Confessions of a Mad Librarian

On March 4, 2004, in a 5-1 vote, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) proposed new rules on the definition of "political committees" and "expenditures" that are regulated by the Commission. This is no ordinary rulemaking. If adopted as proposed, the proposed rules would transform overnight many nonprofit groups (including charities, civic organizations, religious groups, labor unions, and fraternal organizations) into federally regulated political committees. The potential chilling effect on free speech cannot be overstated: the proposed rules would have a devastating impact on the issue advocacy activities of nonprofit organizations. The current, tightly drawn FEC definition of regulated and restricted "political speech" would suddenly be expanded to include all speech about anyone who is a candidate for federal office at the relevant moment.

Nonprofits who engage in issue advocacy could be faced with draconian restrictions on how they raise and spend money - for merely expressing an opinion about a federal officeholder's policies or views.

Many nonprofits would be forced to choose between either ceasing normal operations or facing crippling restrictions on fund raising. The proposed rules would convert many nonprofit groups into federally-regulated political committees: the rules would

dramatically expand the definition of a "political committee" - a group would be forced to become a "political committee" if it spends or spent merely $50,000 (or, in the alternative, 50% of total disbursements) in the current year - or any one of the past four years - on voter mobilization work or on communications that "promote, support, attack, oppose" the positions of a federal officeholder running for reelection or on voter mobilization work;

expand the definition of a federally-regulated "expenditure" to include communications that "promote, support, attack, or oppose" a federal candidate or policy position of a candidate;

create a "look back" at a nonprofit group's activities over the past four years - before McCain-Feingold was ever passed and long before the FEC ever proposed these rules - to determine whether the group qualifies as a federal political committee. If so, the FEC would require the group to raise hard money to repay prior expenses that are now subject to the new rules. Any and all further work would be halted until debts to the "old" organization were repaid.

Examples of the kinds of speech that would be severely restricted or outright prohibited by the FEC's proposed regulations include:
The American Red Cross could not run newspaper ads soliciting contributions to a fund for victims of a major flood in Louisiana if the ads also presented in a favorable light a message from a U.S. senator from Louisiana who was running for re-election requesting assistance for his state.
The National Rifle Association could not send letters to a list of activists urging them to call their members of Congress to oppose a bill banning all guns if the letter could be read as criticizing those members of Congress and they were standing for reelection.
A "good government" organization like Common Cause would become a "political committee" by launching a campaign costing more than $50,000 to promote a report criticizing members of the House of Representatives for taking junkets to the Bahamas as guests of the hotel industry. The Club for Growth could not use corporate contributions to provide information to the public regarding federal candidates' voting records on budget issues.
The Concord Coalition could not communicate its message of fiscal discipline and opposition to federal spending increases to the public as part of a fundraising and recruitment campaign if it identified specific members of Congress as favoring such spending increases and those members of Congress were running for re-election.
For a Q&A fact sheet on this proposed rulemaking, see
http://www.afj.org/nonprofit/public_policy/campaign_finance_reform/FEC_Prop527.pdf

TAKE ACTION!

For more information, go to http://www.nonprofitadvocacy.org/ or send a message to:advocacy@nonprofitadvocacy.org
Two Ways To Send Comments to the FEC
1. Send you own comments using a template you can edit on OMB Watch's online contact system.
2. Sign on to comments with the Coalition to Save Nonprofit Advocacy by sending an email by noon on Monday, April 5, 2004, to:
takeaction@afj.org
Click here for a copy of the comments.
Contact your Representative and Senators.
Ask them to submit or sign onto comments to the FEC opposing the rule.
Click here to email your legislators directly.