Larsen Pushes Forward on Campaign Finance Reform

Press Release

Rep. Rick Larsen, WA-02, continued his efforts today to reform campaign finance laws by cosponsoring a bill that would roll back harmful provisions passed last month as part of the federal government spending bill. The provisions greatly increased campaign donation limits to allow individual donors to give more than $1.5 million to a political party each two-year election cycle.

"The success of our democracy depends on people's participation at the ballot box, not the size of their bank accounts. I voted against the spending bill last month because it gave the wealthy an even more outsized influence over our elections. Congress should have passed a clean spending bill without harmful provisions like this one. But today I am pleased to sponsor a bill that moves us in the right direction, to make sure elections give power to the people, not to money," Larsen said.

Larsen has vocally opposed actions that let more money into elections. Last year he supported a Constitutional Amendment that would have overturned the Supreme Court's Citizens United and McCutcheon campaign finance decision, which opened the door to unprecedented levels of corporate campaign spending, and he will support such an amendment again once it is introduced in the new session of Congress.

The new reform bill, the Closing the Floodgates Act, was introduced by Rep. Derek Kilmer, WA-06. The Act restores the political party donation limit to $97,200 per year.

Source