[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 19 (Monday, February 28, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: February 28, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
              THE RHETORIC IS GREAT, BUT THE REFORM IS NOT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California [Mr. Horn] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HORN. Madam Speaker, our current President ran on a platform 
proclaiming change and reform. Today I wonder: What happened to those 
changes? Where is the reform?
  Last year, the President abandoned the cause of real campaign finance 
reform. Now the so-called candidate of change has embraced the status 
quo in the Federal Election Commission.
  Every candidate knows it takes months, sometimes years, to get an 
investigation of bad practices in political campaigns that too often go 
on in both parties in this country.
  The Federal Election Commission is crippled by low funding and 
partisan gridlock. So what did the candidate for change propose? He 
reappointed the same Federal Election Commission Commissioners who 
represent the partisan gridlock, and then in his new budget not only is 
the promised stronger Federal Election Commission missing, but funding 
for the FEC is actually cut.
  Ask the New York Times, one of America's greatest and most 
distinguished newspapers.

                              {time}  1240

  Recently, it wrote on its editorial pages,

       Mr. Clinton set back the cause of campaign reform by 
     shortchanging the Federal Elections Commission. The 
     President's budget,

In the words of the New York Times,

     fails to provide enough money for the agency to keep up with 
     its current mission, much less for an expanded role.

  As I suggested earlier, it barely keeps up with its current mission. 
Candidate for change? President Clinton may utter words of reform and 
utter them very convincingly, but his actions are right out of the 
status quo playbook.
  Madam Speaker, I enclose for the Record an editorial from the New 
York Times of February 19, 1994, on the Federal Election Commission.

                [From the New York Times, Feb. 19, 1994]

                       Federal Election Omission

       President Clinton says he is foursquare for serious 
     campaign finance reform. But he has a strange way of showing 
     it.
       His impassioned speechmaking notwithstanding, Mr. Clinton 
     silently stood by last year as House Democrats hatched and 
     passed a campaign finance measure designed to keep money from 
     special-interest political action committees flowing to 
     incumbents. Its weak provisions now pose an obstacle to 
     serious reform as the issue moves to a House-Senate 
     conference committee.
       Recently Mr. Clinton made the task even harder. He quietly 
     set back the cause of campaign reform by shortchanging the 
     Federal Election Commission in his proposed 1995 budget.
       A strengthened law will mean significant new 
     responsibilities for the notoriously weak F.E.C.--the agency 
     charged with keeping candidates within the rules. Instead of 
     enhancing the F.E.C.'s ability to enforce the law, and 
     signaling a commitment to making it work, Mr. Clinton's 
     proposed budget fails to provide enough money for the agency 
     to keep up with its current mission, much less plan for an 
     expanded role. The $23 million Mr. Clinton allocates for next 
     year--about $9 million less than the agency had requested--
     will actually force a cut in its operations.
       Granted, money is tight. But in a $1.5 trillion budget, 
     surely it is possible to find at least the modest $3 million 
     more needed to fund the F.E.C. at its current operating 
     level. In another disappointment, Mr. Clinton has announced 
     he will renominate two longtime members of the six-member 
     commission, Lee Ann Elliott, a Republican, and Danny 
     McDonald, a Democrat, rather than select distinguished new 
     members who might help break the agency's partisan gridlock.
       Where is the Bill Clinton who has pledged time and again to 
     make campaign finance reform a top priority?

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