End Citizens United Action Fund President Tiffany Muller released the following statement on the resignation of Federal Election Commission (FEC) Vice Chair Matt Peterson, which leaves three vacancies at the agency:
“We need a fully functioning FEC to uphold election laws and hold candidates and outside groups accountable. Without at least four commissioners, the FEC won’t be able to take action on even the most basic and essential elements, like making rules, conducting audits, offering official guidance to political committees, and imposing fines. An FEC that’s incapable of enforcing the law also allows corporate special interests and hostile foreign actors to more brazenly abuse and manipulate an already weakened campaign finance system. It’s a recipe for a corrupt government further beholden to big donors and special interests that doesn’t get anything done on behalf of the American people.”
The House passed the For the People Act (H.R. 1/S. 949) in March, which would make crucial reforms to the FEC to ensure that the agency is not mired in partisan gridlock and has real enforcement power, but Senator McConnell’s obstruction is once again preventing progress. The provisions laid out in H.R. 1 include restructuring the Federal Election Commission to break gridlock and making the FEC’s civil penalty authority permanent.
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