Montana lawmakers will review proposed new campaign-finance rules Tuesday. The rules, written by political practices commissioner Jonathan Motl, are controversial. Steve Jess reports that they might be delayed.
Motl’s proposed new rules have come under fire not just from politicians, but a wide range of public-interest groups, from the National Rifle Association to the American Civil Liberties Union. At a hearing in September, the ACLU’s Niki Zupanic said the proposal requires so much disclosure that donors might be scared off.
“Entities like ours will be forced to disclose a donor's contribution when that donor had no intention that the gift be used for political purposes. It's impractical and it's unfair.”
The State Administration Committee put the rules on hold until this month.
Commissioner Motl says the committee might try to delay them until 2017 legislature, but he doesn’t think that will happen.
The rules are needed to implement the “dark money” disclosure bill the legislature passed this year, as well as the Supreme Court’s “Citizens United” decision in 2010.
The Administration committee will probably poll all 150 legislators to see whether Motl’s rules are what they wanted when they passed the dark money bill. The poll won’t change anything, but it may delay the rules from going into effect by a few weeks.
