Russ Feingold: “like Senator McCain, I see this rulemaking on 527s quite simply as a test of the FEC's willingness to enforce the law.…”

“like Senator McCain, I see this rulemaking on 527s quite simply as a test of the FEC's willingness to enforce the law. As we have noted many times, the Supreme Court in the McConnell v. FEC decision concluded that the FEC improperly interpreted federal election law and allowed the growth of the soft money loophole that made necessary our 7-year reform effort. We have been watching the agency closely since the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act was signed into law in March 2002, looking for signs that it will not repeat its past mistakes. For the most part, we have been sorely disappointed. The announcement yesterday that the FEC general counsel's office wants the commission to delay action on the rulemaking for 90 days is the latest example of this agency's failure to carry out its responsibilities. It is important to remember that the issues the FEC has been considering recently arise not under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act that we passed a few short years ago, but rather under the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974. The question of whether an organization is a political committee subject to the Federal election laws is sometimes a complicated question, but it is not a new one. The McConnell decision made it clear that the FEC's previous approach, which was to allow 527s to avoid registering as political committees if they didn't use 'express advocacy,' was wrong.”