GOP Leadership Compares Campaign Finance Reformers to Actress Glenn Close Character in Fatal Attraction

Last Friday, Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said that campaign finance reformers remind him of actress Glenn Close in the movie Fatal Attraction.  "You think she's dead. She comes springing out [of the tub] for one more attempt to commit mayhem," McConnell told a group of Republican Party state chairmen on Friday.  McConnell then warned the group that "if Republicans hope to hold on to their congressional majorities, they will have to resist as mightily as Michael Douglas did in the movie." (Washington Post, Sunday, April 11, 1999)

This colorful admission sheds light on the Republican leadership's true reason for attempting to tighten their death grip and drown reform once again - campaign finance reform will not only cost them their marriage to wealthy special interests, but their slim majority.  "Take away 'soft money' and we wouldn't be in the majority in the House and the majority in the Senate and couldn't win back the House. Hell's going to freeze over first before we get rid of soft money," McConnell said.

Senator McConnell may be ready to take the Kentucky chainsaw to the reform effort, but it is going to take more than a scare tactic to stop the Democrats from passing campaign finance reform in the House.  On Wednesday, April 14, the Blue Dog Democrats will be announcing their effort to urge  Members to sign a discharge petition that makes in order a rule, H.Res.122,
to allow for House consideration of the "Meehan-Shays" legislation, as well as other proposals to reform current campaign finance laws.

Last year, 196 Members signed the discharge petition that led to the passage of the Meehan-Shays Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Bill.  Without the discharge petition process, the Republican Leadership would never have let that debate occur.

Campaign Finance Reform may indeed be "fatal" for Republicans, but it is time they answer to the nine-out-of-ten Americans who want real reform.

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U.S. House Democratic Policy Committee
Richard A. Gephardt, Democratic Leader
 http://dpc.house.gov
(202)225-6760