Colorado bill would require business campaign backers to register

Monday, April 26, 2010, 2:41pm MDT
Denver Business Journal - by Ed Sealover
http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/stories/2010/04/26/daily10.html

Colorado corporations and labor unions that spend $1,000 or more on political campaigns would have to register with the Secretary of State’s office under a bill introduced Monday in the state Senate.

Senate Bill 203, sponsored by Sen. Morgan Carroll, D-Aurora, is a response to the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a ban on direct corporate and union donations to political campaigns earlier this year. A number of other states have introduced similar bills since the decision, and Congress is working to come up with some sort of disclosure plan as well.

Because Colorado does not have the option of banning corporate and labor donations, the best it can do is require that companies and unions disclose who they are when they fund media advertisements for or against candidates or ballot initiatives, Carroll said. The bill would require registration in a publicly searchable database that states the name of the company behind the funding and a contact person.

The bill also bans foreign corporations from donating to Colorado political campaigns. State law already bans foreigners from giving such money, but Carroll said she feared a loophole created by the Citizens United decision would allow funding from foreign companies.

Carroll said she does not expect that the bill will stop or even slow cash from corporations and unions from going to candidates, but she hopes it will at least shine a spotlight on who is giving that cash.

“We’ve entered a new era in which entities can and will be outspending natural persons, and people have the right to know that. It may help people at some level decide who to support or not,” Carroll said when asked what effect she hopes her bill will have. “I suspect at some level, people who have unlimited funds will not be deterred by this ... I’m not sure it stops it, but it at least exposes it.”

Colorado law now sets contribution limits at $500 per person to statewide candidates for state government office, $200 per person to legislative hopefuls and $500 per person to political action committees. Carroll and House Majority Leader Paul Weissmann, D-Louisville, said that they do not believe the Citizens United decision affects those limits or allows corporations or labor unions to contribute directly to candidate or political committees.

However, the decision does allow businesses and labor groups to air ads and run other forms of communications, called independent expenditures, that are done without any coordination with the candidate committee. SB 203 would ensure that the funders of those ads are public record.

Carroll and Weissmann, who will be the House sponsor, said that they are not sure how much opposition the measure will generate since it puts corporations and labor unions on the same playing field with individuals. Carroll said she rejected more restrictive proposals, such as those being run in some states in which corporations must get board or shareholder approval before making political contributions, because she didn’t think she could get them through in the 2-1/2 weeks left in the legislative session.

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