Phil Gramm Shuts Down His Leadership PAC

By John Bresnahan

(The Politico)  Former Sen. Phil Gramm (R-Texas), now an economic advisor to John McCain's presidential campaign, has shut down his leadership PAC, according to disclosure records filed with the Federal Election Committee.

Friends of Phil Gramm PAC was officially closed on July 4. The PAC distributed its last $73,000 by the end of June, including $11,000 in donations to Republicans like Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Kevin Brady (R-Texas) and Jim Gerlach (R-Pa.), among others.

Other disbursements from the PAC included $45,000 in payments to the firm Ruffalo and Associates.

Gramm's ties to the McCain campaign have proven controversial. Gramm , a former chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, is now a vice chairman at UBS, the giant Swiss bank. Federal officials are seeking a court order to find out if the bank helped wealthy Americans avoid taxes by placing money in offshore accounts. According to media reports, as many as 20,000 Americans have stashed up to $20 billion in these accounts.

Gramm began advising the McCain campaign last year, while at the same time being registered to lobby Congress on the mortgage crisis. Gramm. who has been mentioned as a potential Treasury secretary if McCain wins the White House, was "deregistered" as a UBS lobbyist in April of this year.

.Gramm is one of a number of former lawmakers with leadership PACs. Retiring members and senators transfer unused campaign funds into these PACs when they leave office, and then later dole out the funds to candidates and incumbents.

The 66-year-old Gramm was first elected to the House in 1978 before switching to the GOP in 1983 and winning a Senate set the following year. He left the Senate in 2002 after three terms, including abn unsuccessful run for the White House in 1996