Political Quotes

“The courts have allowed and made those distinctions in the past where we can draw a line in terms of methods of communicating and have allowed different rules for public airwaves. We are focusing on the most egregious abuses that have been identified in these campaigns in the past. If anything, I think the 1996 cycle highlighted the extent of the problem by the amounts of money that were placed in issue advertising that ordinarily would be, I think, a significant component in the campaign. But what has developed in the final analysis, as we all know, is sort of circumventing some of the restrictions that are currently in campaigns by what is masked as issue ads but really are candidate advocacy ads. That is what we are highlighting in this amendment by requiring disclosures by those groups that support these advertisements on behalf of candidates or in opposition to candidates shortly before the election. So we create a very narrow timeframe so that we do not engage in any possibilities of interfering with first amendment rights.”