Christopher Dodd

Mr. DODD

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, is there any time remaining?

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum until we come to some understanding.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I point out we are not on the budget resolution yet. I was just looking for time for Members to speak on the bill, to get a little time to be heard prior to final passage. It seems to me that is not an unreasonable request. Given the 2 weeks we have spent on this bill, I think Members would like to spend a few minutes expressing their thoughts on this legislation. Rather than take the time of the Senate today, I thought prior to the vote on Monday was the time to do that.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I know the leaders were discussing this. I ask unanimous consent that there be 1 hour on Monday, off the budget resolution, prior to the vote at 5:30 for Members to come over to make final comments about the adoption of this important piece of legislation.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I am going to oppose the modified Durbin amendment. Quite simply, it preserves all of the incumbency protection provisions of the original Domenici amendment. I compliment my colleague from Illinois on his attempt to correct his amendment of last week, but this modification does not get the job done. Let me review for my colleagues what happened last Tuesday and which provisions of the Domenici amendment are most objectionable to this Senator. Last Tuesday the Senate adopted amendment number 115 offered by Senators Domenici, DeWine, Durbin, McConnell and others regarding wealthy candidates. The proponents of this amendment claimed that it addressed an unintended effect of the Buckley decision--namely, that wealthy candidates have a constitutional right to use their own resources to finance a campaign. My colleagues argued at the time that the Buckley decision created a substantial disadvantage for opposing candidates who must raise campaign funds under the current fund-raising limitations. That is an outrageous statement. Who among us really believe that we are disadvantaged by hard money contribution limits? The benefits of incumbency are well known and are recognized obstacles for challengers to overcome. The contention of my colleagues, who supported the Domenici amendment last week, is that the current limits are simply too low for incumbents to overcome challengers who have independent wealth. Consequently, their amendment establishes threshold amounts, based on the voting population of the state, which if exceeded by contributions of personal wealth by a candidate, would trigger outlandish benefits to an incumbent. Benefits of 4 to 6 times the contribution limits of current law. I opposed that amendment because it clearly created yet another advantage of incumbency--that of ignoring the significant wealth that incumbents also have in the form of campaign treasuries. Moreover, the benefits afforded to an incumbent with a war chest were way out of line with the threshold limits that triggered these benefits. For example, in my State of Connecticut, the voting age population is roughly 2.5 million. Under the Domenici amendment, a wealthy candidate would only have to expend $250,000 of his or her own resources to trigger benefits to an incumbent. And what are those benefits? Well, it depends upon how much the wealthy candidate spends. If the wealthy candidate spends $500,000 of his or her own money--not an insignificant sum, but not huge either--the amendment would triple the contribution rates for the incumbent. That means that the incumbent could raise funds, equal to 110% of the $500,000, in amounts three times as large as current law. The incumbent facing this moderately wealthy challenger in the State of Connecticut would be able to solicit $6,000 per individual, per election for a total of $12,000, or $24,000 per couple. That is hardly reform. But what if that moderately wealthy challenger expends twice that amount in personal resources, or $1 million? In that case, the so-called disadvantaged incumbent can raise contributions from individuals at 6 times the current rate. In that instance, the incumbent could legally solicit funds from an individual in the amount of $12,000 per election, or $24,000 per election cycle, or $48,000 per couple. Is there anyone who believes that asking a couple to write a check in the amount of $48,000 is reform or in the best interest of this Democracy? I think not. But let me add another twist. Suppose this same incumbent, facing the wealthy challenger, has a campaign account--as almost all incumbents do. And in that campaign account there is a balance of $1,000,000, not an unrealistic amount for many incumbents. And yet, even though that incumbent has 1 million dollars in the bank, and the wealthy candidate spends only $500,000 of their personal funds, the incumbent still gets 3 times the benefits. What is fair about that? Some of my colleagues suggest that their campaign accounts are not the same as a challenger's personal wealth--that they have worked hard to raise those campaign dollars, living within the current limits of only $1,000 per individual per election. Before my colleagues feel too sorry for themselves, let me point out that I am sure that wealthy candidate believes he has worked equally hard for his personal wealth. And like the wealthy candidate who, alone, controls whether to spend those resources, the incumbent is similarly in charge of his or her campaign account. There is simply no way to justify treating an incumbent's war chest differently than a challenger's personal wealth. And yet, both the original Domenici amendment and this so-called fix offered today do. The amendment by the Senator from Illinois also ignores what has transpired since last Tuesday and the adoption of the original amendment. Since that time, the Senate has adopted the Thompson- Feinstein amendment which doubled the hard money contribution limits for individuals and indexed them for future inflation, so we are now up to $2,000 per year, or $4,000 per election, $8,000 per couple. That amendment also doubled the amount that a Senate campaign committee can give such a candidate to $35,000 and indexed it for inflation also. In the period of a short week, we potentially gave an incumbent facing a wealthy challenger an additional $17,500, plus an additional $4,000 per couple per election. To address these increased limits would require additional reform which Senator Durbin's amendment does not address--that is, whether the benefits of this provision providing for a triple or 6 times current rates, are now too great. When the original amendment was drafted, the contributions limits were one-half of what they are today. Consequently, any benefits offered by this amendment should recognize that fact. Moreover, this so-called fix is not a fix at all. To fairly level the playing field, an incumbent's campaign treasury should be matched dollar-for-dollar by a wealthy candidate's spending of personal funds before any benefits accrue to the incumbent. But that is not what the amendment before us does. Rather, it allows an incumbent to disregard 50% of the funds in his or her war chest before matching such balances against the personal spending of a challenger. So again, in the example of a race in Connecticut, the incumbent has a war chest of $1,000,000, but only $500,000 of that is considered. So when the wealthy candidate spends $500,000 of his or her own money, no benefits are triggered. But as soon as that wealthy candidate spends $1,000,000, the triple limits apply. That simply does not make sense. The entire balance of the incumbent's campaign treasury should be counted. I opposed the original amendment because it did not appear to me to be reform, and I oppose this so-called fix as well. I urge my colleagues in the House to take a close look at this provision and either completely eliminate the Domenici provision from the bill--which would be preferable--or amend it to eliminate the substantial loophole for incumbents.

Mr. DODD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. DODD. This amendment covers every organization. If you are for McCain-Feingold, you don't want to put people in the situation where you are potentially becoming a criminal because you had a conversation. So this covers the NRA, pro-life groups, every organization. Without the adoption of this amendment, you have a situation that is inviting criminality. I do not think any of us want to see that be the case. Senator McCain and others have worked this out. I urge the adoption of the amendment.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 20 seconds, if I can.

Mr. DODD. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. DODD. Is it permissible to move to a second amendment? I want to send a modification on behalf of the Senator to the desk on the Reed amendment.

Mr. DODD. I thank my colleague for doing this. I opposed the millionaires amendment for the very reason that the Senator from Illinois outlined this morning. The reason he has offered this amendment is to correct it; it creates a giant loophole. Talk about incumbent protection, we allow now six times the new levels of hard money. It allows literally someone to receive a check from one couple of $48,000, vastly in excess of what Members intended when they adopted this amendment a week ago. Under the Feinstein-Thompson increase in hard dollars, we need to come back to this. The Senator from Illinois offered a reasonable, sensible amendment to correct this problem. I urge its adoption.

Mr. DODD. Parliamentary inquiry: Is it permissible for a modification to be sent to the desk and considered prior to the vote of an amendment that has already been submitted?

Mr. DODD. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DODD. I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. DODD. The Senator from Kentucky is correct.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, while I will not object to the adoption of the amendment by my colleague from Missouri, Mr. Bond, I do not believe that it presents the best approach for ensuring comprehensive enforcement of this new law. In particular, I disagree with the method of appearing to single out one type of violation for enhanced enforcement or prosecution, namely conduit contributions in the name of another. My lack of objection should not be read to infer that either this Senator, or this body, believe that conduit contributions represent the most serious abuse of campaign finance laws nor that such an abuse requires selective enforcement and prosecution apart from other violations of the Act. I also want to be clear that I do not completely agree with the characterizations of the Senator from Missouri of the alleged campaign finance abuses in the 1996 Presidential and Congressional elections. Let me also be clear, campaign finance violations are already subject to civil enforcement and prosecution as both misdemeanor and felony offenses. The remedies Senator Bond is proposing appear to already be available in law if the facts or evidence in such cases include aggrevated circumstances. An unintended result of the amendment of Senator Bond may be the appearance and reality of selective prosecution. Such a result is avoided by the approach of my colleagues from Tennessee, Senator Thompson, and Connecticut, Senator Lieberman. Theirs is the preferred approach which provides for comprehensive enforcement of all violations of the new law. I am pleased that their provision has also been included in S. 27, the McCain-Feingold legislation, and believe that it should be applied across the act to all violations. We all agree that existing civil and criminal laws must be vigorously and uniformly enforced. I believe that this will be the case.

Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum to be charged to both sides.

Mr. DODD. I don't know if his amendment includes reaching that provision. Even if we go back to the original hard dollar limits, we still include the millionaires which would allow those numbers to go up. I was curious as to whether or not the amendment touched on that provision.

Mr. DODD. I think this is an amendment that makes some sense. He is absolutely correct. There is some question about the soft money constitutionality. If that ban is found to be unconstitutional, then the door is wide open again. As my colleague knows, while I supported the Thompson-Feinstein compromise, I did so reluctantly, having spoken out against the increases. I agree with my colleague on that point. I have some concerns over the so-called millionaires amendment as well which allows for an exponential increase in contributions if someone challenges us with personal wealth. I know that makes Members uneasy, but it allows for a factor as high as presently six times the hard dollar limits.

Mr. DODD. Will my colleague yield for a question?

Christopher Dodd

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