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John McCain, Russ Feingold reunite to block Barack Obama's FEC pick
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| Contributor | Craverguy |
| Last Edited | Craverguy Jul 01, 2009 11:42pm |
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| Category | News |
| Author | Kenneth P. Vogel and Manu Raju |
| News Date | Wednesday, July 1, 2009 09:30:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | The campaign finance dream team of Sens. Russ Feingold and John McCain is reuniting to block President Barack Obama’s first appointment to the Federal Election Commission and to push him to shake up the embattled agency.
In a surprising move that invokes memories of a bitter skirmish during Obama’s annihilation of McCain in last year’s presidential election, Feingold (D-Wis.) and McCain (R-Ariz.) have placed a hold on the FEC nomination of Democratic labor lawyer John Sullivan, POLITICO confirmed Tuesday. Their hold could reverberate in Congress, the White House, the 2010 midterm elections, and beyond.
In a statement issued in response to POLITICO’s inquiries, the lawmakers signaled they would release the hold only if Obama taps two additional nominees to fill expired seats on the six-member independent panel, which critics contend is systematically deregulating campaign rules.
“The FEC is currently mired in anti-enforcement gridlock,” read the joint statement from Feingold and McCain, whose names became synonymous with efforts to limit the role of special interest cash in politics when they teamed to shepherd into law the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act, better known as McCain-Feingold. “The president must nominate new commissioners with a demonstrated commitment to the existence and enforcement of the campaign finance laws.”
Their hold on Sullivan, who would replace a commissioner whose term expired two years ago, was exhilarating to advocates of limiting the role of money in politics, who want Obama to chart a new course for the agency. And it was an unmistakable shot across the bow of both Senate leaders and Obama, who have not moved to replace the two commissioners whose terms expired in May. |
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