FEC Regresses From Dysfunctional To Nonfunctional

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With One Resignation, Federal Election Commission Regresses From Dysfunctional To Nonfunctional

Statement of Democracy 21 Counsel Donald Simon

With Commissioner Matthew Petersen’s resignation from the Federal Election Commission announced today, the FEC will regress from a dysfunctional agency to one that, as a practical matter, ceases to function at all. Of the six seats on the agency, one has been vacant since mid-2017 and the other since early 2018. Petersen’s departure at the end of this week will reduce the agency to three members.

Because four members are needed for a quorum, the agency will be unable to meet or conduct business.

That means the agency cannot open investigations, cannot impose fines or otherwise enforce the law, cannot make rules, cannot issue advisory opinions and cannot act on audits. It basically cannot function.

This is occurring just over a year before the 2020 elections, and when the presidential campaign is already well underway. The country needs a cop on the beat to enforce the election laws in order to provide a meaningful deterrent to foreign interference in the 2020 elections and to safeguard against illegal contributions. But the FEC will be unable to act.

The problem is even worse than it seems. The remaining three FEC members are all serving in “holdover” status well beyond their terms of office – one Commissioner has a term that expired in 2007.

The fault here lies with the White House, which has failed to nominate Commissioners both to fill the empty seats and to replace the holdover Commissioners. While the White House did nominate one Republican last year, it disregarded the established tradition of pairing Democratic and Republican nominees for the Senate to consider.

The President should select nominees to fill the vacancies on the FEC as soon as possible, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell should commit to bringing those nominees to the Senate floor for confirmation on an expedited basis. It is imperative that both the President and the Senate ensure that there is a functioning FEC with members who are committed to enforcing the campaign finance laws and to protecting the public interest in fair, open and honest campaigns free from the corrupting influence of big money.

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