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Wisconsin Right to Life
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Trying to breathe life into its effort to advertise throughout the election season, Wisconsin Right to Life filed an appeal with the United States Supreme Court Thursday, requesting an injunction against being subjected to McCain-Feingold campaign finance laws.
The pro-life organization wishes to run three television and radio ads mentioning the name of U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., but because Feingold is up for re-election this year, his name may not be featured in corporate-funded broadcast ads within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of the general election.
In the proposed ads, WRTL asks viewers and radio listeners to contact Feingold and fellow Democratic Wisconsin Senator Herb Kohl and urge the two to oppose filibustering President Bush’s judicial nominations.
Since the ads do not mention Feingold’s stance on abortion or address Feingold’s upcoming election battle with pro-life Republican Tim Michels, WRTL should be granted an exemption from the campaign finance law, executive director Barbara Lyons said.
“We are conducting a grassroots effort, and our free speech rights have been totally destroyed,” Lyons said. “They are taking away our right to petition the government.”
WRTL, which ran the ads before the 30-day blackout period went into effect Aug. 16, filed an injunction appeal with Chief Justice William Rehnquist Sept. 7. Rehnquist has since turned down the appeal, prompting WRTL to file with the entire Supreme Court.
The timing of the ads had nothing to do with the November election, Lyons said. Instead, their late-July introduction to the airwaves was coordinated with Democratic filibusters of Bush’s judicial selections in the Senate.
Feingold campaign spokesman John Kraus said the organization’s pursuit of the injunction is a lost cause that has repeatedly been ruled against in other courts.
“Wisconsin Right to Life keeps asking the same question and they keep getting the same answer,” Kraus said. “The point is the McCain-Feingold Act was passed by Congress, it was signed by President Bush, it went to the Supreme Court, and they ruled that it was constitutional.”
“It’s a frivolous lawsuit that’s already been decided,” Kraus added.
The lawsuit, formally titled Wisconsin Right to Life v. Federal Election Commission, had been struck down in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia before Rehnquist’s injunction denial. Undeterred, WRTL filed the appeal Thursday with the entire Supreme Court.
“The Supreme Court decided long ago that you can’t use corporate funds for these ads,” Kraus continued. “[WRTL] keeps retrying this, but they’ve taken it to every level, and now Rehnquist has denied their request.”
Kraus noted that WRTL may use unregulated hard money from individual donors to get their message out, but utilizing corporate soft money is a strict violation of the McCain-Feingold Act.
When asked whether the group would consider exclusively mentioning Kohl, who is not up for reelection this year, but not Feingold in the ads, Lyons said it remained a possibility but said such an act would leave viewers in the dark on Feingold’s record.
“This is strictly a grassroots act informing the public on a legitimate issue,” Lyons said.
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Seriously—when are you going to put “A publication of the Republican Party of Wisconsin” on your masthead? It seems like any right-wing cause or candidate can get onto your front page for putting out a press release.
Fair and balanced, indeed.
Oh, so we shouldn’t ever write about any activity on the right, like it never happens. You are the kind of stupid person that makes people in Wisconsin think Madison represents everyone on the left.
I hope the Patriot Act crawls out from under your bed where you hide all your neurosis and eats you.