New 527 "Reform" Act on Fast Track

[papau]

The 527 Reform Act would require the 527s to register as political committees to the FEC and therefore be subject to federal campaign finance laws, unless everything they spend is targeted to non-federal races and elections. The bill would require that at least 50 percent of all federal expenditures be funded with regulated, "hard money" donations and restrict individual donations to $25,000 or less.
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/50_68/news/8007-1.html
Bill on 527s May Be on Fast Track - (Feb 3 2005)
The usual campaign-finance reform crowd, bolstered by some newfound supporters, has kicked off what looks increasingly like a fast-track issue in the 109th Congress: prohibiting so-called 527 groups from raising and spending soft money to influence federal elections.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59184-2005Feb2.html

A Win for Campaign Reform

By David S. Broder
Thursday, February 3, 2005; Page A27

As one who has been skeptical of the claimed virtues of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, I am happy to concede that it has, in fact, passed its first test in the 2004 campaign with flying colors.

The 2002 law, which insiders refer to as BCRA (for Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, pronounced bick-rah), did not, as many of us critics feared, weaken political parties or stifle political debate. Instead it played at least a supportive role in the greatest upsurge ever recorded in the number of small contributors. <snip>

The prediction about the parties turned out to be flat wrong. As Anthony Corrado of Colby College showed, the national party committees together raised $1.2 billion in hard money (regulated contributions) in the 2004 election cycle, $140 million more than they had raised in hard and soft money combined for the 2000 contest. <snip>

But there were significant differences in the way the two sides spent their money. Democrats emphasized TV ads, filling in for John Kerry during times in the campaign when their nominee was running low on funds. Republicans put the bulk of their funds into grass-roots organizing.

Jack Oliver, a principal fundraiser for the Bush campaign and the RNC, said that difference paid off for the president in closely contested states such as Ohio. There and elsewhere, he said, local volunteers recruited by the Bush campaign proved more adept at turning out voters than the out-of-state workers hired by independent groups to whom the Democrats "outsourced" much of their precinct work. <snip>