Pat Meehan: “I am happy to respond to the gentleman's inquiry, and the answer is yes. Political action committees, commonly known as…”

“I am happy to respond to the gentleman's inquiry, and the answer is yes. Political action committees, commonly known as PACs, raise money from individual donors in amounts that are limited by Federal law. They are subject to the Federal Election Campaign Act, thus they are not affected at all by title II of the Shays-Meehan substitute which relates to electioneering communications. Title II provides that corporations, including nonprofit corporations and unions, cannot use their treasury funds to pay for ads that mention a Federal candidate during the last 2 months of the election cycle. However, PACs, because they are not corporations or unions, can run ads that mention a candidate at any time during the election cycle without any restriction.”