Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) on Tuesday threw his support behind a constitutional amendment aimed at gutting the impact of a Supreme Court decision lifting key restrictions on corporate campaign spending.“I think we need a constitutional amendment to make it clear once and for all that corporations do not have the same free speech rights as individuals,” Kerry said during a Senate Rules Committee hearing.Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) is the only other senator so far to back the idea of taking on the Herculean task of passing a constitutional amendment in response to the high court’s 5-4 Citizens United ruling.The White House and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) for months have been bracing for the sweeping Supreme Court decision that freed corporations and unions to spend money on independent expenditures during all times of the campaign. The decision also reversed a provision of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill barring corporations and unions from funding issue ads airing 30 days before a primary and 60 days before a general election.Pelosi has put Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) in charge of a task force that will produce legislation aimed at blunting the court’s ruling.Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), chairman of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee, will serve as Van Hollen’s Senate counterpart and will try to work quickly to pass a legislative package curbing the power of corporations and unions before this year’s mid-term Congressional elections begin in earnest.Most opponents of the high court’s decision regard passing a constitutional amendment as a long-term, long-shot goal because it requires the support of two-thirds of the House and Senate and three-fourths of the states to ratify it. Many Republican members of Congress support the Supreme Court’s decision, a high hurdle to overcome in amending the Constitution.A new poll may help bolster support for a Constitutional amendment as well as legislation aimed at weakening the decision’s impact.The Angus Reid Opinion Poll, conducted Jan. 28 and 29, showed strong opposition for the Supreme Court decision across party lines. Sixty-six percent of Democrats either “moderately” or “strongly” disagreed with the ruling, but so did 63 percent of Republicans and 72 percent of independents.Supporters of greater restrictions on campaign finance are urging Congress to act as soon as possible to offset the decision with immediate legislation.“[The court’s] terrible decision deserves as robust a response as soon as possible,” said Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.). “Nothing less than the future of our democracy is at stake.”Van Hollen and Schumer, with the help of several committee chairmen with jurisdiction, are working on a package that would require shareholders to vote before a corporation can spend money in elections; require companies that pay for ads supporting or opposing candidates to more clearly identify themselves in the ads; restrict the ability of companies with big government contracts to air such ads; and tighten rules prohibiting outside groups from coordinating ads with candidates.Others, such as Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), are making an appeal for a broader legislative fix such as passing a public financing program for federal candidates similar to the one in place for presidential elections.“I think we need to break away from this model we have for campaigns that has caused so much cynicism on behalf of the American voters,” Durbin said.“That way [candidates] won’t have to spend their lives on the telephone having secretaries make excuses for why the boss can’t take the calls from them.”The Campaign Legal Center, a watchdog organization and defender of the McCain-Feingold law, also would like the Federal Communications Commission to ensure access to airwaves by candidates. Right now broadcasters must sell campaign ad time to candidates at the lowest unit rate, but broadcasters can pre-empt those ads if a higher bidder is willing to pay more for the time.“Air time sold at the lowest unit rate is generally pre-emptible, thus forcing candidates to buy the more expensive, non-pre-emptible time to ensure they reach the targeted demographic. A new statute should ensure that once again the lowest unit rates for candidates are meaningful,” the group wrote Schumer.At one point in Tuesday’s hearing, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) asked whether a corporation or union would be able to buy all of the airtime before an election, preventing a candidate from being able to respond to attacks.Fred Wertheimer, the president of Democracy 21, said the Federal Communications Act requires only that broadcasters sell “reasonable” amounts of time to federal candidates.“I’m worried in these tough economic times when broadcasters are looking for top dollars, those [candidate] times could be squeezed out,” Murray said.Steve Hoersting, of the Center for Competitive Politics, which supports the high court’s decision, suggested that Congress could counter any corporate advantage in buying ad time by passing laws lifting the ban on large or unlimited corporate and union contributions to candidates and parties.“You could put yourself in a position where you can afford your campaigns more than you already can under existing constraints,” he said.Congress spent years passing laws shutting down unlimited “soft-money” contributions tand should not return to it now because members are scared of the new power of corporations and unions, Wertheimer responded.“The notion that we ought to solve this influence-buying corruption problem by opening up the door to more influence-buying and corruption is not what we need,” he said.Sen. Robert Bennett (R-Utah), who supports the Citizens United ruling, argued that 2002 McCain-Feingold has done little if anything to stop the flow of money into politics. Campaigns raised and spent $1.6 billion in the 1998 presidential and Congressional elections, and 10 years later that total increased to $5.2 billion.“Somehow the goal of taking big money out of politics was not achieved by passing that law,” he said.
via thehill.com
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