FEC considers request to ease election-time ad restrictions on interest groups

(AP) Just in time for the fall elections, government regulators are weighing whether to ease restrictions on when interest groups can run political ads within weeks of the voting.

The Federal Election Commission on Thursday began circulating a proposal by Commissioner Hans von Spakovsky that would grant an exemption on airing ads outside a specific timeframe. The commission plans to take up the matter at an Aug. 29 meeting and could vote that day.

If the commission approves the change, it could unleash a flood of election ad spending and open a new legal battle over the 2002 campaign finance law, the overhaul measure for which the Supreme Court has already weighed in.

The FEC commissioner said more than 200 individuals and organizations wrote the panel complaining that the law "stifles their ability to lobby Congress and the executive branch on important issues that they're considering, and I believe that's absolutely correct."

If approved, the exemption would remain in effect until September 2007 unless the commission made it permanent.

In 2003, the AFL-CIO, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other interest groups lost a bid to overturn much of the law, including the restrictions. That provision bans interest groups financed with corporate or union money from running television and radio ads the month before a primary and two months before a general election if they identify a federal candidate or target a candidate's district.

The groups want the FEC to exempt "grass-roots lobbying" efforts from its rules spelling out how the commission interprets the law's election-time ad limits. They argue that the court hasn't upheld a ban on "genuine issue ads" that mention members of Congress but do not promote or oppose federal candidates.

"It's a little hard to get people to write their congressman or senator about legislation without mentioning the incumbent's name," said Jan Baran, an attorney for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce business lobby, noting that Congress returns from its summer break almost exactly 60 days before the election and will consider several bills.

Campaign finance watchdogs are leaving open the option of suing should the FEC grant the exemption.

"We are absolutely committed to protecting the integrity of the electioneering communications provisions that Congress enacted in the 2002 law. And one of the options here always may be challenging it in court," said Fred Wertheimer, head of Democracy 21.

Campaign watchdogs and the law's chief sponsors _ Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., and Martin Meehan, D-Mass. _ contend that many of the election-time ads run with corporate and union money before the law took effect were clearly meant to influence congressional and presidential races.

Shays and Meehan successfully sued to overturn several of the FEC's initial rules interpreting the law. They argued that the commission had overstepped its bounds and illegally opened several loopholes for candidates, donors and other political players.

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On the Net:

See FEC documents on the proposal at: http://www.fec.gov/law/law_rulemakings.shtml lobbying