Date: 2002-02-13
Speaker: TOM DAVIS (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Virginia

Mr. Chairman. I know that feelings are strong on both sides. I want to shed light on the issue about the softmoney loophole in the ShaysMeehan substitute this afternoon. We have heard about .a letter from Larry Noble. who is no longer associated with the Federal Election Commission. At one point he was general counsel. He is now associated with the Center for Responsive Politics. and I think we understand where that opinion comes from. Mr. Noble has a long history of losing cases at the FEC. the list of cases he has lost being far larger than the cases he has won. In fact. one case he litigated. the Christian Action Network. which is in my home fourth district. he not only lost it. the FEC was faced with fees and sanctions that were imposed against the FEC. We believe his letter is erroneous. It has nothing to do with the current FEC. which is not addressing this. Mr. Chairman. I have a memorandum that I will include for the RECORD from Patton Boggs that basically says in contrast to current law. the proposed language in the ShaysMeehan substitute would allow a national party committee to pay any debt with soft nonFederal dollars in the period from November 5. 2002 to January 1. 2003. Specifically. it could be used to retire outstanding debts or obligations that were incurred with the 2002 elections. This is not consistent with the current regulations. This would be illegal under current law. which would not allow us to borrow hard dollars and pay them off with soft dollars. This would allow buildingfund dollars which now are limited to building funds to basically repay harddollar obligations that were barred. and under the buildingfund loophole that we find later in the legislation. that could be replenished later down the road with soft dollars. That is under the language. I am hard pressed to understand the arguments from the other side unless their committees can come forward and make it clear that they would not try to do this in terms- of what the interpretations are. I have also looked at Trevor Potters Web site. the Campaign Finance Institute. and although they are saying one thing to Members. their own Web site states that new transition rules in the ShaysMeehan substitute provides that through the end of 2002 the national parties may spend excess soft money to pay off any outstanding debts. Sponsors and opponents of the bill dispute whether the provisions would allow soft money to be used to pay off hard money debts. We seem to have that disagreement today. But he notes on the Web site that the text provides that soft money could be used to retire outstanding debts incurred solely in connection with an election. That means hard dollars. That is what it means under the law. It does not make any reference to contributions or expenditures. i.e. hard money. or nonFederal joint or allocated activities which include soft money. I do not question the motivcs of the other side. but when we come up with amendments drafted in the dead of night. submitted the evening before. drafting errors occur. I think that we have that there. I urge support.of NeyWynn and defeat of the ShaysMeehan substitute. The memorandum previously referred to is as follows: