McCain to Endorse State Ballot Initiative

Aligning himself with other political rebels, Republican presidential candidate John McCain today will endorse a California initiative that would dramatically limit the amount that political donors could give to their favorite candidates.

Proponents of the measure are gathering signatures to place it on the March 2000 primary ballot, the same one that McCain, a senator from Arizona, hopes will feature his name among his party’s contenders.

Forwarded by Republican Ron Unz and Democrat Tony Miller--both of whom have become pariahs within their own parties for pressing campaign reform--the initiative would limit contributions to $5,000 per person for statewide candidates and $3,000 for all others. It would ban corporate contributions, set limited periods during which fund-raising would be allowed, offer credits for television spending for candidates who abide by voluntary spending limits and require immediate Internet disclosure for major contributions.

California voters have in recent years approved a succession of campaign finance initiatives--the latest 1996’s Proposition 208--but all have been quashed by the courts. Currently there is no limit to the donations a candidate can receive; in his first six months in office, Gov. Gray Davis raised $6.1 million, including donations of $50,000 or more from at least 25 individuals or corporations.

In an interview after a Riverside campaign appearance Monday, McCain said that although he does not agree with all of the initiative’s proposals--chiefly the television credits, which amount to a form of public financing--he backed it as a necessary reform for a system he considers beyond repair.

“In its entirety, it is a very good proposal,” McCain said of the Unz-Miller measure, which is being touted by its authors as the “California Voters’ Bill of Rights.”

“The reality is that what happens in California happens all across the West,” McCain added. “If it could succeed here, I would imagine that it would have a similar impact on other states.”

The alliance, which will be formalized today when McCain and Unz appear at a Sacramento press conference, at least initially could benefit both sides.

In McCain, the initiative backers have the best-known supporter of federal campaign finance reform, the coauthor of a bill with Democratic Sen. Russell D. Feingold of Wisconsin that would outlaw so-called soft money donations. He has aroused great anger among party leaders because of his stand.

In the initiative, McCain has a vehicle that could help underscore his reformist image and offer him greater credibility in California among non-Republicans who have yet to learn of his candidacy. Here, as well as elsewhere in the nation, McCain lags far behind Texas Gov. George W. Bush in early polls.

“If it has some effect, enhances my image as a reformer, that’s fine with me,” McCain said in the interview. “The point is to say, ‘It’s broken in California.’ ”

In signing on to the California initiative, McCain joins a trio of iconoclastic Californians making yet another effort in the long and star-crossed battle for campaign finance reform.

Unz, a Silicon Valley software magnate, first outraged his party when he ran for governor in 1994 against the GOP incumbent, Pete Wilson. After that primary loss, he mounted the successful campaign for last year’s Proposition 227, which outlawed most bilingual education programs.

Miller served for years under former Secretary of State March Fong Eu, but lost a race to replace her to Republican Bill Jones. He was a principal author of Proposition 208, the campaign finance initiative passed by voters in 1996 and tabled by a federal judge last year.