Campaign Finance Reform Bill Gains Key Senate Supporter

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) announced Thursday that he has picked up another influential Senate supporter for his trademark issue of campaign finance reform, moving him within reach of the 60 votes needed to end the filibusters that have stymied his crusade for years.

The new backer is Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), the senior senator from the home state of Trent Lott, the Senate GOP leader who has bitterly fought McCain in the past on this issue.

The announcement is likely to sharpen the challenge that the issue will pose to George W. Bush soon after he is sworn in as president. McCain and his allies are talking about introducing a bill two days after Bush’s Jan. 20 inauguration.

McCain and Sen. Russell D. Feingold (D-Wis.), who has co-sponsored past versions of the reform legislation, said that they have not yet completed this year’s version. But one goal remains: to ban “soft money” contributions to political parties.

Such contributions have ballooned in recent years as parties and candidates have sought every edge in an escalating political arms race. Unlike direct contributions to federal candidates, gifts of soft money are not limited under federal law.

The developments on campaign finance reform came as the two parties were nearing agreement on a plan to run the evenly divided Senate, which will be controlled by Republicans after Jan. 20 on the strength of the vice president’s tie-breaking vote.

Democrats were pushing a plan for partisan parity on Senate committees, while Republicans were heatedly debating whether they could live with that. In an institution as driven by procedure as the Senate, the details of the new organizational plan will matter a great deal.

Republicans are especially concerned that power sharing could create serious roadblocks to the enactment of Bush’s agenda or to the approval of his judicial and administrative nominees.

“It’s a very thorny problem,” said Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.). “How do you get things done?”

Lott briefed Republicans in a closed-door meeting on one proposal to provide for equal partisan splits on committees, along with suggestions on how to prevent gridlock. “We’ve got to find a way to get results,” he told reporters.

McCain reiterated that he plans to press for early Senate action on his bid to reshape how U.S. campaigns are funded. And he scoffed at suggestions that his effort will complicate hopes of the incoming administration for a quick start on its legislative agenda.

“Simply nonsense,” McCain said, noting that the Senate typically does not take final votes on legislation for the first several weeks of a new Congress. “Everyone knows that the longer you delay in bringing up this issue, the less the likelihood it is of passage. . . . That’s just a political reality.”

Bush has opposed McCain’s plan. The version of campaign finance reform he supports would include restrictions on the use of union dues for political purposes, which would be a deal-killer for many Democrats. On Thursday, the president-elect declined to say whether he would veto a McCain-Feingold bill.

“I’ll worry about the ‘ifs’ once I get sworn in,” Bush told reporters in Austin. “But I will tell you that I think it’s very important for us to make sure that the bill is fair and balanced.”

In recent years, versions of McCain-Feingold legislation have not come to a direct vote in the Senate, foundering on a rule requiring 60 votes to end debate. Companion bills have, however, passed in the House with wide bipartisan majorities. With the victories in November of several new Senate Democrats who support McCain, the Arizona maverick seems close to the total he needs to move forward.

Cochran, who in 1999 opposed McCain in a key procedural vote to block his legislation, said he believes such a bill “should be a high priority in the Senate this year, and I’m looking forward to taking an active role in this effort.”

Cochran cited as promising one proposal from two Republican senators who have been in McCain’s camp in the past, Olympia J. Snowe of Maine and James M. Jeffords of Vermont, to require increased disclosure of independent advertisements aired in the weeks before elections.