GOP Warns Against FCC Political-Ad Disclosure Rule

GOP senators warned the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in an April letter that the agency should avoid passing new rules requiring disclosure of those funding political ads. The letter to the FCC commissioners was in response to a Senate Commerce Oversight hearing last month in which Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson (Fla.) urged the commissioners to do via rule-making what Congress has failed to achieve legislatively. The FCC letter was signed by more than a dozen GOP members of the Senate Commerce Committee, as well as minority leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.). After the Citizen's United decision by the Supreme Court, which lifted a ban on corporate and union funding of campaign ads, Democrats responded by introducing the Disclose Act in 2010 and reintroducing it in 2012, but the bill failed to pass. Converting the bill's intent into an FCC rule would take the the agency beyond its statutory role to "weigh in on a partisan political dispute," which would "seriously undermine the integrity of the commission and imperil its independence," the GOP letter argued. For the news story, see http://www.adweek.com/news/television/gop-fcc-dont-take-political-ad-disclosures-148531