Presidential Funding Act of 2007

Bill: 110-s-2412
Sponsor: Sen. Feingold, Russell D. [D-WI]
Introduced: 2007-12-05 in the Senate
Policy area: Government Operations and Politics
Subjects: Administrative procedure
Agriculture and Food
Agriculture in foreign trade
Appropriations
Campaign funds
Checkoff
Computer software
Cost of living adjustments
Department of the Interior
Economics and Public Finance
Election candidates
Electronic government information
Energy
Fees
Foreign Trade and International Finance
Foreign trade promotion
Fund raising
Geothermal resources
Government paperwork
Government publicity
Government trust funds
Grazing
Income tax
Indexing (Economic policy)
Law
Licenses
Lobbying
Marketing of farm produce
Mining claims
Mining royalties
Oil and gas leases
Oil well drilling
Political conventions
Political parties
Presidential elections
Primaries
Public Lands and Natural Resources
Range management
Science, Technology, Communications
Soft money
Tax returns
Taxation

Summary:
action_date: 2007-12-05
text: 
Presidential Funding Act of 2007 - Amends Internal Revenue Code provisions relating to public financing of presidential election campaigns to: (1) quadruple (1:1 to 4:1) the matching rate for contributions to primary election candidates; (2) lower from $250 to $200 the limit on individual campaign contributions; (3) increase the presidential primary qualifying threshold from $5,000 to $25,000 in 20 states; (4) require presidential candidates to participate in the primary payment system to be eligible for general election payments; (5) move the starting date for payments to primary candidates from January 1 of a presidential election year to six months before the earliest state primary election; (6) allow additional payments and increased expenditure limits for candidates who face opponents who do not participate in public financing and who raise more than 20% of applicable spending limits; (7) designate the last Friday before the first Monday in September as the date for payments to eligible presidential candidates; and (8) increase from $3 to $10 the presidential campaign tax return check-off amount.

Amends the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to: (1) increase expenditure limits for presidential primary campaigns and eliminate state primary spending limits; (2) limit political party general election campaign expenditures to $25 million, with an additional $25 million allowance after the party's candidate is nominated; (3) prohibit political parties from spending unregulated funds (soft money) on their national conventions; and (4) require presidential campaign committees to disclose information about bundled campaign contributions (series of contributions exceeding specified threshold amounts).

Amends the Energy Policy Act, the Geothermal Steam Act of 1970, and the Public Rangelands Improvement Act of 1978 to increase license fees, royalties, and grazing fees under such Acts.


Legislative actions:
action_date: 2007-12-05
text: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance. (text of measure as introduced: CR S14791-14797)
action_date: 2007-12-05
text: Sponsor introductory remarks on measure. (CR S14790-14791)
action_date: 2007-12-05
text: Introduced in Senate