With Clean Elections program stumbling, its opponents try to knock it down

TRENTON -- With the future of the Fair and Clean Elections program hanging in the balance and its supporters set to try to negotiate its fate in two weeks, four of its opponents gathered in the State House today to question not only the program's effectiveness, but the sincerity of some of its proponents.

Assembly members Jay Webber (R-Morris Plains) and Allison Littell McHose (R-Franklin) joined Virginia-based Center for Competitive Politics (CCP) President Sean Parnell and Center for Policy Research (CPR) of New Jersey Executive Director Greg Edwards to outline preliminary findings of the CCP's report that they say shows the program has been ineffective in virtually all of its stated goals.

Most notable, according to Parnell, was the fact that special interest groups still appeared to exert large influence in collecting the hundreds of $10 donations needed to participate in the program.

Webber and McHose argued that the program was a disingenuous approach to diminishing special interests' influence on the process. McHose, who reluctantly participated in the program last year, singled out Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden), saying that if he was serious about reform he would seek to ban leadership PACs, which are not constrained by the same contribution limits as regular legislative candidates.

Roberts's leadership PAC has poured millions into Democratic campaigns across the state.

"I'm saying he's a hypocrite. He's not looking to police himself, but he's looking to police the rest of us," said Littell. "I ask the Speaker, if he's so committed to this project, why isn't it in his own district?"

That drew a harsh rebuke from Assembly Democratic spokesman Derek Roseman.

"Allison is a special interest puppet who is not terribly bright and doesn't stand for anything, so of course she's against cleaning up elections in New Jersey," he said.

The Clean Elections program, which was tested in 2005 and 2007, is currently reeling from an opinion by the non-partisan Office of Legislative Services that said that its clause for "rescue funds" would likely be ruled unconstitutional under the precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision in Davis v. Federal Election Commission. Without the clause, proponents say, it will be hard to get candidates to agree to participate. That decision came after the program's reauthorization bill was pulled before the legislature could vote on it.

"Rescue funds for this program would be unconstitutional and would not survive a court challenge," said Webber. "Without that component I think the clean elections program is mortally wounded. It should have been defeated before that decision came down, but with that decision it is an intractable program."

But despite questioning the constitutionality of the rescue funds, Webber stopped short of calling for a turnover of last year's Assembly election results in District 14, where Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein was given $100,000 extra to combat large media buys against her by a 501(c)4 group called Common Sense America.

"I don't think anybody would argue that the results of the election should be overturned or reversed," he said. The point is that going forward, this so-called rescue money, a massive subsidy and thumb on the scale by government.... is unconstitutional and should not be engaged in going forward."

Among the most startling findings, according to Parnell, was that special interest groups' influence was not significantly diminished. Parnell's group sent surveys to 4,800 residents of Districts 14 and 24 who contributed $10 to a candidate. He based his data on the 750 that were returned.

Parnell found that New Jersey Educational Association (NJEA) members made up nearly one quarter of all of the contributors. In the 24th District, members of the National Rifle Association (NRA) provided one-third of donations to Republicans (who included McHose) and 17.9% of contributions to Republicans in the 14th District. Also heavily represented among the donors were those from NARAL Pro-Choice New Jersey, New Jersey Right to Life, Communications Workers of America and the Sierra Club.

"The evidence clearly shows that candidates continue to rely on interest group members to collect the small contributions needed to qualify for clean elections programs," said Parnell. "If the goal of taxpayer-funded campaigns was to eliminate or substantially reduce the influence of special elections, it is clear that Clean Elections has failed to achieve that goal."

Moreover, Parnell said, the program did not appear to diminish constituents' feelings about their legislators. Regardless of how the candidates were funded, the contributors' perception went unchanged.

"Taxpayer funded political campaigns can't improve public perception because most public perception is from ideology and partisanship, which is not going away any time soon," he said.

When questioned by reporters, Parnell said that he could not determine whether there was an active campaign by unions and advocacy groups to bundle small donations to their chosen candidates. Parnell also said that candidate-solicited donations -- which the program was meant to encourage -- did make up the largest single part of the donations, though not a majority by itself.

State Sen. Bill Baroni, whose took part in the program during his election last year and is one of its foremost Republican champions, said that the vast majority of his ticket's $10 contributions were solicited through individually organized events.

"I don't know where they got their data, so God bless them. I can tell you that every one of our contributions was one in a series of backyard barbeques and coffee gatherings organized by individuals, along with some mailings," he said, adding that Parenell's group, while non-partisan, is ideologically opposed to publicly financed elections.

Baroni said that he agrees with McHose and Webber's calls to end wheeling and Leadership PACs, but doesn't see why it precludes the Clean Elections program.

"Allison and Jay are right. But ending the culture of corruption has many roads, and one of them is the Clean Elections Program, one is getting rid of wheeling, one is getting rid of leadership committees and one is lowering campaign contributions," he said.

Greg Edwards, the executive director of CRP, said that the program's very nature gives Democrats an advantage. Republicans, he noted, are philosophically less inclined to want to donate money in an effort to secure government campaign funds, while Republican districts tend to be geographically larger and more rural - making it harder for Republicans to collect the requisite number of signatures.

"We've created an un-level playing field," he said.

Speaker Roberts did not offer a detailed rebuke of the critics' charges, but did cast doubt on the legitimacy of CCP's study.

"Although the conservative Supreme Court dealt Clean Elections a serious blow, this unscientific ‘survey' and its results are not persuasive at all... just another excuse to oppose the program," he said in a statement.