Steny Hoyer: “even in the perpetration of a sham, a little light comes through. There is nothing wrong with this bill. It is the right…”

“even in the perpetration of a sham, a little light comes through. There is nothing wrong with this bill. It is the right thing to do. I would hope everybody would support this bill, even in their disappointment about this process, even in their disappointment that this bill is a sliver of what we ought to be doing, even though this bill, introduced by the gentleman from Washington (Mr. White), does not cover soft money. There is no disclosure of soft money in the bill offered by the gentleman; and, furthermore, there is no disclosure of independent expenditures: who come into your districts and spend all sorts of money. Both candidates, both the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Lois Capps) and her opponent, said that that kind of expenditure undermined the integrity of their election. So even though the bill of the gentleman from Washington (Mr. White) goes only a little bit, it is a proper bill, so it would be foolish to oppose this bill. I suggest to my colleagues that this bill was put last in this group of four because, number one, it is such a small facet, a correct one but a small facet, that it would perhaps clean up what has been an otherwise desultory representation of campaign finance reform.”