GOP challenges state’s campaign finance limit

• By KEVIN MCGILL
• Associated Press writer
• Published: Mar 2, 2009 - Page: 6B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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NEW ORLEANS — Louisiana’s Republican Party and the Republican National Committee spent almost $42,000 apiece on a coordinated effort to defeat scandal-plagued U.S. Rep. William Jefferson last year, but they wanted to spend more.

Turns out they didn’t have to. The Republican candidate, Anh “Joseph” Cao — with his own campaign fund in addition to the help from the parties — pulled off the upset on Dec. 6.

But the state and national parties and Cao are pressing on with a lawsuit that they hope will bring an end to campaign finance restrictions in place since the post-Watergate reform atmosphere of the 1970s.

At issue in the Cao lawsuit are the limits federal election law has on what state and national parties can spend in coordinated efforts on behalf of a candidate — about $42,000 each in most congressional districts. Each party can spend more in individual efforts but Roger Villere, chairman of the Louisiana Republican Party, says that can result in expenditures on messages that are either duplicative or contradictory.

The Louisiana lawsuit is one of two high-profile lawsuits targeting campaign finance limits. The other, pending before a three-judge panel at the U.S. District Court in Washington, targets the 2002 ban on unlimited “soft money” contributions — that is, unlimited amounts of money from corporations, unions or individuals.

“The interesting thing about the Louisiana case is that the party coordinated spending limits that are under challenge have already been upheld by the Supreme Court,” said Tara Malloy, attorney with the Campaign Legal Center, which is considering filing court papers in support of the restrictions.

Attorneys challenging the finance limits contend that there were unresolved questions in past rulings.

Among other things, the Cao lawsuit contends that the campaign finance restrictions limited efforts to bring attention to Jefferson’s legal woes and his specific votes that might prove unpopular among some in his district — including votes to ban offshore drilling.

While supporters of the restrictions hail them as a means of restraining the corrupting influence of big money in politics, the lawsuit argues that the laws are unconstitutionally vague and amount to an abridgment of free speech in violation of the First Amendment.

Both cases were filed following the ascension to the Supreme Court of John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Both appointees of President George W. Bush have pushed the court to the right and may be less favorable to the restrictions.

Republican attorneys in the Louisiana case are trying to put it on a fast track to the Supreme Court. They’ve asked U.S. District Judge Ginger Berrigan of New Orleans to, in effect, bypass a district court trial and seek a ruling from the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — a ruling that almost certainly would be appealed to the Supreme Court.

RNC member James Bopp is a lawyer representing the party in both lawsuits. He said the lawsuit was not filed in hopes of benefiting from a more conservative Supreme Court but because party leaders decided to push ahead with it at a time when Cao’s and two other high-profile congressional races were pending late in 2008.

Cao’s campaign had taken on added urgency last fall after hurricanes delayed Louisiana’s election. Jefferson, already hobbled by a 2007 bribery indictment, appeared even more vulnerable when the general election was pushed back to Dec. 6, when there would be no Barack Obama on the ballot to excite black voters.