[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 155 (Friday, November 7, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12003-S12004]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. McCONNELL:
  S. 1416. A bill to amend Federal election laws to repeal the public 
financing of national political party conventions and Presidential 
elections and spending limits on Presidential election campaigns, to 
repeal the limits on coordinated expenditures by political parties, and 
for other purposes; to the Committee on Finance.


              the presidential campaign reform act of 1997

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the Governmental Affairs hearings 
investigating the 1996 Presidential election affirmed what 
knowledgeable observers have contended for years--that the Presidential 
campaign finance system of spending limits and taxpayer funding is a 
fraud.
  Not soon forgotten will be the seamy videos of the White House coffee 
fundraisers in which the President was caught on tape extolling the 
virtues of circumventing the Presidential system's contribution and 
spending limits, via soft money contributions to the DNC--that once 
proud institution hijacked by the Clinton-Gore campaign bent on 
reelection in 1996. The 1996 Clinton-Gore reelection campaign took 
campaign finance chicanery to new heights, or lows, depending on your 
perspective.
  Mr. President, I am no fan of spending limits so am not without 
sympathy for those who must campaign under them. The Presidential 
system, while technically voluntary, presents a Hobson's choice to 
those contemplating a campaign. Candidates can choose between 
compliance with arbitrary and severe spending limits, burdensome 
regulatory requirements, and the prospect of years of FEC audits or 
trying to mount a credible campaign under the severe constraints of 
outdated contribution limits.
  It's difficult enough to mount a statewide Senate campaign with 
individual contributions limited to $1,000 a pop. Conducting a 
nationwide effort under the same contribution limits must be a 
nightmare. It requires, at the least, a Herculean effort, unless a 
candidate has the good fortune to have a fortune sufficient to bankroll 
their own campaign out of their own pocket. So I might be inclined to 
cut the President and Vice President some slack for this particular 
malfeasance--they have so many fundraising misdeeds to account for this 
one got lost in the shuffle until recently. I might cut them some slack 
if they were not such shameless hypocrites, portraying themselves as 
victims of the system and America's biggest fans of reform, when they 
aren't pleading incompetence.
  ``William J. Clinton'' signed a letter, addressed to the Chairman of 
the Federal Election Commission, on October 13, 1995, in which the 
President agreed to comply with the Presidential system's limits in 
exchange for which the Clinton-Gore campaign would receive taxpayer 
dollars. All told, the Clinton-Gore campaign received $75 million for 
the primary and general elections in 1996. The Democratic National 
Committee received over $12 million for its convention extravaganza in 
Chicago. It was a lie.
  The Clinton-Gore campaign took the money--$75 million from the U.S. 
Treasury--and never had any intention of confining their campaign to 
the spending limits. The Presidential system, from its inception, has 
been a bad joke on the American taxpayers, limiting neither spending, 
nor so-called ``special interests,'' as its creators--self-styled 
reformers--said it would.
  Unwilling to concede that their utopian reform vision has become a 
taxpayer-funded debacle worthy only of dismantling, the inside-the-
beltway reform industry agitates instead for even more restrictions--on 
the party committees and independent groups. It would be like putting 
band-aids on the Titanic, and unconstitutional, to boot.
  The reform dream is the taxpayers' nightmare. Over $1 billion has 
been squandered on the Presidential system. It is an entitlement 
program for politicians. And a boondoggle for the likes of fringe 
candidates such as Lenora Fulani and Lyndon LaRouche who have flocked 
to the Presidential campaign entitlement program, like moths to a 
flame.
  Even Ross Perot's Reform Party has gotten into the act--as the Texas 
billionaire received $30 million from the U.S. Treasury last year for 
his campaign. An irony is that the Perot Reform Party's partaking of 
taxpayer funds from the Presidential system coffers will be the straw 
that breaks the camel's back in 2000. The Reform Party is going to 
bleed the reform dream dry if it takes what it will be entitled to in 
primary matching, convention, and general election funding. This is the 
gist of a recent FEC staff report on the fund's prospects for the 2000 
campaign.
  At the outset of the 2000 Presidential primaries, the Presidential 
fund will be so near bankruptcy that candidates will be able to receive 
only a tiny fraction of what they are entitled to. FEC

[[Page S12004]]

staff predict this dearth of funding will prompt some candidates to opt 
out of the Presidential spending limit system altogether. Where would 
such an exodus leave the competitive field? The candidates would still 
be stuck with the quarter-century old contribution limits, bestowing a 
tremendous advantage on those select few who have a huge donor base 
from which to draw or the wherewithal to fund a campaign out of their 
own pocket.
  This is a very real campaign finance crisis--a Presidential system on 
the edge of oblivion and a wide-open contest looming in the year 2000. 
So I rise today to introduce a bill to reform the Presidential system--
the object of so much scandal and scorn. This reform legislation would 
repeal the Presidential system's spending limits and taxpayer funding. 
It would save the American taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars 
every election. To compensate for the loss of taxpayer funding and make 
the system more realistic, the contribution limit for Presidential 
candidates would be adjusted to $10,000, up from the current $1,000. 
The PAC limit would also be adjusted up to $10,000.
  It would also strengthen the political parties by updating the hard 
money contribution limits regulating donations to them. These limits 
are a quarter-century old and long overdue for adjustments. Candidates 
and political parties should not be shackled in the year 2000 with 
circa-1970's contribution limits. The bill would also do what the 
Supreme Court talked about doing in the 1996 Colorado decision and is 
likely to do in the near future: abolish the coordinated spending 
limit. This arbitrary restriction on what parties can do in 
coordination with their nominees is absurd. The parties prefer to 
operate in hard money over soft money. These reforms would facilitate 
that activity.
  Mr. President, these are commonsense reforms that would enhance 
competition and increase accountability in Presidential elections. In 
the interest of heading off a complete breakdown of the Presidential 
system in 2000, I urge Senators to step away from the traditional 
reform paradigm and join me in this effort.
                                 ______