a 

radio program that was critical of a candidate at the time, would 

it have been illegal for them to produce it and advertise it with corporate funds? 

Mr. HOERSTING. I feel I need to defer to Allison Hayward here 

because she has written so well on this topic. But my under-
35 

standing is, no, that would not be constitutional. The Court has 

waited decades to reach—— 

Senator BENNETT. I will get to that. 

Mr. HOERSTING. Sure. I am sorry. 

Senator BENNETT. In 1908, a corporation could have produced a 

radio show, that being the predominant media at the time, attacking a candidate and put it on the air, paid for it, and advertised 

it with corporate funds. Is that correct? 

Ms. HAYWARD. Absolutely. Yes. 

Senator BENNETT. All right. Let us go to 1948. Would it have 

been illegal to use corporate funds to distribute and advertise ‘‘Truman the Movie’’ prior to that election? 

Ms. HAYWARD. Well—in 1948. 

Senator BENNETT. 1948. 

Ms. HAYWARD. It might have been because there was not an exemption for editorials or commentary in the expenditure ban that 

was part of Taft-Hartley. 

Senator BENNETT. Okay. So they do it in 1944 against Roosevelt. 

Ms. HAYWARD. Okay. That would have been legal. 

Senator BENNETT. All right. So what about, you know, in 2000, 

of course, Citizens United would have been prohibited from distributing and advertising ‘‘Hillary the Movie’’ in New York 2 months 

before the general election, and that had to do with the 60-day ban 

and so on that was put in place. 

So we have a long history of corporations having the right to do 

this kind of thing, and then it is changed, you say first in a fashion 

in Taft-Hartley and then, of course, by the passage of McCain-Feingold. 

Ms. HAYWARD. That is right. 

Senator BENNETT. It does not sound to me like we are overturning a whole history of legislative bans if we are only overturning something that is relatively recent. 

Ms. HAYWARD. Pardon me, if I could just interject. 

Senator BENNETT. Surely. 

Ms. HAYWARD. There was great prosecutorial queasiness about 

the expenditure ban from the very beginning, and you can see 

there is testimony before the Senate from 1955 where the Assistant 

Attorney General at that time announces that the Department of 

Justice is not prosecuting under the expenditure ban because they 

are concerned about its constitutionality. There is other material I 

have gotten out of archives that I would be happy to share with 

the Committee if the Committee is interested that show that concern dating back to 1948, just at the very beginning. 

I think the expenditure ban in Taft-Hartley caught a lot of people by surprise, and thus, you do not really have much of a court 

record on its scope at that period because the Department of Justice was not pursuing cases under it. They did not want that bad 

decision that would turn the whole thing unconstitutional and lead 

to some other bad consequence. And so they simply did not bring 

the cases. 

Senator BENNETT. All right. Mr. Wertheimer, you referred to 

Justice Stevens’ dissent. Obviously, that is not the only dissent 

Justice Stevens has written. Let me quote Justice Stevens in Buckley, and he wrote the following. He said, ‘‘I am convinced that 
36 

Buckley’s holding on expenditure limits is wrong and that the time 

has come to overrule it. I have not reached this conclusion lightly. 

As Justice Breyer correctly observes, stare decisis is a principle of 

fundamental importance. But it is not an inexorable command, and 

several factors taken together provide special justification for revisiting the constitutionality of statutory limits on candidate expenditures.’’ 

Now, if the Court had heeded Justice Stevens’ advice in that case 

and overruled Buckley on that point, what would have been your 

reaction? How would you have felt about that decision? 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Which case are you referring to his writing in? 

Senator BENNETT. Buckley v. Valeo. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Well, you quoted him as talking about overruling Buckley. What case was he writing in? I am not sure—— 

Senator BENNETT. Oh, I am sorry. I am sorry. It was Randall v. 

Sorrell. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Yes. 

Senator BENNETT. Would you have been pleased if the Court had 

overruled Buckley? 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Overruled Buckley on expenditure limits? 

Senator BENNETT. Yes. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. Not particularly, no. But I would say to you 

that there clearly are exceptions to stare decisis, which is a wellestablished concept. They do not exist, in my view, in the Citizens 

United case. 

And if I could take one minute to respond to the comment you 

made about McCain-Feingold? 

Senator BENNETT. Sure. 

Mr. WERTHEIMER. It was not about big money. It was about big 

contributions. It was about million-dollar contributions from labor 

organizations or $5 million contributions or multimillion-dollar contributions from trade associations. That is what the soft-money ban 

took out of the system. It was never intended to address the question of all of the money in the system. It was intended to address 

the contributions that had the most clear power to buy influence 

over Government decisions. And if you look at the Buckley decision 

approving limits on contributions, it says that inherently large financial contributions have the power to corrupt and create the appearance of corruption. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you for that. The overall pattern that 

I recall out of the press was this is going to take big money out 

of politics, and I appreciate your clarifying that that was not your 

view of it and not the primary thing that was driving you for your 

advocacy. 

Finally, Mr. Chairman, I would just go back to the situation we 

have heard many times before in this debate, and maybe it does 

not need to be repeated, but I want to put it on the table for us 

to recall, and that is the McCarthy campaign of 1968 when Senator 

McCarthy went to New Hampshire—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. I worked in it. 

Senator BENNETT. You worked in it. All right. And Senator 

McCarthy went to five individuals, as I recall—this shows what inflation has happened since 1968. He said, ‘‘I am going to challenge 
37 

President Johnson, and to do that I need some money.’’ And each 

one of the five gave him $100,000. 

Chairman SCHUMER. I was not one of those. 

Senator BENNETT. You were not one of those. All right. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator BENNETT. Each one of the five gave him $100,000, and 

with half a million dollars and the scale of expenditure challenges 

and organizational costs and so on, he attracted you to New Hampshire and probably prevented Lyndon Johnson from running for reelection. And that would be illegal today. Eugene McCarthy would 

not have been allowed to challenge a sitting President today by 

that kind of funding. I am sure you do not feel that Eugene McCarthy was corrupted by those five gentlemen—I think they were all 

gentlemen—who gave him the $100,000. I do not think he was corrupted. And I think we need to be a little careful in jumping to 

many of the conclusions we do on the particular issue of campaign 

finance reform. 

I do understand, Mr. Bullock, the challenge of having outside 

groups come in and spend a whole lot of money in your State to 

distort your position. I am going through it right now. None of my 

opponents in my own race have any money—well, that is not true. 

One of them is a self-funder, and he is a millionaire entrepreneur, 

and he is putting in the money he needs to support his race to 

challenge me. But an outside group having little or nothing to do 

with the State of Utah is coming into the State, they have promised the whole—the ‘‘works’’—television, radio, billboards, mail, the 

whole thing. I really do not like it. But it is their constitutional 

right, and there is nothing I want to do to prevent them from doing 

it, even though it makes my life very unhappy. 

So I know what you mean when people come in and distort your 

record, come in from out of State and distort your record. I sympathize with you, and I am glad you have prevailed, and I intend 

to prevail against that kind of pressure. But, constitutionally, I do 

not think there is anything we can do to prevent them from doing 

it. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. In the spirit of bipartisanship, Senator Bennett gets the last word. 

Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 10 

business days for additional statements and documents the Committee may receive. 

The Committee is in receipt of statements from groups—I do not 

have to name them all, do I? No. Without objection, they are all 

going to be added. 

Chairman SCHUMER. I want to thank my colleagues for participating. I want to thank our witnesses for their excellent help, guidance, and diversity on this issue. 

The hearing is closed. 

[Whereupon, at 12:05 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

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NOMINATION OF STEPHEN T. AYERS, AIA, 

LEED, AP TO BE ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL 

THURSDAY, APRIL 15, 2010 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION, Washington, D.C. 

The Committees met, pursuant to notice, at 10:03 a.m., in Room 

301, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Mark L. Pryor presiding. 

Senators Present: Schumer, Pryor, Bennett, and Cochran. 

Staff Present: Jean Bordewich, Staff Director; Jennifer Griffith, 

Deputy Staff Director; Jason Abel, Chief Counsel; Josh Brekenfeld, 

Professional Staff; Lauryn Bruck, Professional Staff; Lynden Armstrong, Chief Clerk; Matthew McGowan, Professional Staff; Justin 

Perkins, Staff Assistant; Mary Jones, Republican Staff Director; 

Shaun Parkin, Republican Deputy Staff Director; Paul Vinovich, 

Republican Chief Counsel; Abbie Platt, Republican Professional 

Staff; Trish Kent, Professional Staff; and Rachel Creviston, Republican Professional Staff. 

Senator PRYOR. I will call the Rules Committee to order. I want 

to thank everyone for being here today. Mr. Ayers, I especially 

want to thank you for being here and I am going to chair the hearing today but I would like to turn it over to the real chairman of 

the hearing who has to slip away because of his schedule. Senator 

Schumer. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SCHUMER 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. Well, I want to thank you. 

First, I want to thank Senator Pryor for chairing the hearing. I told 

Mr. Ayers he is the guy you have got to pay attention to around 

here. And I certainly want to thank my friend and colleague and 

just a fine man and outstanding senator, Senator Bennett, for 

being here as well. 

And of course, I want to welcome you, our nominee Stephen 

Ayers. Mr. Ayers has been serving as the Acting Architect to the 

Capitol for three years and is here to be confirmed to a ten-year 

term as the Architect of the Capitol. He’s been joined today by his 

family: his wife Jennifer, his daughter Stephanie, his son Nick, his 

parents Ben and Jane, parents-in-law Chuck and Shirl. 

brother Ben, sister Jennifer. Welcome to you all. 

The history of the Office of the Architect to the Capitol is as old 

as the building itself. Individuals who have held the title, have 

been instrumental in shaping our nation’s Capitol from its early beginnings into the working symbol of democracy as we see it today. 

William Thornton is recognized as the first Architect to the Capitol 

because his design of the Capitol was chosen by Washington in 

1793. So we have a lot of history here. 

Throughout the 1800’s, four men were hired to oversee the Capitol’s construction, creating much of the structure we still use and 

occupy today. 
250 

Today the Architect to the Capitol employs over 2,600 staff and manages a budget of $600 million a year. Mr. Ayers’ nomination by 

the President came after a rigorous bipartisan and bicameral selection process that began in the Fall of 2006, three and a half years 

ago. 

The nomination was approved by the President Pro Tempore of 

the Senate, the Speaker of the House, the Majority and Minority 

Leaders of both houses, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the 

Committee on House Administration, the Chairman and Ranking 

Members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committee, and 

of course, by the Chairman and Ranking Members of this committee. 

And I do want to say this; Mr. Ayers has had wide acclaim. Just 

about everybody wanted to see him become the Architect to the 

Capitol so there was very little controversy. It was a long and rigorous process with other candidates but Mr. Ayers came through 

with flying colors. This wasn’t a situation where there were three 

candidates and each one had its strengths and weaknesses. Mr. 

Ayers was all strengths. 

Senator Pryor will go over Mr. Ayer’s career history. I’ll just end 

by welcoming him and thanking him for being. I look forward to 

his being confirmed as Architect to the Capitol and to working with 

him in the years to come. 

Senator Pryor1. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And I apologize to everybody. I have to get 

on my way. 

Mr. AYERS. Thank you Mr. Chairman. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you very much for your leadership. Senator Bennett, would you like to make an opening statement? 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BENNETT 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much. As Chairman Schumer 

has indicated, this has been a three year job interview. The process 

started and I was new to this position on the Rules Committee and 

we did indeed start out with a fairly long list of candidates and we 

would come to a conclusion this is what we think it ought to be and 

then the House would say, no we don’t like that one and then 

members of this committee would say well, we prefer this one to 

that one and we would settle on somebody and then someone else 

would not like it. 

And the one steadying influence through all of that turmoil was 

the fact that Stephen Ayers as Acting Architect was keeping the 

doors open, the lights on and things going forward. And it emerged 

out of all of that experience that we had a very competent Architect 

to the Capitol and why were we looking around? And why didn’t 

we stay with what we had? 

It took a little while to convince everybody that that was the 

thing that we should do, but it became very clear that that is the 

thing that we should do. So this is turning into a testimonial rather than a hearing, I almost said roast, but it is not. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator BENNETT. Not that kind of thing. The thing that I would 

like to put in the record, is that during this three year long job 
251 

interview and in the period prior to that when Stephen Ayers was 

the Deputy Architect to the Capitol it was not a time of calm and 

serenity around here. It was a time of great controversy as we were 

involved in the largest addition to the Capitol in the history of the 

Capitol. 

The Capitol Visitor Center added more square footage to the 

Capitol than any other change in the Capitol in its history and it 

was controversial for a variety of reasons, some of them political, 

some of them financial, some of them aesthetic and a steady hand 

as I say to keep the thing moving along intelligently was necessary. 

Alan Hantman, who was the Architect to the Capitol deserves 

credit for the work he did there, but his Deputy was a very, very 

important part of keeping the thing online and going forward in a 

legitimate fashion and then when Mr. Hantman stepped down, taking over the responsibility of making sure that it opened in an intelligent fashion. And we can look back on it now as often happens 

in history, when you look back on things that were controversial 

and say, Boy, we’re really glad we did it. We’re really glad that this 

was handled in such a way and that kind of erases the historical 

memory of how difficult it was to do it. 

But we now have the statistics that show that visitors to the 

Capitol have increased by over a 100 percent and I am sure the visitor experience has gotten better, particularly as we are coming 

into the summer by far more than a 100 percent, because I remember the lines in the heat with people waiting for hours standing in 

line to get into the Capitol with the possibility of any kind of problem. The security challenge after 9/11 of having crowds out on the 

plaza with no physical protection and a huge target for a terrorist 

attack. 

Now all of that is gone. The plaza is back looking better than it 

did before and the square footage of the Capitol Visitor Center accommodating twice as many visitors in a secure area, air-conditioned, plenty of rest rooms, all of the other things which future 

generations will take for granted as part of the Capitol Visitor’s experience and have no memory of how difficult things used to be. 

And yes, those who came before him made a very significant contribution to that but Stephen Ayers played a very significant role 

in seeing to it that we got what we have and it is only fitting now 

that we have it, that he be continued for another ten years so that 

when the plumbing starts to leak he will know where to go to fix 

it. And I am happy to join with the Chairman and Stephen in welcoming you here. Telling you this appointment is long overdue and 

adding my endorsement to the assignment. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you Senator Bennett. Senator Cochran, do 

you have an opening statement? 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR COCHRAN 

Senator COCHRAN. Mr. Chairman, thank you. I am glad to be 

able to come by and congratulate Stephen Ayers for his nomination 

and his imminent confirmation as Architect of the Capitol. This 

has, as my good friend from Utah said, it has been a long and arduous journey, but I am glad to see that it has turned out as it 

has and that we are going to be able to have a full fledged, con-
252 

firmed Architect of the Capitol finally and to thank him for his patience in his demeanor throughout all of this. 

I think the changes that we have seen in the Capitol over the 

last few years are just enormously impressive for many reasons. 

Those of us who have been on the Rules Committee for awhile and 

have attended a lot of the hearings and engaged in a lot of conversations, not just about who should be the Architect, but the redesigning of the Capitol. A huge job. 

And I think Mr. Ayers deserves our accolades and compliments 

on a successful completion of that work as well. So that is why I 

am here Mr. Chairman and I am glad to join you and Senator Bennett in the work of this committee and the confirmation of this outstanding new Architect of the Capitol. You can strike out the word 

‘acting’ now. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR PRYOR 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you. Thanks Senator Cochran. I do have 

a longer statement for the record, but let me just say a few words 

here. If confirmed Mr. Ayers will become the 11th Architect of the 

Capitol. He graduated from the University of Maryland with a 

bachelor’s degree in Architecture and received his Masters degree 

in Systems Management from the University of Southern California. 

Mr. Ayers served as an officer in the U.S. Air Force, was promoted to Captain and received the Meritorious Service Medal for 

his five years of military service. 

The nominee is no stranger to the Architect’s organization. In 

1997 he joined the Office of the Architect of the Capitol as an Assistant Superintendent of the Senate Office Buildings and was 

later promoted to Deputy Superintendent. His next job took him 

across the street to the Library of Congress where he assumed the 

position of the Superintendent of the Library Buildings and 

Grounds in 2002. He was named Deputy Architect of the Capitol 

in 2006 and in 2007 he became Acting Architect to the Capitol. 

Since that time Mr. Ayers successfully negotiated a settlement 

with the Office of Compliance addressing asbestos and hazard mitigation in the Capitol Power Plant’s utility tunnels and improved 

the Agency’s performance-based Strategic Plan for fiscal years 2007 

through 2011. 

When Mr. Ayers assumed the role of Acting Architect, there was 

no projected date for completing the construction of the Capitol Visitor Center. He set and met a date for the substantial completion 

of this building. Under his leadership the Architect’s office successfully completed the Fire and Life Safety Systems Testing, which 

was required before the facility could open. On December 2, 2008 

the long awaited Capitol Visitor Center opened its doors to the 

public. 

Under the nominee’s leadership as Acting Architect and in his 

previous role as Deputy Architect/Chief Operating Officer, the 

Agency improved cost accounting procedures and internal controls 

and has received five consecutive clean financial audits. 

And, again, I have a longer statement for the record, but I say 

those things just to demonstrate that this is the right person for 

this job and we are so happy to have you with us today and what 
253 

I will do now is ask you to stand and raise your right hand and 

I will administer the oath. 

Do you swear that the testimony you are to provide is the truth, 

the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? 

Mr. AYERS. I do. 

Senator PRYOR. Please be seated. 

I have just a few questions, but I would like to hear your opening 

statement first, please. 

TESTIMONY OF STEPHEN T. AYERS, AIA, LEED AP, TO BE 

ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL 

Mr. AYERS. Well, thank you so much Mr. Chairman, Senator 

Bennett and Senator Cochran. 

It is an honor and a real privilege for me to be here today as the 

Presidential Nominee for the position of Architect to the Capitol 

and I would like to first extend my sincerest thanks and gratitude 

to all of the members of the Nominating Committee for recommending me to President Obama to serve as the 11th Architect to 

the Capitol. 

I truly appreciate the trust that the Congress and the President 

have placed in me. 

As the Chairman noted, I am joined here today by my wonderful 

family and it is because of their love and support that I have been 

able to pursue a career in public service. I really appreciate them 

being here today to continue that supportive role. 

As the Chairman noted I have served as Acting Architect since 

2007 and in this role I think I have been able to combine two important skill sets. First of course, that of being a licensed architect 

and second, the ability to focus on business management and to 

bring best business management practices to the table. 

The stewardship of the Capitol Complex is important to me, it 

is important to the Congress, and it is important to the Nation and 

it is equally a very unique challenge. This challenge is amplified 

by the historic significance and iconic nature of our buildings, the 

landscape, and aging physical infrastructure, as well as the day-today requirements of the Congress. 

Chief among these challenges is the significant backlog of deferred maintenance and capital renewal projects totaling today in 

excess of $1.5 billion over the next ten years, as well as security, 

life-safety, accessibility, and environmental requirements. To assist 

us in our efforts to address this backlog of projects, we have successfully developed and implemented a robust and balanced process 

to prioritize projects based on a facility’s condition assessment and 

the level of maintenance required in any given building. 

This process uses several tools including Facility Condition Assessments, the Capitol Complex Master Plan, and Jurisdiction 

Plans, among other criteria. 

The component that provides us and the Congress with the big 

picture, the 20-year look ahead that queues up priorities and investments and projects, is the Capitol Complex Master Plan. The 

Master Plan and the other prioritization tools provide Congress 

with concrete, practical assessments of our infrastructure and by 

using these tools, Congress can make wise investments in the Capitol Complex in the future. 
254 

Mr. Chairman, great organizations are made up of great people 

and to ensure that the AOC is an employer of choice, I have set 

out to invest in our most valuable assets, our employees. And it is 

my responsibility to provide them with the right tools, the right 

equipment, and the right training to allow them to build on our 

successes and to be the best of the best. In that regard, I have implemented a number of workforce programs to provide greater flexibilities including a telework program, a flexible work schedule program, and a student loan repayment program among many other 

initiatives that they so richly deserve. 

And I am committed to using sustainable design practices whether we are building a new facility or maintaining one that is over 

200 years old. With the support of Congress we have implemented 

a number of programs and projects designed to save energy and 

conserve our natural resources. 

Last year we entered into energy savings performance contracts 

for the Senate, the House, and the Capitol buildings that include 

$93 million in planned facility energy-related upgrades. These are 

really important public/private partnerships that will help us and 

the Congress achieve its energy reduction goals. 

To ensure that we continue to see a reduction in energy consumption, we are evaluating proven technologies that can be implemented in our continued effort to increase energy efficiencies across 

the Capitol campus. Among the options being considered is co-generation, which simultaneously generates both electricity and heat, 

as well as the use of biofuels in the Capitol Power Plant. Moving 

in a more sustainable direction will enhance our efforts to meet energy reduction mandates as well as provide higher energy system 

security and reliability with lower overall costs. 

This year, the agency will be updating our Strategic Plan to set 

new goals and priorities that will drive our organization for the 

next five years. 

Consistently an overwhelming majority of our customers have 

said that they are satisfied or very satisfied with the services the 

Architect provides in our annual surveys. However, as one of my 

favorite authors, Jim Collins, points out the challenge before us is 

not to let good get in the way of great. And I will not be satisfied 

until we are able to achieve a 100 percent satisfaction rating. 

And should this committee recommend that I be confirmed by 

the full Senate, I will be honored to continue to work beside the 

very talented men and women that make up this great team of the 

Architect of the Capitol. Thank you, and I would be happy to answer any questions you may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ayers follows:] 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you. Let me start with one question: in 

2003 Congress directed the Architect to the Capitol to complete a 

20-year Capitol Complex Master Plan. 

Could you give us a status report on that and tell me if it is not 

completed when it will be completed? 

Mr. AYERS. Well, certainly Mr. Chairman, the Capitol Complex 

Master Plan is a really important tool, not just for the Architect, 

but for the Congress as a whole. It provides a road map of the facilities for the next 20 years. It is so important for us to look ahead 

so that we can ensure that we provide the facilities necessary for 
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the Congress to conduct its business and we do not get ourselves 

in the situation where we have to close a building or we are so 

overcrowded that the Congress cannot effectively conduct its business. So that is really the overarching purpose for the plan. 

Today, we are nearly finished with the plan. The Capitol Complex Master Plan is made up of nine individual plans—one for the 

Senate and one for the House and Capitol and the Library and the 

Supreme Court, among others. And among those, two of those nine 

plans have been approved. Three of them are before the Congress 

awaiting approval. And four of them we are still working on and 

nearing completion. I suspect it will be at least another year before 

we are able to complete those and gain the approval and imprimatur of the Congress. 

Senator PRYOR. I notice that the AOC budget request for FY2011 

included a 25 percent increase over the FY2010 funding levels. 

Senator Nelson, Chairman of the Legislative Branch Subcommittee 

on the Appropriations Committee, has said that he wants a flat 

budget for FY2011. 

If confirmed, how do you plan to move the agency forward if you 

have a flat budget? 

Mr. AYERS. A flat budget for us, Senator Pryor, is a cut of $155 

million out of our FY2011 budget request. So a cut that significant, 

I think, is going to take strong leadership, it is going to require 

tough decisions, and it is going to take partnership with the Congress. We have laid out a plan to do that and have submitted that 

to Chairman Nelson. 

I think we have taken a good approach. We first looked at the 

money that Congress has already provided the Agency and we were 

able to drive $15 million out of that to apply towards the FY2011 

budget request. Similarly, we looked carefully at our Operations as 

the Architect’s budget is really made up of our Operations piece— 

salaries and expenses—and then at our projects. So we were able 

drive another $14 or $15 million out of our Operations request. 

The rest of the budget is simply projects that must be deferred 

or projects that have to be broken down into smaller pieces and 

phased. I think we have laid out a smart plan to be able to do that 

if that is the way that our 2011 budget turns out. 

Senator PRYOR. This will be my last question, because I want to 

hear from my colleagues, I do not want to revisit all of the details 

of the planning and construction of the Capitol Visitor Center, but 

as you know, it started out as a $265 million building. It was supposed to be ready for the January 2005 Presidential Inauguration. 

Over time it became a $600 million building and it was finally 

opened in December of 2008. 

I know that you have another big project on the horizon, the 

complete renovation of the Cannon House Office Building. Are 

there lessons learned from the CVC and that whole process that we 

can apply to the Cannon remodel and what would those be? 

Mr. AYERS. I think there are, Mr. Chairman. I think that is a 

really important point that to be a great organization, we have to 

be able to look at ourselves in the mirror, be our own worst critics 

and learn from ourselves and ensure that we have a system of continual learning and continual improvement. 
256 

I am really proud of the fact that I believe that we as an organization do have that mantra. We have looked very carefully at the 

Capitol Visitor Center and taken it apart piece-by-piece to understand where those cost overruns and where those time delays happened. I think they really come down to a couple of overarching 

themes. 

One, of course, is we have to be tenacious about defining the 

scope of a project up front before we start construction and we are 

setting out to do that with the Cannon Building renovation. Secondly, we have to have a rigorous change management process in 

place so that when we are asked to make changes on a construction 

project while we are in construction, we effectively communicate to 

the Congress the cost and schedule impacts. We need to communicate to the highest levels of Congress the cost and schedule impact of changes while we are in construction. 

I think those are the two overarching lessons learned. We have 

got a great document that we have partnered with the Government 

Accountability Office to develop on other lessons learned, but I 

think those are the two most important that I take away from that 

project. 

Senator PRYOR. Senator Bennett. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman. 

In my experience dealing with these issues now, yes we have to 

keep the lights on and the function going, but you have two areas 

that are unique to this architectural situation that you do not find 

in a typical office building or college campus or whatever you may 

want to compare this to. And they are historic preservation and security. 

There are some places where you simply say this building does 

not fit our needs anymore so we will tear it down and build a new 

one. You cannot do that with the Capitol. The necessity for historic 

preservation is there and we have to keep using it even as we are 

preserving a building that is as old as this one. 

And then the second one that came home to us very dramatically 

after 9/11 was security. So I would like to talk a little bit about 

both of those areas and let’s start with security. I have become a 

bit of a nag on the issue of the Capitol Police and the unification 

of the Capitol Police Service so that it includes the Library of Congress and other things. And I would like an update on where you 

think that is going and how it is working. 

And particularly, let’s talk about the Capitol Police Radio Project, 

which I understand is to be completed by March of 2011. And are 

we on track for that? And what are we going to get out of that in 

terms of increased security for the campus? 

Mr. AYERS. You mentioned two things. The first is the integration of the Library of Congress Police Force with the United States 

Capitol Police Force, and obviously I sit with the Senate and House 

Sergeant of Arms on the Capitol Police Board and have been responsible with the Chief to pull those forces together. I think it has 

been a good process and quite frankly, better than we expected it 

to be. And they are fully integrated now and it really seems to be 

working well. The three of us on the Board stay in very close contact with the Chief on this particular issue and the Chief is very 
257 

comfortable with the integration of those new officers into the 

United States Capitol Police. 

The second issue you mentioned, Senator Bennett, is this very, 

very important radio project for the Capitol Police. The current radios with the Capitol Police are not secured and secondly, they are 

not able to join in with other local and federal law enforcement officials on their network. 

So we are working, the Architect’s Office is working very closely 

with the Capitol Police on the implementation of a new digital, 

encrypted radio system for the United States Capitol Police. And 

our portion of that work is to assist in managing the technical design aspect, as well as the installation of that radio system whether 

it is exterior building antennas or interior building antennas 

throughout the Capitol Complex. 

So that process is going smoothly. We do not see any delays or 

cost overruns on that job. It is being effectively managed and we 

are very, very carefully watching where the designers are placing 

their antennas both inside and outside to ensure that we do not do 

any harm to any of the historic or historically significant portions 

of any of the buildings across the Capitol Complex, not just the 

Capitol building. 

Senator BENNETT. Yeah. Can you talk about the dome renovations and rehabilitation? 

It seems like the dome is always being rehabilitated. The whole 

I have been here there has been work on the dome, but where are 

we with respect to that? 

Mr. AYERS. We have got a couple of things that we know we need 

to do to the dome. Just this year we are doing interim painting and 

caulking and that is to buy another two or three years before, we 

believe, we are going to have to take the paint off of the dome and 

completely repaint it and fix many of the deteriorating architectural elements that are part of the dome. 

That has not happened since the East Front Extension, which I 

believe was completed in the early ’60s. There are some great photographs of the dome showing how it looked with just its red rust 

preventative coating back in the ’60s. We need to do that again. 

Our plans are to do that within the next three to four years; take 

all of that lead-based paint off of the Capitol dome, repaint it, and 

reseal it. That is a significant project to the tune of maybe $100 

million that needs to be invested back into the Capitol dome. 

But obviously it is our symbol of representative democracy and 

the most recognizable symbol in the world and I am confident, together with the Congress, we will make the appropriate investments there. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Chairman. 

Senator PRYOR. Did you have any other questions? Are you sure? 

Let me ask one last question about the greening of the Senate 

Office Building. I know that there an Energy Savings Performance 

Contract that you have entered into and it sounds like that you are 

ahead of your goal in terms of reaching your energy savings goal 

for the Senate. 

Will that continue? Will we continue to exceed that goal? Or once 

we hit the goal will we stop doing what we are doing? Or do we 
258 

always try to become more efficient and save taxpayer dollars and 

greenhouse gas emissions? 

Mr. AYERS. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Our legislative mandate 

with the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and the Energy Independence 

and Security Act of 2007 requires us to reduce energy intensity 

three percent per year for a total of ten years; a total of 30 percent 

reduction in the Senate office buildings. We are on track to do that. 

For the first four years of that program we have met or exceeded 

our goals. We expect the next year or two to be under our goal, but 

ultimately, to come back and meet our goals for the rest of the duration. And at the end of that ten year period, we will have met 

or exceed that 30 percent reduction. 

Our biggest effort to increase sustainability are the energy savings performance contracts and we are implementing those right 

now in the House, Senate and Capitol. As those construction efforts 

take place, energy reduction will dip a little bit until those construction projects are complete and, once they are complete, they 

will begin to save more energy. Ultimately, will then exceed our 

goal and meet our 30 percent reduction goal. And we are very confident that we will be able to do that. 

Senator PRYOR. Great. Senator Bennett, you do not have any 

other questions? 

Well, I want to thank you on behalf of the Rules Committee for 

your testimony this morning. The record will remain open for five 

business days for additional statements. The Committee plans to 

consider this nomination in a timely manner so the Senate can confirm Mr. Ayers as the next Architect of the Capitol. 

Since there is no further business before the Committee, the 

Committee is adjourned subject to the call of the chair. 

Mr. AYERS. Thank you. 

Senator PRYOR. Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 10:36 a.m., the committee recessed, subject to the 

call of the Chair.] 
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VOTING BY MAIL: AN EXAMINATION OF 

STATE AND LOCAL EXPERIENCES 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 5, 2010 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION, Washington, D.C. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in Room 

SR–301, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Charles E. Schumer, 

Chairman of the committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Schumer and Roberts. 

Staff Present: Jean Bordewich, Staff Director; Jason Abel, Chief 

Counsel; Veronica Gillespie, Elections Counsel; Adam Ambrogi, 

Counsel; Sonia Gill, Counsel; Julia Richardson, Counsel; Lauryn 

Bruck, Professional Staff; Lynden Armstrong, Chief Clerk; Matthew McGowan, Professional Staff; Mary Jones, Republican Staff 

Director; Paul Vinovich, Republican Chief Counsel; Michael 

Merrell, Republican Counsel; Rachel Creviston, Republican Professional Staff; and Justin Lee, Republican Intern. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SCHUMER 

Chairman SCHUMER. The Rules Committee will come to order. 

Good morning. First, I want to thank my friend, Senator Roberts, 

for joining us this morning. Ranking Member Bennett is unable to 

attend. I would also like to welcome Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon 

and Congresswoman Susan Davis of California, two very strong advocates of voting by mail. 

Now, I have had a lot of opportunity to work with Senator 

Wyden on many, many occasions, most recently on the DISCLOSE 

Act, where a major portion of our bill comes from provisions that 

he and Senator Collins put together originally. I can say that there 

is no truer champion of reform than Senator Wyden. He is a great 

champion for all Oregon constituents and Oregon is always first on 

his mind when he is legislating. 

In this case, I can tell the public here that I, probably a minimum of 25 times, have heard Ron Wyden talk to the Democratic 

Caucus about why voting by mail is a great thing and how well it 

works in Oregon, as recently as our last Tuesday lunch, not about 

this hearing, but it came up. So we are honored to have him here 

today and look forward to his insight, experience, firsthand knowledge of election law issues. 

I also want to thank Congresswoman Davis, who has also called 

me on this issue on several occasions and is as strong an advocate 

in the House as Senator Wyden is in the Senate. 

So we are going to examine vote by mail systems and programs 

used by States for Federal elections. Vote by mail is no longer a 

rare exception. Today, many voters throughout the country exercise 

their constitutional right to vote by mailing in their ballot, and the 

most well known vote by mail State is Oregon, which is the only 

State that conducts all elections entirely through its vote by mail 

system. It is amazing, and I followed it a little bit myself. 
294 

Washington State is a close second. It conducts elections in 38 

of 39 counties by mail. I don’t know if one of our witnesses can tell 

us why one county isn’t involved. Maybe they don’t have the Post 

Office serving them. 

Meanwhile, Colorado voters cast ballots by mail at a 64 percent 

rate. And in our largest State, California, voters went 44 percent 

by mail in the 2008 Federal elections. Some of those States are represented by members on this committee, Senator Feinstein and 

Senator Murray. 

But what do we actually mean when we talk about vote by mail? 

There are two different ideas and we are going to discuss them 

today. 

First is what many call, appropriately, the Oregon model. In this 

model, a State does not have polling places and its election is conducted solely by mail. The second is what is called the ‘‘no excuse 

absentee balloting,’’ or universal vote by mail. In this system, polling places still exist as much as they do in other States, but voters 

can choose to vote absentee and by mail without any reason whatsoever. 

I am happy that my own State of New York just decided to adopt 

the second model—not that I prefer it over the first, but at least 

it is better than nothing—of no excuse absentee balloting. We 

joined 29 other States that offer no excuse absentee balloting and 

four States that provide permanent no excuse absentee balloting. 

Finally today, we will discuss how to give voters the tools to 

track their ballots once sent. If people can track a package when 

it arrives, surely the technology is there to track a ballot. 

It is an issue that we have had some experience, successful experience, in this committee. Working with Senators Bennett, 

Chambliss, Nelson, and others, we passed the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act, known as the MOVE Act, as part of 

the National Defense Authorization last year. It ensures that all 

States permit military and overseas citizens and their dependents 

to register and vote by absentee. 

One of the most important aspects of that law, which passed 

with Congresswoman Davis’s strong support in the House, is that 

it requires election jurisdictions to provide to all military and overseas voters free access to notification that their voted ballots have 

been received by the local Board of Elections. Congresswoman 

Davis has her own bill, which passed the House on the Suspension 

Calendar, H.R. 2510, which is aimed at providing that same free 

access notification to all absentee voters in the country. I look forward to learning more about this particular proposal, as well. 

I believe these reforms to be sensible, secure, and the right thing 

to provide voters. Vote by mail elections will help all eligible voters 

to register and vote in Federal elections, including disabled voters 

and their caretakers, Americans holding down two jobs who can’t 

get away to vote, and just about anyone who can’t get to the polls 

but wants to exercise their prized constitutional right. 

So after we hear from our two Members of Congress, we are 

going to be lucky to hear from State and local election officials who 

can relate their experiences with these programs. They have been 

on the ground in the areas of policy, law, legislation, and imple-
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mentation of vote by mail programs. We can all benefit from their 

experience. 

Senator Roberts? 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROBERTS 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a privilege to be here to pinch hit or stand in for Bob Bennett. 

I might observe that in a unique test of observation by the media 

on Capitol Hill, many times, we have been mistaken for one another. This is somewhat unique in that Bob is six inches taller than 

I am and he, when a member or the Chairman of the Joint Commission on Economics and I was the Intelligence Committee Chairman, were being asked by media, Mr. Chairman, all the time different questions, they would ask me about the Fed and about the 

interest rate and about the economy, and I would say, well, we are 

going to take that up very quickly and if you will just get back to 

me, I can have something for you later. And Bob, when asked 

about an intelligence matter, would simply smile and say, ‘‘Well, 

you know I can’t say anything about that.’’ 

And so we have become sort of a, what, band of brothers in regards to the media, I guess, inquiries. That still has puzzled me, 

other than the fact that I think we both belong to the follicly challenged caucus. Perhaps that is the reason that one is mistaken for 

the other. 

It is a pleasure to be here with you. I have known the Chairman. 

We served together in the House and now serve in the Senate. The 

Chairman is known for his legislative prowess and his political acumen. I simply want to thank him for getting who I was in 2008 and 

I appreciate that very much. 

So at any rate, with Ron Wyden, Ron comes from Wichita, along 

with some other very famous person that we know at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and so I have known him for a long time and he 

serves on the Intelligence Committee. I think you are still serving 

there. And I appreciate his efforts. If there is one person who does 

reach out and tries to be bipartisan in regards to the challenges 

that we must face, it is Ron. And so, Ron, I really appreciate your 

friendship and your service. 

And Susan is a member of the sometimes powerful House Administration Committee, of which I was a member many, many 

years in the House—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. It was always powerful when you were on 

it, Senator Roberts. 

Senator ROBERTS. It was always very chaotic and very controversial, but at least I think we got some things done, so thank you 

to the members. I am looking forward to the panel. 

The Constitution under Article I, Section 4, states the time, 

places, and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives shall be prescribed in each State by the legislature 

thereof. Although the Constitution does permit Congress to make 

laws that affect elections, it is clear that the Founders intended for 

the responsibility and administration of elections to remain within 

the States and accountable directly to their voters. 

Since 1995, my State of Kansas has permitted advance so-called 

no excuse balloting for Kansans who fill out the appropriate appli-
296 

cation and meet the statutory requirements. There are some county—there is county flexibility due to cost and access and things of 

that nature, however. They may vote prior to Election Day either 

by mail or in person at a location approved by their County Election Office. 

Now, 27 other States have various forms of advance balloting, 

but it is important to remember that 22 don’t. These States have 

chosen probably for different reasons, I suspect cost and other matters, not to initiate advance balloting. That choice must be respected, I think, by the Federal Government as well as by other 

States. 

And I understand that some advocate extending advance balloting to States that have not adopted advance balloting. Others 

highlight concerns that doing so opens the door to abuses such as 

fraud. For example, in Essex County, New Jersey—where else— 

there is an ongoing investigation of fraudulent absentee ballots in 

the 2007 Senate race and this is not the only example. We could 

go on and on. 

Worse yet, we must consider the possibility of coercion. The concept of the secret ballot is one of the cornerstones of democracy and 

we must exercise extreme caution with any form of legislation that 

could potentially or inadvertently undermine the secret ballot and 

open the door to intimidation of individuals when voting on candidates or questions before them on Election Day. 

I thank the Chairman again for calling this hearing. I look forward to the witnesses’ testimony. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Roberts. 

And now we will hear from Senator Wyden. 

STATEMENT OF HON. RON WYDEN, A UNITED STATES 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OREGON 

Senator WYDEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. With 

your leave, let me just spare you the speechifying and maybe just 

highlight a few of my main concerns. 

I don’t want to make this a bouquet-tossing contest, but I also 

especially appreciate the way you, Mr. Chairman, and Senator Roberts and Senator Bennett tackle these issues in a bipartisan way. 

I think both of my colleagues know that Senator Grassley and I, 

for example, have spent a full decade trying to eliminate secret 

holds here in the United States Senate, another effort to open up 

the political process to make Government more accountable. 

Senator Schumer, when I talked to him about this a decade ago, 

the very first question Senator Schumer asked me was, are you 

doing this in a bipartisan way, so Chairman Schumer, I am very 

appreciative of the fact that you have put a special focus on these 

issues that are so important to democracy to work in a bipartisan 

fashion, and it is obvious you are doing that again. 

And to my friend, Senator Roberts, my former Chairman on the 

Intelligence Committee, we have worked together often on so many 

issues, and to work with you and Senator Bennett, and he, of 

course, has been my partner on a number of economic issues, 

health, and others, this is exactly what we need more of in the 
297 

United States Senate, and so I very much appreciate the way you 

all are tackling these issues. 

I am the first United States Senator to have been elected by 

mail. Suffice it to say, when you look at the 30-year history of what 

Oregon has done, what you see is that this empowers voters. They 

have almost three weeks to have a ballot in their hand to get more 

informed on the issues. It has increased turnout. It is cost effective. 

And on the central issue that colleagues have asked me about as 

they have looked at it, I am of the view that it reduces election 

fraud, and let me cut to the bottom line on this issue. 

We know that elections are contentious matters. People have 

passionate differences of opinion. The first point on this issue, in 

the history of our using vote by mail, and it goes back almost 30 

years, and I mentioned this to my friend, Senator Roberts, not once 

has a Democratic candidate or a Republican candidate said that 

they lost their election by voter fraud using vote by mail. There has 

not been one instance of that. 

And in fact, to highlight how strongly we feel that this is bipartisan, at one point, I was one of a handful of Democrats who were 

for this idea. Republicans at that time thought it would favor them 

because they thought that their constituency would be more interested in this. Then the roles were reversed and now Oregonians 

have put it on the ballot because overwhelmingly this is a bipartisan approach. 

One of the reasons that it has not been something susceptible to 

fraud is the extensive checks that we have put in this, and our very 

fine Secretary of State will touch on this in a few moments. First, 

we require that people sign the ballot. Then we verify the signatures. And because you have close to a three-week process, you 

have plenty of time to see if a signature is verified. And we have 

very substantial penalties—it is a felony if you sign somebody else’s 

name to the ballot. 

And Mr. Chairman, with your leave, I would like to put into the 

record an instance in Curry County where an elected official whose 

wife had back surgery and asked her husband to sign the ballot, 

he did it, they picked it up on verification and he went to jail for 

his conduct. So we have very substantial—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. You are a tough folk in Oregon. 

Senator WYDEN. We are tough folks, but we are very serious. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Without objection, that will go in the 

record. 

[The information of Senator Wyden submitted for the record:] 

Senator WYDEN. We are very serious, and I just want my colleagues to know that we don’t take a back seat to anybody on this 

question of ballot integrity. So we have 15 million ballots that have 

been cast by mail since we have used it and absolutely no evidence 

of systematic voter fraud, and our excellent Secretary of State will 

get into this in just a moment. 

Finally, Mr. Chairman, the package of bills that I have introduced includes a universal right to vote. We consider that fundamentally about access and fairness. No longer would there be arbitrary requirements that block voters from choosing to vote by 

mail. I want it understood that this wouldn’t force anyone to vote 
298 

by mail, nor does it require States to implement new voting systems. It, again, increases voter choice and voter options. 

Also, S. 3299 would eliminate arbitrary barriers that may prevent voters from exercising their rights in States that still have excuse requirements, and I note that the State I was born in, the 

State that Senator Roberts represents, was the first State to eliminate absentee ballot restrictions. 

Then I have also introduced S. 3300, the Vote by Mail Act of 

2010, that would create a model grant program to help States or 

smaller jurisdictions transition to vote by mail systems. And one of 

the reasons why I think, colleagues, we also ought to look at these 

small grant programs is it seems that every four years, when we 

have jurisdictions around the country having substantial problems 

in protecting the franchise and empowering the voters, we end up 

spending more Federal money on broken systems. So it would 

make more sense, it seems to me, to pick up on a model that has 

strong bipartisan support, that has worked, that is cost effective, 

that is efficient, that has not in any way promoted fraud, and quite 

the opposite, has sanctioned any instances of tampering with a ballot aggressively. I think it would be in the country’s interest to follow the Oregon model. 

I will plead guilty, colleagues, to being proud of my State. I think 

good government is in the Oregon chromosomes. It is hwy we participate so extensively in government. It is why people show up at 

my town hall meets in every county, every year. This is another 

way to open up the doors of democracy and to do it in a bipartisan 

way. 

So I thank colleagues for the chance to come, to you, Chairman 

Schumer, for particularly showing that you can be passionate about 

issues like this and do it in a bipartisan way. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Wyden inserted into the 

record] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Senator Wyden, and we thank 

you for your leadership on this issue. 

Congresswoman Davis? 

STATEMENT OF HON. SUSAN DAVIS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Ms. DAVIS. Thank you very much. Chairman Schumer and Senator Roberts, it is an honor to be here and to be here with Senator 

Wyden, a true leader on mail ballot issues, to testify about the rising use of absentee voting and improving the process. I will be as 

brief as I can to allow for your panel of experts, because truly, 

these are election officials whose experience offers us the greatest 

value. 

My interest in bettering our elections goes back to my service as 

President of the League of Women Voters of San Diego. Historically, the Federal Government has opened the doors to those who 

have been shut out of the voting process, whether intentionally or 

unintentionally, and each time those doors open wider, our country 

has been the better for it. 

But our work is not done. The next step is to give hard-working 

Americans with busy lives the best chance to vote no matter what 

comes up on Election Day. I vote at polls whenever I can because 
299 

I really want to. Many Americans feel the same, and I am not proposing that we take away that option. But we shouldn’t consider 

a person any less patriotic for wanting to do his or her civic duty 

at the kitchen table. 

The reality today is that ever-increasing numbers of voters 

choose to vote by mail because people pursuing the American 

dream are getting up earlier, commuting longer distances in more 

traffic, and they savor precious family time. They want to participate in democracy, but are uncertain whether they will make it to 

the polls between their work and family obligations. 

These ballots today are longer and they are often filled with complex initiatives and some voters don’t like to feel rushed at the 

polls. An absentee voter can choose whether to turn a ballot in 

right away or wait to hear everything the campaigns have to say. 

Some say early in-person voting is an alternative to voting by 

mail. While I fully support this opportunity, I would disagree with 

that. Like Election Day, early voting still involves lines and limited 

hours and administrative burdens. Mail simply has a broader 

reach. 

In California, we have no excuse absentee voting, meaning that 

anyone can vote by mail for any reason. I took the right to vote by 

absentee for granted until 2004, when a nurse from an excuse 

State told me she could not vote for President because her shift 

overlapping with polling hours and work wasn’t an acceptable excuse for an absentee ballot. Since she would not abandon her patients, well, she did not vote. Her story compelled me to take action. 

The fact that some 21 States still require excuses to vote by mail 

is a problem on three levels. First, voters in excuse States simply 

do not have as great an opportunity to vote as their counterparts 

in no excuse States. This creates an unequal playing field when we 

are all voting for the same President and the same Congress. 

Second, the excuse requirements are arbitrary impediments and 

they do not increase security. For example, in Michigan, you can 

vote absentee if you are over 60. In Mississippi, you have to be over 

65. And in Georgia, you have to be over 75. In Delaware, you need 

to collect and pay for a notary signature to prove that you are on 

vacation or that you are a student. In Tennessee, sick voters need 

a note directly from their doctor to the county clerk. Even work 

doesn’t count as a valid excuse in many States, and in some, only 

certain kinds of work do. 

And no State has a special exemption for parents of young children. I am all for setting an example by taking kids to the polls 

when they can, but any parent knows it is not always practical to 

stand in line with a couple of toddlers and then try to concentrate 

on a long ballot. 

And the third reason absentee excuses are a problem is they can 

violate our privacy for no good reason. Some people say a voter’s 

privacy is at risk voting from home. There is not much evidence of 

that, however, and most people talk politics with their family anyhow. What is clear is the threat to privacy States pose when they 

request unnecessary information just to vote. 

For example, in Virginia, you must state where you will be vacationing to get an absentee ballot. If you have a religious obligation, 
300 

you have to explain that. If you are sick, you must list the nature 

of your disability or illness. If you are caring for someone else, you 

have to list that person’s illness. And my favorite one, if you are 

pregnant, you must disclose that to the State. All of this information becomes public record and it is never verified to prevent fraud. 

But if you forget to fill out any part of it, sorry, you can’t vote. 

The good news is, we can fix all of these problems by passing the 

Universal Right to Vote by Mail Act. This bill merely expands a 

process every State already has and it clearly falls under 

Congress’s constitutional authority to regulate the place, time, and 

manner of Federal elections. 

In addition, the Congressional Budget Office scores it at zero and 

finds it is not an unfunded mandate because it is a civil rights bill. 

So before I close, I just want to urge the committee to consider 

one more bill, as well, H.R. 2510, the Track Act, a bill we recently 

passed in the House and is awaiting action here in the Senate. 

This bill, which I co-authored with Kevin McCarthy, also on the 

Administration Committee, is modeled on a successful law in California and would expand on the tracking language in the MOVE 

bill. You are familiar with that. It would provide State grants to 

set up absentee ballot tracking systems so voters can know whether their absentee ballot has been sent, received by the Elections Office, and has been counted, all three of those steps, which are very 

important. 

I strongly believe this Congress must expand and improve absentee voting for all eligible voters and extend a bedrock promise of 

our democracy, a vote for every citizen. 

I want to thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for holding this 

hearing. I want to thank you for your help and support. And I certainly want to thank your staff, as well, that were tremendously 

helpful to us. 

I seek permission to submit for the hearing record a letter from 

the Michigan Association of County Clerks. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Without objection. 

[The information of Ms. Davis submitted for the record:] 

Ms. DAVIS. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Davis submitted for the record:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. One quick question for Senator Wyden. 

When did Oregon implement its universal by mail voting, and how 

was the education and transition process? I am sure people would 

want to know that. 

Senator ROBERTS. Wasn’t that with Lewis and Clark when 

they—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. Lewis was for it and Clark was against it, as 

I recall. 

Senator WYDEN. And then when they saw how well it worked, 

they both came on board. 

Senator ROBERTS. I see. 

Senator WYDEN. Mr. Chairman, I would also like to submit for 

the record, we have put together—our State officials put together 

a history of vote by mail. 

[The information of Senator Wyden submitted for the record] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Oh, good. 
301 

Senator WYDEN. But essentially, there is a 30-year chronology 

dating back from 1981, where we started testing vote by mail for 

local elections, the chronology. We made vote by mail permanent 

in 1987. The majority of counties began to use it for local elections, 

as I noted. We held the Statewide special election in 1995 and 

1996. In January of 1996, when I was chosen Oregon’s first new 

United States Senator in almost 30 years, we had 66 percent turnout, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Wow. 

Senator WYDEN. This was in the dead of winter. It was unbelievably cold. And colleagues, I don’t remember it—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. That was because of the quality of the candidate. 

Senator WYDEN. Well, as all of us know, Senator Smith was an 

extraordinary elected official, as well, and he and I worked very 

closely together. But I note that at that time, when 66 percent 

turned out, people compared it to the previous Senate special election. We had one, which I believe was in Texas, that had turnout 

somewhere in the 20 percent range. So you get a sense of what the 

extraordinary effect this has had in terms of increasing voter turnout. Make this chronology a part of the record—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. Without objection. 

Senator WYDEN[ continuing]. But we have a 30-year successful 

history, and that is why I feel comfortable about coming before you 

and arguing that it ought to be expanded, is we have had a chance 

to work through the kinks. 

Particularly just one last point, Mr. Chairman. You have been 

very gracious on time. When you look at this fraud issue, if a ballot 

is fraudulent, under the Oregon system, it never gets counted because we have used that three-week period to essentially check the 

envelopes, identify the problems, fix the errors, investigate any 

questionable ballots, as opposed to what happens when you have 

the traditional process of the polling place. The vote has already 

been counted and then you are playing catch-up ball to deal with 

retrieval issues as opposed to what we think has been successful 

in terms of getting at these questionable activities up front. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And to Congresswoman Davis, California’s 

rate of vote by mail is extraordinarily high, 44 percent. Why do you 

think that is, compared to, say, other States that have the same 

law, basically the same law in effect? 

Ms. DAVIS. Well, one thing, they have made it permanent voting 

so that people don’t have to actually request an absentee ballot 

every time there is an election. They can—that is basically a permanent absentee voter and I think that makes a large difference, 

and people have found that it works for them. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Senator Roberts? Thank you both. 

Senator ROBERTS. With a highly mobile society, more especially 

with California, how does that work? It is a permanent situation 

by address, I am assuming. 

Ms. DAVIS. Yes. If people move, then of course they have to reregister at that address. 

Senator ROBERTS. Sure. But I would guess, what, 20 percent at 

least in California—— 

Ms. DAVIS. Are moving around? 
302 

Chairman SCHUMER. Are moving to Kansas. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. I don’t think so. 

Ms. DAVIS. A lot of them do move within the State, but even if 

they move down the street—— 

Senator ROBERTS. We have very strict immigration laws. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. DAVIS. But the other thing that has been mentioned is the 

signature is really the key in California, as well. I have been at the 

registrar when they are checking all of that and they do. They go 

through every signature—— 

Senator ROBERTS. I don’t think there is a better salesperson for 

this than you have represented yourself before the committee. If 

you have been talking to your colleagues in regards to the 22 

States that do not have this, it would seem to me you have a very 

convincing argument. 

I think I can say the same thing about Kansas. I am not too 

eager to superimpose by federal fiat upon the 22 who do not. You 

may think they live in the Dark Ages or whatever it is that one 

may think, but being the sales person that you are, of course, you 

have other duties to perform. Have you talked to some of your colleagues in some of the States that you were talking about in regards to the need for voting by mail? 

Ms. DAVIS. I certainly have, and you are absolutely right that 

people believe that this is in the venue of the State. I think what 

we have to point out to them is that, actually, traditionally, while 

the States have run elections, no court has really said that the 

Tenth Amendment trumps Article I, Section 4, which basically says 

that the Congress can determine the place and time. We have 

HAVA. We have Motor Voter. We have done a number of things to 

try and provide some standardization. 

So I have given them those arguments and I think that they do 

tend to fall back on the State argument. But when they have an 

opportunity to talk to their registrars and their county people, I 

think that they come around often with the feeling that this doesn’t 

make sense anymore. It may have at one time. 

Senator ROBERTS. I am a veteran of the Motor Voter meaningful 

dialogue that we had in the House Administration Committee and 

had three amendments. One, you had to be a citizen; two, that it 

was an unfunded mandate and we should pay for it; and then, 

third—oh, what the heck was the third one? But at any rate, another common sense amendment. They all went down by a party 

line vote. 

I am trying to think of the Washington Representative that was 

such a leader in that—Congressman Swift, Al Swift. And then ten 

years later, I went back over all of the evidence that he indicated 

State by State in terms of what he thought would represent an increased voter turnout. As it turned out, it didn’t affect it much one 

way or the other. What affected it was the candidates and the timing and everything that involves a political year. So I still have 

some reservations about that. But at any rate—— 

Ms. DAVIS. I think one of the things you might look at is for all 

of those States that have made this decision and moved forward, 

none of them have changed and gone back. 
303 

Senator ROBERTS. I understand that. It would be very difficult to 

do that under the circumstances. I think, politically—the third one 

was, by the way, if the State had a more strict law enforcement requirement than the bill actually provided, that that would prevail. 

And it seemed to me those three things were very reasonable. 

Mr. Chairman, I did not mean to get into a renewed debate on 

Motor Voter, but anyway, that struck a chord. Thank you very 

much. 

Ms. DAVIS. Thank you. 

Chairman SCHUMER. I thank both of our witnesses for being 

here. 

Senator WYDEN. Thank you. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And now we will call the next panel to come 

forward, who are Kate Brown, the Secretary of State of Oregon, 

recommended by Senator Wyden, John Fortier from the AEI, and 

Rokey Suleman, who is from the Board of Elections in the District 

of Columbia. I will read a brief biography of each and then we will 

ask each witness to submit their entire statement to the record and 

speak for five minutes. 

Ms. Kate Brown currently serves as the Secretary of State of Oregon, a position she has held since 2008. She was elected to Oregon’s House of Representatives in 1991, served there until 1997 

when she was elected to the Oregon Senate in 2004. She became 

the first woman elected Majority Leader in the Oregon Senate, 

served there for five years, earned her law degree from Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon. Welcome. And one of your Statewide colleagues, John Kroger, 

worked for me for a number of years. 

John C. Fortier is a research fellow at the American Enterprise 

Institute as the principal contributor to the election reform project 

done in conjunction with the Brookings Institute, a member of the 

Committee to Modernize Voter Registration, and the author of Absentee and Early Voting: Trends, Promises, and Perils. He taught 

political science at the University of Pennsylvania, University of 

Delaware, Boston College, and Harvard. He earned his undergraduate degree from Georgetown, Ph.D. from Boston College. 

And Mr. Rokey Suleman currently serves as the Executive Director for the Board of Elections and Ethics in the District of Columbia, where he is responsible for the maintenance of voter records 

and election preparation. Before joining the D.C. Board, he served 

in Fairfax County, Virginia, as the General Registrar in the Office 

of Elections, as well as in Warren, Ohio, as the Deputy Director of 

the Trumball County Board of Elections. 

You are all welcome. Secretary Brown, your entire statement is 

read in the record and you may begin. 

STATEMENT OF KATE BROWN, OREGON SECRETARY OF 

STATE, SALEM, OREGON 

Ms. BROWN. Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members. For 

the record, I am Kate Brown, Oregon’s Secretary of State, and 

thank you for inviting me here to testify today. I really appreciate 

both Senator Wyden and Congresswoman Davis’s leadership in attempting to provide Americans with universal access to vote by 

mail. 
304 

You have my written testimony in front of you. I would like to 

highlight a few of those points. 

Oregon’s 30-year experience with vote by mail has been a resounding success. Vote by mail enhances turnout, is cost effective, 

and secures the integrity of the ballot. We know that Oregonians 

like vote by mail because we can measure the effects it has had on 

turnout over the past few election cycles. Oregon has been in the 

top ten of States in voter turnout amongst registered voters for the 

last two Presidential elections. It is the only State in the top ten 

that does not have same-day voter registration, another subject for 

another day. 

It is easy to understand why. With vote by mail, we make it easier, more accessible, and more convenient for Oregonians to cast an 

informed ballot. It is easier for folks living in rural Oregon, miles 

away from the Elections Office, to drop their ballot in a mailbox. 

It is accessible for people with disabilities to vote independently in 

the privacy of their own homes. And it is convenient for busy families, as Congresswoman Davis mentioned. 

Vote by mail is cost effective. The last general election at a polling place was in 1998. It cost $1.81 per voter. Our special election 

in January of 2010 cost $1.05 per voter, not including inflation. 

We continue to add efficiencies, as well. Last legislative session, 

we passed a bill which allows counties to process the ballots before 

Election Day. As you all know, voters and elected officials want results immediately in this day and age, and in our last Statewide 

election, we released more than three-quarters of the results within 

half-an-hour of the voting deadline. 

In addition, as Senator Wyden mentioned, vote by mail is secure. 

To combat any attempts at fraud, we have put a number of security measures in place to make vote by mail as secure as traditional polling place systems. For example, to ensure the integrity 

of each ballot, we check every single signature, and I know this because it happened to me. One election, I got a call saying my signature didn’t match my signature on the voter registration card and 

would I come down to the Elections Office to verify my ballot. Of 

course, I did. 

We are also using tracking measures by including a bar code on 

every single envelope so we can track a given ballot while it is in 

the custody of Elections. And by November of 2010, voters will be 

able to track their ballots and confirm that they have been received 

by elections officials, just like we can track our purchases on eBay. 

As Senator Wyden mentioned, the penalties for voter fraud are 

severe. I have another case in Josephine County where a man 

forged the name of his younger brother to register to vote. His 

younger brother was a citizen. We caught him. He was discovered 

when his brother was summoned for jury duty and the county 

learned that his brother was only 14 years old. He was convicted 

of four felonies and deported, and now he can never become a citizen of the United States. 

Finally, given the length of time of the election, as Senator 

Wyden mentioned, with the ballots going out about 18 days ahead 

of time, county clerks and elections officials have ample opportunity to resolve unanticipated problems. 
305 

It has truly been a collaborative process and we work closely 

with our partners at the United States Postal Service. 

Senator Schumer, I would let you know that Secretary Reed has 

a letter detailing the experience in the State of Washington and he 

can tell you why Pierce County is not all vote by mail. But I believe 

it is the only county in Washington that doesn’t have vote by mail. 

In sum, we are really proud of our system in Oregon and we are 

very encouraged by the willingness of Congress and this committee 

to discuss its merits. However, as excited as I am about the prospect of vote by mail going national, I know that I have to temper 

my excitement in light of the long path we took to fully implement 

the system, and that was a full 30 years. 

Senator Wyden’s approach is creative and a common sense way 

to give all voters across the country access to the convenience of 

voting by mail in a very ‘‘take it easy’’ approach. 

I would like to thank the members of the committee for having 

me here today. I heartily encourage you to support the three bills 

that the good Senator Wyden has introduced. And if Oregon’s experience is any indication, universal access to vote by mail has the 

potential to affect our country’s elections for the better. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Brown follows:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Secretary Brown. 

Mr. Fortier? 

STATEMENT OF JOHN FORTIER, THE AMERICAN ENTERPRISE 

INSTITUTE, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. FORTIER. Thank you, Chairman Schumer and Senator Roberts. I commend you on having this hearing today because we have 

had a silent revolution in voting that has taken place over the last 

30 years. Thirty years ago, we could look at the States and there 

would be some similarities. Most States would have about five percent people voting by absentee. You would have those people with 

reasons. They would be overseas, they would be ill, or they would 

be out of town on business or some personal business. 

And starting in the late 1970s and early 1980s, a number of 

States started to change this, and we have seen a tremendous rise 

in voting by mail, but I also want to highlight a tremendous rise 

in voting early in person. Both of these phenomena have added together, add up to about a third of voters voting before Election 

Day, a tremendous change which has really been State by State. 

Some States, Oregon, 100 percent, Washington State, nearly 

there, are voting by mail. Some States—New York is now moving 

in this direction but has traditionally had very low rates of absentee voting. Many of the Northeast States still have those rates of 

five percent or less. 

Some States have moved very heavily to voting early in person 

but do not do much voting absentee. Texas and Tennessee were the 

leaders. Georgia and North Carolina also fall into this category. 

And then there are a number of States who do a lot of both. 

So I note to you the great variety that is out there in the States, 

and I think that is some caution to what Congress should weigh 

in on, whether Congress should put early voting in person, or early 

voting by mail above other forms of voting. 
306 

Now, if I were advising you as a State, I do have some reservations about moving towards voting by mail. Of course, it is needed 

for a certain percentage of voters who cannot make it to the polls, 

but that does not mean that you could not go to a certain form of 

convenience voting, and that is voting early in person. And the reason I would recommend that method of voting rather than voting 

by mail or expanding voting by mail in a significant way is several 

reasons. 

One, it is not a secret ballot, a vote by mail. It is needed by some 

people, but once that ballot has left the polling place, it is in the 

hands of someone. It is potentially out there for others to see. And 

while most of us do not have pressures on us as to how to vote, 

there are some that do. There are vulnerable voters. There are people with prying spouses or bullying employers or who face a certain 

sort of peer pressure being part of a group, and the fact that the 

ballot is out there makes it very hard for those people to resist 

those pressures. If you go to a polling place, you may have all the 

pressures in the world, but ultimately, you pull the curtain behind 

you and you vote as you like no matter what your friends, spouse, 

or peers have told you to do. 

There are also problems with the chain of custody. Certainly, an 

absentee ballot or a mail ballot leaves the polling place. It is sent. 

It is requested. It has to be turned back. And the problems that 

we have found have been in the fraud area. While I don’t think we 

can prove in any way that they are extensive, they certainly are 

to do with people intercepting ballots, people requesting ballots for 

people who are not eligible voters or are not where they are supposed to be. There is an extra opportunity for fraud that does not 

exist at the polling place. 

I also think there are some problems with the way ballots are 

handled, and I want to accept Oregon for this. In many ways, I am 

a critic of voting by mail, but I think Oregon, when it does voting 

by mail, does it very well. That is not the case all around the country. There are many States who do not take the same care of checking signatures, of ensuring that there is contact with voters if there 

are problems. 

And I point to the Minnesota example, where Minnesota, a contentious recent election, we had problems that both sides argued 

about, about ballots being not counted that should have been 

counted or ballots that were counted that didn’t meet the requirements, and ultimately also some problems potentially of votes 

being cast with errors in them which are not able to be corrected 

on the ballot itself, whereas at a polling place, there are error 

checking mechanisms in a number of voting systems. 

You know, my caution on moving towards requiring voting by 

mail everywhere is that, look, we have a very good other system, 

voting in person early, and we wouldn’t—I am going to speak for 

Secretary Brown here. I am not sure she would be excited if we 

passed a bill and said that we should require there be early voting 

in person everywhere all the time or in an extensive way. I don’t 

think we should impose one or the other. I think the States are 

making decisions. And I will note, I think that the statistics show 

that we are moving more in the direction of voting early in person. 

The recent rise in that has been greater than the other. 
307 

My last point is that just because I don’t think we should ask 

States to—we shouldn’t force States to offer absentee ballots to everyone, we should consider making some of the improvements that 

are dealing with the tracking, with the signatures and other things 

that Oregon and other States do well. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Fortier inserted into the record] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. Fortier. You hit the nail on 

the head exactly at five minutes. 

So we now go to Mr. Suleman. 

STATEMENT OF ROKEY W. SULEMAN II, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, D.C. BOARD OF ELECTIONS AND ETHICS, WASHINGTON, 

D.C. 

Mr. SULEMAN. Thank you, Chairman Schumer and Senator Roberts. Universal access to an absentee ballot is something that 

should be available to every U.S. citizen. 

I have been an election official in a State with universal access 

to an absentee ballot—that would be Ohio, an official in a State 

that severely restricts absentee ballot access—that would be Virginia, and am currently the Chief Election Official in the District 

of Columbia, a jurisdiction that is now making the transition from 

excuse-based absentee to no excuse absentee voting. I can speak 

with firsthand experience to the administrative difficulty that results from restricting ballot access through the mail. 

Demands on the lives of voters have grown as our country has 

grown. We owe it to our citizens to give them as much access to 

the ballot as they request. No fault absentee voting does just that 

in a place that is convenient, their home. 

Some argue that a vote by mail system erodes a community’s 

sense of civic duty, that a ballot received through the mail is equal 

to junk mail received on a daily basis. I disagree. I believe that voting by mail gives families as much of an opportunity, if not more 

so, to educate their children about voting. Not every parent has the 

luxury to have their children tag along to the polls with them on 

Election Day. With vote by mail, families can sit around the kitchen table and discuss the issues and the candidates. 

Virginia places significant restrictions on access to an absentee 

ballot through the mail. A person must meet one of numerous requirements in order to vote absentee either in person or via the 

mail. A voter must check a box on a form and also give supporting 

information for their reason. For example, a voter must check ‘‘personal business’’ or ‘‘vacation’’ and then list the place that they are 

visiting. Failure to list the location results in a mandatory denial 

of that application. 

Medical reasons for requesting an absentee ballot through the 

mail also require supporting information. If a person does not list 

the nature of their illness on the application, the application must 

be denied. The medical reason to vote absentee may be very personal and subject the voter to public embarrassment. Absentee applications are records available to inspection by the public. Although there is some thought that the Health Insurance Portability 

and Accountability Act of 1996, HIPAA, may apply, election officials have received no guidance to how to balance the right to privacy against the freedom of information regarding these docu-
308 

ments. We face the prospect of serious litigation in the future if 

these requirements are still in place. 

Requiring an excuse to vote absentee also places a significant administrative burden on local election officials. The denial rate in 

my office in Fairfax, Virginia, for absentee applications was very 

high in 2008. A significant number of voters check a reason but do 

not supply the supporting information. My staff has to review each 

application for completeness. Failure to properly complete the form 

requires a notice to the voter informing them of the deficiency and 

supplying a new application. This is all done by hand. 

During the November 2008 general election season, my former 

office denied thousands of applications because of these simple failures to supply burdensome information. There were several file 

drawers filled with applications that were denied. Some voters 

were denied multiple times before submitting a properly completed 

application. This took thousands of dollars out of our budget for the 

increase in man hours, postage, and supplies needed to process 

these applications. This is a tremendous waste of valuable tax dollars. No excuse access to a ballot through the mail would have 

saved that office thousands of dollars in processing and overtime 

costs. 

Some opponents of no excuse absentee voting by mail claim a 

person should be able to fill out a form properly and failure to do 

so should disqualify their vote. I have had to deny applications to 

former U.S. Congressmen and current U.S. Supreme Court Justices 

because of failure to supply supporting information. If these educated folks make mistakes, imagine the mistakes made by a 90- 

year-old voter that has difficulty reading and writing. 

The transition from excuse-based absentee voting to no excuse 

absentee voting in Ohio caused no problems or increased fraud. As 

a matter of fact, in today’s Cleveland Plain Dealer, they indicate 

that the majority of votes in Cuyahoga County in yesterday’s primary came in through the mail. 

It is my professional opinion that increased access to ballots 

through the mail does not lead to an increase in voter fraud. The 

numbers I have seen just do not support the assertion. What universal access through the mail does is give a voter another option 

in casting a ballot, an option that more and more voters across the 

country desire. 

There are other benefits to vote by mail. Election officials will 

also be able to take advantage of technology to let a voter know 

where their ballot is. By placing bar codes on both the original and 

return envelope, my office in the District will have the ability to 

tell every absentee voter the status of their ballot on our website 

up to the point the ballot is on the vehicle of their postal carrier. 

While we are implementing this technology to comply with the 

MOVE Act, this process will be easily extended to all vote by mail 

voters at nearly no cost. This process is expected to significantly reduce the number of ‘‘where is my ballot’’ calls to the office, which 

in turn will reduce staffing costs. The combination of convenience 

and technology will be a tremendous benefit for the voters in the 

District. 

It is my belief the District will start to see such a shift to early 

and no fault absentee voting that we will be able to combine pre-
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cincts. This will provide my office with thousands of dollars in savings from poll worker reduction, reduced training costs, fewer polling location rental fees, and less overtime. 

No fault absentee voting is a concept whose time has arrived. 

Voters like the ease of use. Election officials as well as the funding 

authorities appreciate savings realized in the elimination of polling 

locations. This is a good government bill. This bill will save taxpayer money and provide greater access to our government. It is 

a bill whose time has arrived. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Suleman follows:] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you. And again, I want to thank our 

witnesses for observing the time limit. 

The first question I have is for Secretary Brown and Mr. 

Suleman in particular, education, and particularly the experience 

with Oregon. When Senator Wyden rehearsed the history, it was 

sort of gradual. It started in local elections. I guess it wasn’t mandatory. You could go to the polls, et cetera. How long did it take 

for Oregon voters to become familiar with the process? How do you 

educate new voters? You have an influx of many citizens from 

other States who come to Oregon. Tell us a little bit about that. 

Ms. BROWN. Mr. Chair, thank you for the question. As Senator 

Wyden suggested, the process to moving to vote by mail in Oregon 

was gradual. A Republican Secretary of State passed legislation in 

1981 to allow for local elections, and it wasn’t until the voter initiative passed in 1998 that we went to full vote by mail. That being 

said, basically, no one under the age of 30 has ever voted in a polling place in Oregon, so it certainly has been a gradual transition. 

I think the beauty of Senator Wyden’s bill is it doesn’t force the 

States to do vote by mail. It allows the voters to have the choice 

of voting by mail, and it is really an expansion. My understanding 

is that all the States have access to some type of absentee voting. 

So it really just expands the systems that the States already have 

in place. 

In terms of education, I am in the schools on a regular basis 

working to educate young Oregonians that we vote by mail and 

how we vote by mail. And we, frankly, have used our Federal Help 

America Vote Act dollars to educate voters about the voting process 

in Oregon. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Mr. Suleman, you mentioned Ohio. That 

was very interesting, that in the primary, a majority of votes were 

cast by mail in Cuyahoga County. How is the process going there 

with educating voters, voters adapting, et cetera? 

Mr. SULEMAN. The election offices in Cuyahoga County and 

Franklin County, Ohio, the two largest jurisdictions in Ohio, are 

very proactive and they send out applications to all of the voters 

to fill out and submit ballots and it has worked very well for them. 

My experience in my county in Ohio was we did a limited approach because we didn’t have the local resources to send out applications to all of our voters. However, we knew that there was going 

to be difficulty with the applications, so we sent out—inside the application itself, we sent a form that described actually how to fill 

out the application so when the ballot came back there weren’t any 

mistakes on the ballot so we could pass that forward. 
310 

Each county has taken it upon themselves to educate the voters 

a little differently, but it has proven to be a great success. 

Chairman SCHUMER. And it is working? 

Mr. SULEMAN. It is working. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. Secretary Brown, Mr. Fortier mentioned some of the complaints with this process. We have talked 

about the fraud, so I am going to leave Senator Wyden’s comments 

on that in Oregon. But what about this idea that you lose some of 

your privacy from, I think his words were, prying spouses and employers who were trying to pressure people, or something like that. 

Do you get many complaints about that from Oregon voters? 

Ms. BROWN. Mr. Chair, actually, we have had no complaints regarding coercion amongst spouses or partners in terms of coercion 

around the ballot, and we have actually done some research. The 

prior administration reviewed divorce petitions looking for allegations regarding coercion between spouses—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. No divorces because of election differences? 

Ms. BROWN. Correct. Correct. But the other thing I would add, 

Mr. Chair, is that—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. It would be a pretty fragile marriage. 

[Laughter.] 

Ms. BROWN. I have been very involved in the domestic violence 

community in my work in the legislature and I have never heard 

any complaints about this particular issue. So we—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. What about with employers? 

Ms. BROWN. Uh—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. No, but employers would say, hey, I want 

you to vote Republican or Democrat and let us see your ballot. 

Ms. BROWN. Mr. Chair, we have not heard any complaints about 

that. The legislature recently passed legislation in Oregon regarding, shall we say, meetings with employers that doesn’t require employees to attend meetings. But no, I haven’t had any complaints 

regarding employers forcing them to turn in the ballot. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Mr. Fortier, when you brought these up, is 

that speculative, hypothetical, or do you know of instances and can 

you mention a few to us? 

Mr. FORTIER. Well, if I could just turn back in a way to the history, we actually had two reform movements, one right before the 

other, a reform movement at the end of the 19th century which put 

in the privacy of the ballot, the Australian ballot, and shortly 

thereafter, we had a reform that States started introducing absentee ballots. And some of the reasons for these requirements to go 

to a notary or provide a reason to vote absentee were because State 

Constitutions had enshrined the idea of privacy of the ballot and 

they wanted to balance these things. 

I am not advocating going back to a notary public, which I will 

note actually I did have to go to the first time I voted absentee, 

but you can see the reason for wanting to do so, that you go to a 

notary public, you show a blank ballot, you then are standing over 

there—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. But any specific instances here? 

Mr. FORTIER. Well, I mean, the reasons at the time, I will just 

say, of course, were worse than we would expect today with polit-
311 

ical machines which had walked into the ballot box with a colorcoded ballot. You knew how you voted. 

I just think you are unlikely to find the subtly pressured voter 

or the voter who is under some pressure to come forward and say, 

look, I have these problems. They are vulnerable voters who potentially have someone giving them a hard time and might actually 

be able to see the ballot. I mean, certainly you can pay someone 

to see their ballot and turn it in, as well. It is not prohibited, or 

there is no way to ultimately get around that. 

I applaud Oregon for doing lots of things to stop that, and I don’t 

think we should get rid of absentee ballots. We need them for some 

people. But in many ways, the polling places provide these protections that that sort of voting doesn’t. And when a State like Texas 

or Tennessee wants to do a lot of convenience voting, a lot of voting 

early at polling places and say voting by mail is for only people 

who really need it, I think that is a good choice for those States 

to make. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. And one final question for all three 

witnesses. Could some States’ motivation here be that they don’t 

want some people to vote or certain people to vote or make it more 

difficult? Is it that States that had traditionally denied voting 

rights to certain groups have tougher laws still to this day for any 

particular reason? Any of the panel on that. Or is that just gone, 

thankfully? 

Mr. SULEMAN. No. Quite honestly, in my professional opinion, 

that is the reason why the extreme absentee restriction to vote by 

mail exists in Virginia. I believe that they just do not want to open 

up access to the ballot to folks. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Mr. Fortier, you disagree with that? 

Mr. FORTIER. Yes, I do. I mean, I think most of the States that 

still have these restrictions are actually in the Northeast, so some 

of those historical reasons may not be quite there. And, look, many 

of these reasons, we may want to revisit them at a State level and 

say, well, maybe this particular provision for providing a reason 

isn’t what we want, or maybe we may need to make it easier. But 

I am not sure that the main reason is to keep turnout down. 

We didn’t really talk about turnout, and I think there are some 

real problems with the claim that voting by mail increases turnout. 

Most academic research has actually shown that it does not. There 

are some contradictory studies, but there are certainly a number 

of studies that show a negative result. So I think the consensus is 

that it doesn’t increase turnout by itself, nor does voting early in 

person. It is convenient. There are some benefits to it. But it is not 

something that is an automatic turnout increaser. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Thank you all. 

Senator Roberts? 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, thank you all. I truly appreciate your 

taking the time. I know you are very busy and it has been very interesting. 

We had a hearing on voter registration issues last March and 

one of the witnesses at that hearing submitted a study showing 

turnout increased nationwide over a period, I think that was highlighted by Ms. Brown when she said increased six percent in your 

State in the last three Presidential elections, and then I think 
312 

there were similar numbers, too, in other States that had a similar 

system. 

But according to the Center for the Study of the American Electorate—I don’t know who that is, by the way, but it sounds pretty 

good—average turnout nationwide for 2000, 2004, and 2008 Presidential elections was 59.26, almost 60 percent, while average turnout for 1988, 1992, and 1996—it occurs to me that is when I ran— 

was 54.3 percent, about five percent below, actually 4.96. So the 

turnout increase over that period was pretty close to the national 

average. 

Do you have any comments on that, Ms. Brown, and also to Mr. 

Fortier? 

Ms. BROWN. Mr. Chair, Senator Roberts, what I can relay to you 

is that Oregon’s turnout amongst registered voters has been in the 

top ten in the nation during the past couple of Presidentials. In 

terms of non-registered voters, we are, frankly, in the middle of the 

pack, and that is why we moved to—in March, we moved to an online voter registration system. We used our Federal Help America 

Vote Act dollars to move to an online system to make it easier and 

more accessible for Oregonians to register online if they have a 

State ID or driver’s license. So we are really working hard on the 

registration end. 

Senator ROBERTS. Mr. Fortier? 

Mr. FORTIER. I will just say, I want to commend Oregon because 

Oregon does have high voter turnout, but it has had high voter 

turnout for quite a long time, before it had all vote by mail elections. So I think that in itself has not been the reason for its high 

turnout. 

There are a number of studies, I would point to some in California, where there are some districts where people are required to 

vote by mail because the number of people who have the same ballot is quite small, and a number of academics have studied those 

districts and found actually a negative result. I don’t claim that 

that is the case, but the range of results is from some small negatives to some small positives. 

The one exception, I will say, is for local elections, small really 

low turnout local elections, local referenda. There, we do see some 

significant turnout. But for any major Statewide race or even local 

State legislative or for House of Representatives, those races, we 

don’t see an increase in turnout. 

Senator ROBERTS. I am going to refer to the Dark Ages when I 

attended the Kansas State University, the home of the ever-optimistic and fighting Wildcats, and we had two political science professors that were pretty famous, or infamous. One was trying to 

lower the voting age to 16. This is before even 18 and if you are 

old enough to fight, you are old enough to vote, which I always 

thought was a rather odd connection, but I can understand it. 

And another political science professor who, I would say to the 

Chairman, had a very unique version. He said a higher voter turnout isn’t necessarily good, that the old expression, it doesn’t matter 

who you vote for, just make sure you vote, if you really look at 

that, that is a pretty stupid observation. I mean, that is you would 

just vote for anybody, just vote. Now, that happens in this country, 

I understand that, for various reasons. And so he thought that the 
313 

best election would probably be about a 20 percent turnout and everybody else is playing golf and things were getting along just fine. 

I happen to also harken back, that was the Eisenhower years 

and—— 

Chairman SCHUMER. You would have very few municipal golf 

courses. 

Senator ROBERTS. That is true. We would have very few golf 

courses. Actually, we have a lot of pastures out in Kansas that 

would work out. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. But Ike was President. It was eight years of 

peace and prosperity. People seemed to be less interested in dramatic legislation, et cetera, et cetera. 

But at any rate, I am not asking you to comment on that except 

that an informed vote, I think, is probably the most important 

thing. But Ms. Brown, you have raised something that really 

makes my eyebrows go up. You argue that in your State, the civic 

ritual of voting at the polling place has been replaced with a new 

civic tradition of families getting together to discuss and vote their 

ballots together. 

I am thinking of my own family and then I am also thinking of 

maybe a family reunion in which this could take place. I shudder 

at that thought, knowing various members of my family—extended. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. I have one son and three daughters—pardon 

me, two daughters. I am into grandchildren now, but that is another thing. I ran for the Senate in 1996. My one daughter was in 

school at the University of Kansas. I don’t know how that happened, but anyway, she enrolled in that school and completed her 

degree. At any rate, the other daughter and the other son did precisely what their Great-Grandfather and their Grandfather and 

their father had recommended in regards to voting, along with the 

various mothers. 

The other daughter, however, decided that she marched to a different drum. I can remember the case of where her brother put one 

of my bumper stickers on her car, which I thought would be an understandable thing. She immediately took it off. She didn’t put my 

opponent’s bumper sticker up there. To date, I do not know if she 

voted for me in 1996, and I have never asked her how she voted 

in this last election. 

But I can see—I am not too sure that this is a civic ritual in regards to our family. It is not that we do not have meaningful dialogue about the issues of the day and various candidates and their 

qualifications, but at any rate, I don’t know. Isn’t the key difference 

that while both systems allow families to sit around and discuss 

the candidates, only one assures a secret ballot as opposed to everybody signing at the appropriate time and everybody pretty much 

knowing how everybody voted, which I am not sure is a good thing? 

Ms. BROWN. Mr. Chair, Senator Roberts, I have a number of responses and I will try and be responsive to your question, but—— 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, help me with my daughter first. 

[Laughter.] 
314 

Ms. BROWN. Okay. Well, I will say, when I first ran for the legislature, I ended up running against a three-term incumbent and 

was outspent two-to-one. I won that race by seven votes. 

Senator ROBERTS. Wow. 

Ms. BROWN. And one of the reasons I ran to become Secretary 

of State is because I believe that every vote really does matter and 

needs to be counted. 

In terms of the power differential, and Chair Schumer raised this 

earlier, I think that is the beauty of the Wyden-Davis approach, 

and that is it allows the individual voter to determine whether he 

or she wants to do the vote by mail. If someone wants to retain the 

polling place system and go to the polls, they can do that. That is 

the beauty of the Wyden approach. It gives the voter the choice. 

In terms of the family conversations, the wonderful thing that 

happens in Oregon is that our voters’ pamphlets come out about 

three weeks ahead of time, so the photos are there, the statements 

are there from the candidates. The ballots come about a half-aweek later. It gives people an opportunity to discuss what is on the 

ballot. We have a complicated ballot in Oregon normally because 

we have an initiative process to further complicate everything, and 

so normally, there are about five to eight initiatives on the ballot, 

as well. 

So people discuss these issues in neighborhood associations, in 

churches, in libraries. Certainly, there is discussion around family 

dining room tables. I know that folks try to influence people, but 

to my knowledge, there is no coercion happening. We haven’t had 

any evidence of coercion. 

And I don’t know what I can do to help you with your daughter 

other than to share with her my story of seven votes and that we 

would hate it if you were to lose. 

Senator ROBERTS. Well, you will probably agree with her. That 

is the thing that—— 

[Laughter.] 

Senator ROBERTS. One other thing. I am way over time here, and 

I apologize to the Chairman and everybody else. This is probably 

not really pertinent, but it does make me stop and think a minute. 

I was editor and publisher of a weekly newspaper in Phoenix during the explosion of Phoenix, and it is still exploding, in more ways 

than one, but at any rate, it was on the West side of Phoenix and 

obviously the home of Barry Goldwater. And I actually traveled 

with the Senator and had great respect for him, and then obviously 

it was the Johnson-Goldwater election. In that newspaper, I editorialized that perhaps the experience of Johnson weighed heavily in 

favor of voting for him and wrote that editorial and voted accordingly. 

My father, who is the former Republican National Chairman 

under Eisenhower, did not get a copy of the paper—thank God— 

until about two weeks later. Coercion? You have no idea about the 

coercion that followed for years afterwards. I have never made that 

mistake again in regards to at least a decision like that, either that 

or I just simply, might add, just sort of took it for granted that I 

voted the way that he thought that I should vote. But anyway, I 

would assume that not all families are like mine. 
315 

I want to thank you all very much and thank you for your personal examples and your expertise. I think it has been a good hearing, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Well, thank you, Senator Roberts, and you 

helped make it a good hearing, as did our three witnesses. 

I would say to you, I just had a little experience. I ran for the 

Assembly at age 23. My parents, particularly my mother, thought 

I should go practice law and make some money and she told many 

of her friends not to vote for me so I would get this dumb idea of 

being a politician from my thick head. So you are not alone. 

[Laughter.] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Anyway, thank you all for coming. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:17 a.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

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NOMINATION OF WILLIAM J. BOARMAN TO 

BE THE PUBLIC PRINTER 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 25, 2010 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION, Washington, D.C. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in Room 

SR–301, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Charles E. Schumer, 

Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Schumer, Warner, and Bennett. 

Staff present: Jean Bordewich, Staff Director; Jennifer Griffith, 

Deputy Staff Director; Veronica Gillespie, Elections Counsel; Julia 

Richardson, Counsel; Lauryn Bruck, Professional Staff; Lynden 

Armstrong, Chief Clerk; Matthew McGowan, Professional Staff; 

Justin Perkins, Staff Assistant; Mary Jones, Republican Staff Director; Shaun Parkin, Republican Deputy Staff Director; Paul 

Vinovich, Republican Chief Counsel; Michael Merrell, Republican 

Counsel; Abbie Platt, Republican Professional Staff; Trish Kent, 

Republican Professional Staff; and Rachel Creviston, Republican 

Professional Staff. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SCHUMER 

Chairman SCHUMER. Okay. Good morning, and I want to thank 

my colleagues here—I apologize for being late—and thank our witness here today. I want to thank my colleague on this Committee, 

Senator Warner; he is going to Chair the remainder of the hearing, 

and I appreciate him doing that, because I had a previous commitment, but we wanted to move this on. And, of course, I want to 

thank Senator Bennett always. 

The hearing will come to order. I would like to welcome everybody, including our Ranking Member, Senator Bennett, and Senator Warner, and especially our nominee, William ‘‘Bill’’ Boarman. 

The Government Printing Office was created by the Printing Act 

in 1860 for the production and distribution of information products 

and services for all three branches of the Federal Government. 

GPO opened its doors on March 4, 1861. That is the same day 

President Lincoln became the 16th President of the United States. 

In fact, next year is the GPO’s 150th anniversary. 

Today the Public Printer employs 2,400 staff, manages annual 

revenue of $1 billion. From the earliest days of the Nation, congressional leaders recognized the need for printed documents to assist 

both chambers in Congress in communicating with the American 

public. James Madison cited in his notes of the Federal Convention 

of 1787 the delegates’ concern over the Government’s responsibility 

to inform the citizenry when he wrote, ‘‘It should not be in the option of the legislature to conceal their proceedings.’’ This is the 

GPO’s primary mission: ‘‘Keeping America informed.’’ 

GPO produces the Nation’s most important Government information products, such as the Congressional Record and Federal Register. Both are produced at the GPO’s main plant in Washington. 
536 

However, nearly 60 percent of the printing the GPO manages for 

the Federal Government is procured through private sector vendors 

throughout the country. On a daily basis, the agency maintains between 600 and 1,000 print-related projects through a longstanding 

partnership with America’s printing industry. 

Congress is dependent upon the ability of the GPO to provide 

printed and electronic versions of our legislative documents and the 

Congressional Record in a timely manner. With the ever increasing 

workload of Congress and our demanding schedules, the agency 

needs to continue to provide the necessary resources to meet our 

legislative demands so that we can carry out our duties as mandated by the Constitution and governed by the rules of both Houses 

of Congress. 

The Public Printer faces diverse and pressing challenges in the 

upcoming years, which I will not list here, but we know what they 

are. And now, if confirmed, Mr. Boarman would be the 26th Public 

Printer. He is a practical printer by trade. He began his career by 

serving a 4-year union apprenticeship at the McArdle Printing 

Company in Washington, D.C. Following completion of his apprenticeship, he worked in a number of local establishments. In 1974, 

he went to work for the GPO. In 1977, he took a leave of absence 

from the GPO after being elected a full-time union official. He has 

continued a professional relationship with the GPO that spanned 

more than 30 years. 

Over the years, he has testified on GPO matters on a number of 

occasions before our Committee and before the Joint Committee on 

Printing. Since 1989, he served as president of the Printing, Publishing, and Media Workers Sector of the CWA, Communications 

Workers of America, and president of the International Allied 

Printing Trades Association. 

Mr. Boarman has served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees 

of the CWA/ITU-negotiated pension plan, CWA Pension Plan Canada, and Executive Board of the Council of Institutional Investors. 

So we are fortunate to have a nominee of Mr. Boarman’s caliber 

and experience for this important post, and I look forward to your 

testimony, sir. 

I call on Bob Bennett. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BENNETT 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. My connection with the GPO goes back to the time when I chaired the 

Leg. Branch Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee and 

went down to the GPO and spent time with the Public Printer, 

went through the plant, got an understanding of how big an operation this really is. And since that introduction of the GPO, I have 

seen it change. I have seen it grow. The number of its employees 

has gone dramatically as its productivity has gone up dramatically, 

which is a pattern that we see throughout American business generally. 

So, Mr. Boarman, we welcome you here, recognize that you will 

be taking on a very significant management challenge, and I simply want to take the opportunity to thank all of those who have 

gone before you, not just the Public Printers but all of the GPO employees who have worked so tirelessly on behalf of the Congress 
537 

and the executive branch. This is an agency, as the Chairman indicated, that serves more than one branch of Government, even 

though the funding does come through the Congress. 

So it is very important that we continue the innovation, the 

change, the pattern of keeping up with the times that has been established in the last decade, and I look forward to hearing what 

plans you have to do that, and I am happy to welcome you to the 

Committee. 

Mr. BOARMAN. Thank you, sir. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator WARNER [presiding]. Thank you, Senator Bennett. 

We have been joined by my colleague and friend, Senator Cardin 

from Maryland, and I know he is here for the purpose of introduction. I will simply add one point. Mr. Boarman, if confirmed, taking 

on this position is of particular interest to both Senator Cardin and 

me since so many GPO employees live in both of our States. I know 

you reside on the other side of the river, but this is an organization 

that has a great deal of effect right here in the national capital 

area, and I am very pleased that my friend and colleague, Senator 

Cardin, is here for the purpose of introduction. 

Senator Cardin. 

STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, A UNITED STATES 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MARYLAND 

Senator CARDIN. Senator Warner, thank you very much. Senator 

Bennett, thank you for your attention to these issues. I am not 

going to repeat everything that Senator Schumer has said, but I do 

want to welcome my constituent, Bill Boarman, to this Committee 

and strongly recommend his approval, his confirmation. 

Bill Boarman has been a lifelong resident of Maryland. He currently resides in Severna Park. And from the beginning of his career as a pre-apprentice at the McArdle Printing Company in 

Washington, D.C., in 1966, Mr. Boarman has devoted his life to the 

printing industry and protecting the workers within the printing 

industry. As has been pointed out, he has worked his way up to 

the senior vice president of CWA, and he has emerged as an icon, 

quite frankly, in the printing industry. He is so well qualified for 

this position. He is an expert. He is well respected by the workers 

at the Government Printing Office, and, Senator Warner, as you 

pointed out, many of those workers live in Maryland and live in 

Virginia, and we have heard nothing but praise as to the selection 

of Mr. Boarman to lead this agency. 

Beginning in 1974, Mr. Boarman spent some of his early years 

as a career journeyman printer in the United States Government 

Printing Office, so he has the experience. He worked his way up, 

as I said, in the unions. He has been involved in every aspect and 

has been called upon by us as an expert in this area. We rely upon 

Mr. Boarman’s views. 

He has been an informal adviser to the leadership at the Government Printing Office. He has been called upon many times to help 

out, and now we have the opportunity to have him as our director. 

He is so well qualified. He has the leadership that is needed to 

bring us into the issues that Senator Bennett has raised dealing 

with new technologies and the new needs within the printing field. 
538 

So I am proud to recommend him, and I am proud that he is a 

fellow Marylander. 

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Senator Cardin. Of course, you are 

welcome to stay, but I know time constraints may mean that you 

have got to move on. 

I know as well that Senator Mikulski was hoping to be here. 

Scheduling prohibited her, but she has got a statement of introduction as well. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Mikulski inserted into the 

record] 

Senator WARNER. At some point along the way, we may be joined 

by our friend Steny Hoyer from the other side of the body. And if 

he comes in, we will interrupt your testimony, Mr. Boarman, to let 

him make his opening comments. 

So, with that, I would ask the nominee to stand and raise his 

right hand? Do you swear that the testimony you are to provide is 

the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you 

God? 

Mr. BOARMAN. I do. 

Senator WARNER. Please be seated. Now, Mr. Boarman, if you 

would like to go ahead and make an opening statement. I know you 

have got friends and colleagues around you. If you want to make 

any introductions to the Committee, please feel free to do so. Then 

we are anxious to hear your statement. 

TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM J. BOARMAN, OF MARYLAND, TO BE 

THE PUBLIC PRINTER 

Mr. BOARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Senator Bennett, for holding this hearing today. I fully appreciate how 

busy each of you are with the important work of the Senate, and 

I am honored by your presence here today for my hearing. 

I want to thank Senator Cardin for his wonderful introduction. 

I hope that Congressman Hoyer will be able to make it. Both of 

these gentlemen have a record of standing up for the citizens of 

Maryland, and I am proud that they wanted to be here for me 

today. It is an honor. 

Mr. Chairman, I would like to introduce a few very special people 

that are here with me today. First, my daughter, Lauren, who is 

sitting right behind me. Lauren is my only daughter and looks 

after me with the love and support that only a daughter can offer. 

I would like to mention my son, Christopher—I think he is 

watching this right now. He could not be here because he is teaching a spring course at Berkeley where he is finishing his Ph.D. in 

medical anthropology. 

Also, I am honored to introduce my colleague and friend for the 

last 22 years, Larry Cohen, the president of the Communication 

Workers of America. He is sitting right behind me, and he also is 

my boss. 

And, finally, a young man whose grandfather happens to be my 

very good friend, and his name is Chase Lawson. He is sitting over 

here. Chase is a junior at Mount St. Joe’s in Baltimore, and he is 

very interested in government and politics, and I invited him here 

today so that he could get a first-class civics lesson on the advice- 
539 

and-consent role of the U.S. Senate as prescribed by the Constitution. So welcome, Chase. 

Let me begin by saying I am deeply honored by the President’s 

nomination to be the Public Printer of the United States. For a 

practical printer by trade, there is no higher post in the Nation 

than as head of the GPO, with its distinguished tradition of supplying the printing and information needs of the Federal Government for almost 150 years. 

I have been a printer for more than 40 years. I learned my trade 

in the private sector and worked in several large commercial printing plants and in two large daily newspapers. As was stated, I was 

appointed to the GPO in the 1970s as a printer and left the GPO 

for a full-time job with my union. Now, since 1989, I have served 

as president of the Printing, Publishing, and Media Workers Sector 

of CWA. 

But while at the GPO, I worked to achieve practical agreements 

with management that opened the door to technological change and 

saved jobs. And during my career with CWA, I have worked toward 

the same objective, establishing a proven track record of cooperation and achievement in labor-management relations in the printing and publishing industry. 

I have also served in a number of executive capacities for a variety of boards and councils and have served for the last 21 years as 

chairman of the board of the CWA/ITU-negotiated pension plan, 

and as president of the Union Printers Home Corporation, which 

is a retirement community our union runs in Colorado Springs, 

Colorado. 

Now, from executive decision making to fund management and 

controlling costs to making payroll, I have had a broad range of 

management experience that I hope you will agree has equipped 

me to lead the GPO, if I am confirmed. 

The GPO today is a substantially different agency compared with 

the one that I left many years ago. It employs fewer employees but 

is significantly more technologically advanced. However, one thing 

has not changed: The GPO continues to employ an extraordinarily 

talented group of men and women who every day carry out their 

responsibilities with unmatched expertise and dedication. If there 

is any one asset that best characterizes the GPO, it is the superb 

quality of the people who work there. 

I think the GPO has made progress in recent years in improving 

functions it carries out. If confirmed, I look forward to continuing 

with that progress and to ensure that what the GPO strives to accomplish in the coming years will contribute measurably to the distinguished record of service it has compiled over the past 150 

years. 

Finally, on a personal note, I have had the high honor and privilege to have been consulted by and testified before some of the true 

giants of the Senate in days gone by. In just this Committee, I have 

had close personal relationships with former Chairman: Claiborne 

Pell, Charles McC Mathias, Mark Hatfield, Wendell Ford, and John 

Warner. Each of these men have sought my counsel and judgment 

on matters that relate to the GPO. Likewise, I have worked with 

almost every Public Printer since the Nixon administration to 

stand beside them on matters that had grave importance to the 
540 

agency as it changed and evolved from administration to administration and Congress to Congress. 

I believe it was these unique relationships and experience that 

the White House focused on when they asked me to serve the 

President and accept the nomination as the 26th Public Printer of 

the United States. I truly believe that all of this background and 

35 years’ involvement with the GPO will serve me well if I am confirmed by the Senate as the next Public Printer. I am ready and 

willing to serve if I can get your support. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I would be happy to answer any 

questions that you and Senator Bennett may have of me at this 

time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Boarman was submitted for the 

record] 

Senator WARNER. Well, thank you, Mr. Boarman. Thank you for 

your testimony, and I look forward to getting to questions in a moment. 

Let me just add for the benefit of Chase, you know, you are also 

getting something rather unusual in today’s hearing. Not only are 

you going to get to see your friend Mr. Boarman testify and the 

Majority Leader of the House of Representatives come all the way 

over to the Senate to make an introduction, but you are also getting something particularly unusual in a hearing of this nature. As 

a new Senator, I usually sit way, way down there on the end, and 

it is a special time that I get to actually sit up here in the big 

chair. So there will be people in this room making sure that I do 

not mess up as well. 

But recognizing before we get to my questions that we have been 

joined by Representative Hoyer, the Majority Leader of the House 

to make an introduction as well, I will call on my good friend Steny 

Hoyer. 

STATEMENT OF HON. STENY HOYER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MARYLAND 

Mr. HOYER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I am 

pleased to see you in the exalted seat of the chairmanship. I know 

it is tough, having been a Governor and running the place, to come 

and sit at the end of the line. So this is a change. 

I want to say I am particularly pleased to be here with Senator 

Bob Bennett. I think Senator Bennett is one of the outstanding 

Members of the Congress. He is a Senator who has served with the 

public’s interest uppermost in his mind, with a view towards making democracy work, not simply having confrontation but sitting 

down at the table and trying to make democracy work. 

Senator Bennett, I want to say I am one Democrat who is going 

to be very sorry to see you leave the Senate. I think it is a loss 

for Utah. I think it is a loss for the Nation. You represented, I 

think, and continue to represent the kind of Member of the Senate 

and the House that the American public wants to see. It is unfortunate that a very narrow band of people in both of our parties think 

that what we need is confrontation, not collaboration. The country 

will be lesser for your loss, and I want to thank you for your service. 
541 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, and I would remind 

you it is Mr. Boarman’s hearing and not mine. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you. 

Mr. HOYER. Well, and I will not vote on confirming you or not 

confirming you, so I will know my proper role. 

Mr. Chairman, I am here to—and I will submit a statement for 

the record—just briefly to say that I have known Bill Boarman for 

a very long period of time. He and his wife are good friends, so I 

am not objective on his nomination. But as you have seen from previous testimony—I presume Senator Cardin was here and Senator 

Mikulski as well, probably—we have all known him very well, not 

only his expertise that the Public Printer will have to deal with, 

but also his judgment, his wise counsel has been, as he said, for 

many of us throughout my tenure in the Congress of the United 

States, which now I am in my 30th year, has been extraordinarily 

well received and important. And I think the administration has 

made an excellent choice for the Public Printer. I think he will 

work well with the people who work at GPO. I think he understands the necessity to look to make a solid business model work 

for the GPO. I know he has talked about that in his statement. 

So I will not belabor the point other than to say that I am 

strongly in support of his nomination. I think he will serve our 

country well and serve the Government Printing Office well and 

serve the Congress well. And I urge his confirmation, and thank 

you for this opportunity to appear. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hoyer was submitted for the 

record] 

Senator WARNER. Thank you, Leader Hoyer. 

Mr. HOYER. Also, I will vote to confirm Senator Bennett. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator WARNER. I am glad you said that after the convention 

instead of before. 

Mr. Boarman, again, thank you for your testimony. And, Representative Hoyer, thank you for your statement. Obviously, from 

your background you are a printer’s printer, a great background, 

varied and the kind of experience across the board in terms of all 

the aspects of the challenge that the President has selected you for. 

I have got a couple of questions, though, before we get to Senator 

Bennett. I am sure this body will confirm you, but, you know, 

printing is going through as much transformation as any industry 

that is around. 

I wanted to start my questioning, though, with—you know, traditionally, the GPO has had a unique role in terms of the relationship kind of as a public-private entity with, my understanding, 

nearly 60 percent of the GPO printing activities are actually procured through private contracts, and I think on a daily basis that 

may mean between 600 and 1,000 print projects a day are managed 

in this ongoing relationship. 

With the changing nature of the business, how do you see that 

business relationship between the GPO and the various private 

sector printers around who the agency employs? Do you see that 

changing? Do you see it continuing? What is your sense of the business model going forward? 
542 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, thank you, Senator. The GPO relies heavily 

on the private sector in order to do the work of the Government. 

The main printing plant is set up primarily to do the overnight, 

quick-turnaround work that the Congress and the President demand. It is really not set up for the kind of work that we procure 

through our procurement program. So we are heavily dependent on 

the private sector to support that program. I think we contract 

somewhere over $500 million worth of work through the GPO procurement program. And we hope to get more, because the law requires all agencies to use the Government Printing Office. 

Unfortunately, there was a dust-up about 10 years ago about 

separation of powers. Since GPO is a legislative branch agency, 

some Assistant Attorney General wrote a memo suggesting that 

they did not have to use GPO. As a result, GPO has lost some of 

its business, even though the law is very clear, Title 44, that they 

must procure their work through the Government Printing Office. 

But I think, you know, my approach to this would be rather than 

arguing about whether it is a separation of powers issue—because 

I think that is ridiculous, but obviously a judge would have to decide that—let these agencies give GPO a chance to procure the 

work for them, bring more business in. 

I believe that the procurement program at GPO is the best price 

execution that money can buy and that we can get the job done 

quicker, better, and at the lowest cost for the taxpayers if we are 

given the chance. And I think that the agencies that use us would 

stand up here today and say the same thing, that that is exactly 

right. 

So as Public Printer, what I would do is to try to go out and 

interact with the agencies that are not using us to try to bring 

more work into GPO because I think it is the right way to do it. 

The procurement program is overseen by the IG. To my knowledge 

there has never been any fraud or investigation there. And it is 

best price execution, and it creates jobs in the private sector when 

we have contracted out, and it basically goes to small mom-and-pop 

shops who get this work. There are big printers in there, like Donnelly and others, who get that work, but many of the people in our 

program are just small printers who depend on this work. 

So I just think the relationship will continue. I think it will grow, 

and I look forward to working with the private sector on this to 

help it grow. 

Senator WARNER. One of the questions, I think one of the unique 

aspects you are going to bring to this job is you have kind of seen 

it from every angle. You have worked at the GPO; you have obviously been involved in the labor movement; you have seen it from 

the workforce standpoint; you have obviously advanced your career 

into the management sector as well. You know, but with the challenges as more and more documents are viewed in electronic form, 

when we see increasing pricing pressure across the printing industry and across Government as a whole, I would like you to speak 

for a moment about how you are going to balance the needs of 

workforce versus technology versus the price constraints that the 

Government is under and how perhaps your background might suit 

you for that challenge. 
543 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, I have been advised by the current political 

leadership and the professional leadership at GPO that next year 

GPO will actually be in a deficit position. So it is not a great place 

to start from, but it is what it is. 

You know, I come from a background of, unfortunately, inheriting organizations that seem to have deficit problems, and I have 

had success in dealing with those. My president, Larry Cohen, and 

I inherited a huge deficit when he took over CWA. I think it was 

somewhere in the neighborhood of about $18 million. And we did 

it the old-fashioned way. We did not use gimmicky and auditors’ 

gimmicks. You know, we made the hard choices that had to be 

made in order to get our budget in line, and today it is in line. 

Likewise, with the nursing home that I run, when I took it over, it had a $1.5 million-a-year deficit. Today it is operating in the 

black, has $2 million in the bank, and, you know, probably makes 

about $600,000 a year. Again, we had to make hard choices. 

For GPO, fortunately they have two streams of income. One is 

the appropriations. Now, most likely that is going to be flat. I think 

the Public Printer asked for $167 million, but I think it is more 

likely to be in the area of $140, $147 million. 

So the other stream is customers, bringing new business in, and 

we now have this program, the SID, security and intelligent documents, where we print the passports but we also do something 

called smart cards, and we are doing it for a number of Government agencies. It has a chip in it, and it is absolutely secure, Government-to-Government relationship. So we need to build that 

business to try to offset some of the losses that are going to come 

as a result of less printing, less ink on paper, and more 

digitization. And I believe we can do that. 

I met with the directors and I have been briefed by all of the toplevel folks at GPO, and I have to tell you that I was very, very impressed with the SID program. And I think it is something that 

Congress should support. I think they should encourage the security agencies of our Nation to take a look at GPO, give us a chance 

to do these ID cards for all these different agencies, because I think 

we can show that the security with us Government to Government 

is a much better way to go. 

So there is a lot of opportunity there. I am going to start out, I 

think, with a deficit, but I am used to that, and I have got some 

ideas to deal with it, and I look forward to the challenge. 

Senator WARNER. I have got a couple more questions, but if I 

ever hope to get close back to this short of being here for 20 years, 

I will not go into Senator Bennett’s time. Senator Bennett? 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Boarman, I will give you an opportunity to deal with the 

issue that has come up very recently, your campaign contribution 

to Mr. Halter. Here is the chance for you to describe how that came 

about and how you realized you needed to send us the letter that 

you did, and we are grateful to have received it, whether there was 

any union efforts, CWA efforts, and you have involvement in that 

in any way that the Committee needs to know about. Can you go 

through that whole situation for us and lay it out? 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, I can tell you what I know. I was asked if 

I would consider giving a contribution to the lieutenant governor 
544 

who was running for the Senate, a $250 contribution, and I agreed 

to do that, and I actually did it online. Someone sent me an e-mail 

from the campaign, and I went on, and in about 5 minutes’ time, 

I plugged in with my bank card and made the $250 contribution. 

It completely passed through my mind because it happened so 

quick, and I did not really have a receipt that I remember. It was 

not in my checkbook. I heard about it—someone mentioned it in an 

article yesterday that I had made a $250 contribution, and I went, 

‘‘What is this about?’’ And then I had to go back and think about 

it. 

So I went to the Federal Election Commission site to see when 

I made it, because I could not remember, and it was March 17th 

of 2010 I made the contribution, and I immediately wrote the Committee a letter, since I had unknowingly omitted that from the 

statement, the questionnaire that I sent up here, on which I had 

listed other contributions that I have made. 

That is all I can tell you. I was not involved in any bundling that 

I have been accused of. I had nothing to do with any of that. I 

made a $250 contribution. 

Senator BENNETT. As you think about it, have there been other 

contributions you have been asked to do, presumably by the union, 

that you said, okay, well, I will take care of that, and you go online 

and do that? Or is this a single experience? 

Mr. BOARMAN. I do not think so, Senator, because most of us contribute through our union COPE program, and they take out an 

amount of money from our check every 2 weeks, and it goes into 

our political action committee. That is—— 

Senator BENNETT. So your contributions have been to the PAC. 

Mr. BOARMAN. Yes, yes. I cannot ever remember doing this any 

other time. 

Senator BENNETT. Okay, thank you. I appreciate getting that—— 

Mr. BOARMAN. That is all I can tell you. 

Senator BENNETT. Okay. You have indicated that you get over $500 million from the private sector, and, yes, it is Donnelly at one 

end and then the mom-and-pop operation at the other. I think in 

all probability the mom-and-pop operations that you refer to do not 

pay union prevailing wages. Are you going to require that they pay 

union prevailing wages in order to deal with the GPO? Or will you 

take their bid without digging into their own internal compensation 

plan? 

Mr. BOARMAN. I have no plans to change the current system. I 

think it would be unlawful to impose union conditions for printing. 

I do not know that there is any law that requires you could do that, 

and the program works perfectly. I believe that the union printers 

could compete in this arena if they chose to do that. And I do not 

think there would be any need to do that. So the answer is no, I 

do not have any plans to change what we are doing. We do it too 

well. It is just it has been in place for so long, and I think in order 

for me to be successful to attract the work that I talked to Senator 

Warner about from other agencies, I cannot mess around with a 

program that works. I mean, I am convinced, from meeting with 

the printing procurement people, that they know what they are 

doing. They know how to reach out to the customers. They know 

how to address their needs. They know how to take care of the 
545 

issues. If there is a billing issue, there is a special person that 

deals with that to make sure that, you know, they are not overbilled and, if we do overbill them, that we refund them. 

I have no plans to change what I consider one of the finest procurement programs in the Government. 

Senator BENNETT. All right. In that vein, then, let us talk about 

the structure. It is currently structured into distinct business unit, 

such as security and intelligence documents where the passports 

and other secure credentials are produced, and then plant operations, publications, information sales, print procurement and so 

on, and each of these business units has its own P&L, and accounting on a monthly basis to spend it through expenses, contributions, 

and so on. 

This allows a degree of transparency in each unit so that you 

know exactly what is being earned and what is being spent in each 

one. And there is some concern that if they all got lumped together, 

some of the transparency might disappear. 

Do you have any feeling about how you will deal with these four 

separate units? 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, I do not have any plans to change the way 

the transparency is flowing. I think that is the best way to do it. 

I think I told you in our meeting that we had the other day that 

one of the things that concerned me was that the CFO was so far 

down the chain in the scheme of things at GPO. In all the organizations that I have headed, the CFO has been right beside me and 

someone I count on to tell me the truth about, you know, how much 

do we have, what is the cash flow, you know, what is outstanding, 

what is coming in, what is the auditor saying. 

I think that relationship between the chief executive officer and 

the CFO is very important. So that is something that I would look 

at to hopefully bring the CFO closer to me so that I could keep my 

handle on the dollars, especially as it appears we are going to be 

entering a deficit situation. 

But, no, I think the transparency that you talked about is fine. 

I think the way they have separated the businesses is—it gives 

them a chance, especially the SID program. They were part of operations at one point, and I think doing pretty well. But now that 

they are separate and there is more security, I think the opportunity for SID to grow and to attract more businesses from maybe 

NSA or from other agencies that do security work—we do some 

Homeland Security products—it is much better set aside. As I understand it, all the people in the SID area have the necessary security clearances. We have the necessary guards to keep the place 

safe from people getting in and getting their hands on passports, 

which could be a disaster. 

So if we can protect the passports for the State Department, I 

believe we could do the same thing for every agency of Government. So I think those separate business units are working well, 

and I would continue that. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you. 

Mr. BOARMAN. Thank you, sir. 

Senator BENNETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator WARNER. Let me follow up on the line that Senator Bennett has raised. One of the things that I saw in your background, 
546 

Mr. Boarman, that impressed me was the fact that you have been 

involved with operations, as you mentioned earlier, where you 

would come in and there was a deficit circumstance and you, from 

a good business perspective, brought it back up into a more positive 

balance. Clearly, with the changing nature of printing and with the 

notion that, should you move forward in this position—and I hope 

you will—the GPO will be in a deficit position to start with. I want 

to simply give you a chance to reemphasize again that coming into 

that deficit circumstance, recognizing that you have got a series of 

private contracts out there, recognizing that you have got Government enterprises that have other choices, if you are going to increase GPO’s market share, you are going to have to be price competitive to do that, and that means if there are good working relationships with your private sector partners, regardless of the makeup of their workforce, you are not going to do anything to cut back 

on GPO’s competitiveness in the marketplace. I would like you to 

expound on that a bit. 

Mr. BOARMAN. No, absolutely not. I think the relationship with 

the printing industry and the contractors—there are a couple different groups that represent these folks that work with us—is a 

good one, and I look forward to meeting with these folks after confirmation and creating that bond even stronger and let them know 

that we count on them for what they do. We cannot do it alone. 

We have to have these private contractors. And it is just good Government to send as much as we can to the private sector. 

I read some statistics somewhere in a publication that GPO had 

cut back on procurement, but I checked into that with the professionals at GPO, and they tell me that the amount of work that was 

contracted out last year is the same percentage that it had been 

in previous years. 

Now, if someone counted the SID stuff, which does not go out, 

it has to be the passport work and the smart cards, which is done 

in-house, if they included that in part of it, I think you could skew 

the numbers. But the printing that we normally contract out will 

continue, and we hope to build on that by getting more agencies 

to come with us and using the GPO. 

Again, give us a chance, let us prove that we can do the best 

price execution. You can always go back to the printer that you had 

if we do not do the job we think we can do. I am absolutely convinced that we are going to save the taxpayers money because we 

can do it cheaper. 

Senator WARNER. In terms of workforce, let me ask you a question there. Again, we see in the newspaper business it is going 

through a dramatic transition. The printing business is going 

through a dramatic transition. The whole notion of ink on page and 

printing books or the traditional periodical is being transformed as 

we move to more electronic media. 

How both within—and I imagine in terms of your contracting you 

can find that new expertise, but within the GPO itself, how do you 

make sure that your workforce stays current? How do you make 

sure that, both from a technology standpoint and from a workforce 

development standpoint, you are truly training the public printers 

of the 21st century and not of the 20th century? 
547 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, that is going to be a challenge because I 

have been advised by the human capital people in the briefings 

that I have had that we have an aging workforce, and that it is 

going to become a critical issue over the next few years. And some 

of these people have extraordinary skills that, if we let them go out 

the door without transferring that to someone else, we could have 

a catastrophe. 

You know, when the Congress of the United States decides to 

stay in late at night and legislate, it is not an immaculate conception that creates the Congressional Record that comes to the Hill 

every day along with the bills and hearings. It is the people that 

I talked about in my opening statement who know exactly what 

they have to do every night and every day when they come in 

there, and they know they have to come in, whether it is snowing 

or whatever, to get the Record out. If Congress is in, we are in. 

Now, I think that we can be very competitive in terms of attracting the kind of people that we need to the GPO. I think the rates 

of pay and I think the benefits and the security of working at the 

GPO is a very attractive package for young people who are pursuing a career in printing and publishing, whether they are in a 

technical college or whether they are at RIT or they are working 

in the private sector as a printer, like I did. 

I think we need to develop a program to go out and recruit these 

people to replace the people that we know we are going to lose over 

the next 4 or 5 years. I think that what I would do right away is 

have human capital provide me with a critical list of the people 

that are going to retire, and then I think I would sit down with 

the line supervisors that know these individuals and say—to tell 

me which one of these have skills that we need to find out and 

have them work with someone so that when they leave we do not 

lose that information, we do not lose that institutional memory 

that they have. 

So that is what I have been thinking about, how to deal with 

this, because whenever you lose people like we are going to lose, 

it is going to be a difficult situation for GPO. But I am confident 

that they will work with us and that we can recruit the people to 

replace them. 

Senator WARNER. I have got one more question, but I will go 

ahead and—well, you know, one of the—the Federal Depository Library Program has the requirement of safeguarding the public’s 

right to know about what is going on in the Government, and, you 

know, the Obama administration has made transparency a hallmark of its administration. 

Now, sometimes translating that transparency into reality has 

been a challenge, and some depository librarians feel that GPO is 

not meeting the needs of its users or adjusting to the increasing demands for digital access to Government information. 

You know, what can the GPO do to work with the librarians to 

ensure that the Federal Depository Library Program will really 

meet its goal of keeping Americans informed in this ever more 

transparent world? 

Mr. BOARMAN. Well, I think the underlying problem can be 

spelled out in one sentence. About 95 percent or more of all Federal 

documents are born digital today and will never end up in the De-
548 

pository Library Program. And everything that we do that we put 

ink on paper can be created digitally as well. 

The law, which originally, I think, dates to the early 1800s, was 

probably the first open Government law passed by the Congress, 

because it provided for this wonderful program of the Federal Depository Library Program where every library gets so many copies. 

The Senators can designate a regional library who get even more. 

But today I think their walls are bulging with the books, and they 

have no place to put them. 

But the current law, which was passed in 1962 and has not been 

revisited, has to be looked at so that we can modernize it to deal 

with the fact that so many documents are born digitally. We cannot 

do that by ourselves. The Congress of the United States—it would 

have to be—I would assume it would have to be the House Administration and Senate Rules Committee would have to come up with 

some changes to the law to deal with that issue. 

Now, I want to caution you. I do not think we ought to throw 

the baby out with the bath water. I think this program is one of 

the greatest programs that our country has. The Congress funds 

this thing, about $40 million each year, to make sure that people 

are informed about what their Government does, and I certainly do 

not want to tinker with that. But I do think there are some things 

that we can do to make it easier on the libraries. 

If I am confirmed, I will get together with the library community 

and try to hear them through, what they think would best work in 

this area. And then I think I would come to the Congress with 

some suggestions on how we can deal with it without messing 

around with the underlying tenets of this law that provides for this 

information. 

So that is another challenge, but I think the libraries and the 

GPO will work well together. They are a great stakeholder for us, 

and I look forward to working with them about this issue. 

Senator WARNER. Well, I think if Senator Bennett does not have 

any other questions, that was my last question. I appreciate, Mr. 

Boarman, your testimony here today, and I think you will be a 

great Public Printer. Obviously, I think you bring a great and varied background, and I do think, you know, one of the challenges is 

going to be—since the GPO will be in a deficit circumstance, we are 

going to need that business approach to make sure that we can get 

the best value possible for the taxpayer, and clearly in an area that 

is going through dramatic transformation driven by technology and 

by the public’s need to know. So I personally look forward to supporting your appointment, and I believe you have got a big job in 

front of you. 

So on behalf of the Rules Committee, I would like to thank the 

nominee, Mr. Boarman, for his testimony. The record will remain 

open for 5 business days for additional comments. The Committee 

plans to consider this nomination in a timely manner so that the 

Senate can confirm Mr. Boarman as the next Public Printer. 

Since there is no further business before the Committee, the 

Committee is adjourned subject to the call of the Chair. 

[Whereupon, at 10:53 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 
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BUSINESS MEETING 

TUESDAY, JULY 20, 2010 

UNITED STATES SENATE, 

COMMITTEE ON RULES AND ADMINISTRATION, 

Washington, D.C. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:30 p.m., in Room S– 

216, The Capitol, Hon. Charles E. Schumer, Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Schumer, Inouye, Dodd, Feinstein, Durbin, 

Nelson, Murray, Pryor, Udall, Warner, and Bennett. 

Staff present: Jean Bordewich, Staff Director; Jennifer Griffith, 

Deputy Staff Director; Veronica Gillespie, Elections Counsel; Josh 

Brekenfeld, Professional Staff; Julia Richardson, Counsel; Lauryn 

Bruck, Professional Staff; Lynden Armstrong, Chief Clerk; Matthew McGowan, Professional Staff; Mary Jones, Republican Staff 

Director; Shaun Parkin, Republican Deputy Staff Director; Abbie 

Platt, Republican Professional Staff; and Rachel Creviston, Republican Professional Staff. 

Chairman SCHUMER. The Committee will come to order. A 

quorum of ten members is present. Unless there is a request for 

a roll call vote, this will be a voice vote. 

Do I hear a motion that the nomination of William J. Boarman 

of Maryland to be Public Printer be reported to the Senate with the 

recommendation that it be approved? 

Senator BENNETT. I so move. 

Chairman SCHUMER. Is there a second? 

Senator WARNER. Seconded. 

Chairman SCHUMER. All in favor, say aye? 

[A chorus of ayes.] 

Chairman SCHUMER. Oppose, nay? 

[No response.] 

Chairman SCHUMER. The ayes have it. The nomination is ordered 

and reported to the Senate with the recommendation that it be approved. 

The meeting is adjourned, and thank you all for coming and for 

your patience. 

[Whereupon, at 2:31 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

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