Christopher Shays: “I would love to just talk about the actual numbers. So you and I do agree that the first issue should not be does it…”

“I would love to just talk about the actual numbers. So you and I do agree that the first issue should not be does it help or hurt one party; it should be what is in the best interests of our country to save our democracy from these unlimited sums of corporate and union dues money and other special interest money, the unlimited sums. But I could ask it in reverse and say how would this have hurt our party? Well, you could say well, just take the 1996 presidential election. Republicans raised in soft money $138 million. Democrats raised $124 million. Both raised a significant sum of money, which, by the way, certain people can direct just to the places they want to direct it to. So Republicans would have lost that $14 million advantage. But it is $14 million. When you are looking at numbers of $124 and $138 million, it is a small percent. By the way, right now our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have raised more soft money in the DNC, in their congressional committee, than Republicans have.”