Feinstein Critics Assail Election Reform Stance : Politics: The senator abandons bill that would ban PACs’ contributions to campaigns. She says it is too broad and she intends to push her own legislation.

It wasn’t even a year ago that Dianne Feinstein, a millionaire in her own right, nearly lost her U.S. Senate seat to Mike Huffington, an even bigger millionaire, when he spent an unsurpassed $27 million of his fortune to beat her.

So no one was surprised when a bipartisan bill to reform federal campaign spending laws was announced this spring and the California Democrat stood front and center before clicking cameras to decry unbridled electioneering.

What did surprise more than a few people was her conspicuous absence when the bill was officially introduced last week minus Feinstein, who had changed her mind and taken her name off the legislation.

Her office says the bill “grew beyond her original intention.” But critics say it struck too close to the second-term senator’s bankroll, threatening the $1 million she has received recently from Emily’s List, a political action committee that supports women candidates who favor abortion rights.

“It was fine as a Michael Huffington revenge bill, which is what spurred her to do this,” one Republican congressional staffer said. “But when it was going to hurt her pet fund-raising cause, she pulled off. How spineless can you get?”

Watchdog groups following the foundering campaign reform effort in Congress were astounded by Feinstein’s change of heart, charging that she had put her campaign finances before the greater good of reform.

“It’s a practical political decision from her perspective,” said Ellen Miller, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics in Washington. “But she is looking at campaign reform through the filters of her own campaign. We need legislators who will look above their own filters and talk about full reform that benefits all Americans.”

Feinstein stood with fellow Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) at a Capitol Hill news conference last May to trumpet a campaign reform proposal that would offer free television broadcast time to candidates who abide by spending limits, penalize candidates who spend significant personal money on their campaigns and ban all political action committee contributions.

But when the senators got down to details in the following months, Feinstein endorsed the ban on PACs linked to corporate interests or labor unions but balked at limits on so-called ideological PACs such as Emily’s List, the Republican staffer said.

Such PACs currently “bundle” money from several individual contributors and funnel it to one candidate, a practice that would be banned by McCain’s bill. Emily’s List gave Feinstein a little more than $1 million in bundled funds during her 1992 and 1994 Senate races, according to her campaign.

“Sen. Feinstein did not agree on limitations on bundling which would have hurt Emily’s List,” press secretary Susan Kennedy acknowledged. “Small contributors writing checks to candidates of their choice is different from a special interest like a corporate PAC, and should be treated differently.”

But that was not the only reason Feinstein divorced herself from the McCain bill, Kennedy said. After reviewing several court rulings, the senator concluded that a ban on PACs would probably not withstand a court challenge and decided to author reform legislation of her own, now being drafted by her office.

The Feinstein bill will concentrate on penalizing candidates who significantly tap their personal wealth, a philosophy clearly shaped by her bout with Huffington. Feinstein pumped $1.5 million of her own money into the campaign but was nearly overwhelmed by the former congressman and oil millionaire, whose $27-million contribution to himself made for the most expensive congressional contest in history.

“Sen. Feinstein pulled off the bill for a number of reasons that cannot be limited to just one aspect,” Kennedy said. “Her emphasis now will be on spending limits that level the playing field for candidates running against wealthy millionaires who would self-fund their campaigns.”

But groups like Common Cause believe that PAC contributions must be brought under control and that Feinstein’s devotion to the group that strongly supported her has eclipsed her better judgment.

“It is considered a particularly dirty aspect of the campaign finance system because it is used to skirt the limits [on what] people can give to a candidate,” Miller said of the bundling technique. “Emily’s List has used it effectively, and so has Wall Street.”

Feinstein’s defection from the McCain bill is seen by some as the latest of several flip-flops since she came to the Senate in 1992, including shifts on the balanced budget amendment and the Clinton health plan.

But her office says Feinstein remains as committed as ever to the goal of campaign reform, noting that congressional candidates raised and spent more than $724 million in the last election cycle.

“The fund-raising pressure on candidates is so enormous,” her office quoted her as saying. “When you couple that with increasing negativity of campaigns, the result is an upsurge in public cynicism.”

Meanwhile, McCain’s bill is co-sponsored by liberal Democrat Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and freshman Republican Fred Thompson of Tennessee. But the endorsement of a moderate Democrat like Feinstein would have rounded out the team, making a bill with generally poor chances of success slightly more palatable to both parties.

Said McCain: “I am very disappointed that Sen. Feinstein is not currently supporting the bill. She would have added a great deal of credibility to our efforts, and I am hopeful that she will see clear to supporting truly comprehensive campaign finance reform legislation.”