Herrera Beutler Spurns Campaign Finance Reform Bill

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U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Battle Ground, voted against a sweeping campaign finance reform bill Friday, citing her opposition to a portion that would use public funds to multiply small campaign donations.

H.R. 1, the first legislative package introduced under the newly Democratic House of Representatives, is a three-pronged election overhaul -- it addresses voter access, campaign finance and transparency.

It passed the House 234-193, though it's expected to die in the Republican-controlled Senate.

The bill would provide a voluntary six-to-one public match to candidates for small donations up to $200. For instance, a candidate who received a $50 donation from a constituent could then receive $300 in matching public funds. Supports say it would elevate the impact of small donations from individuals in comparison to large donations from corporations and Political Action Committees.

Under H.R. 1, public funding for elections would come from a new 2.75 percent fee on fines or settlements with businesses that commit corporate malfeasance.

In a media release, Herrera Beutler expressed opposition to using public money to finance political campaigns.

"Who on earth thinks we don't have enough money in politics? Nobody, yet House Democrats are pushing H.R. 1, a bill that would explode the amount of money spent on campaigns. And worse yet, they'd do so with public dollars," she said.

"When I ask people about how government should best spend the public's money, some say they want more to go to schools. Some say our military. Some say research for curing diseases. Never once, in my entire life, have I had someone say to me 'I'd like the government to send money to political consultants to pay for more TV campaign ads.' But that's exactly what this bill does.



"Under this bill, every time someone writes a campaign a $100 check, the federal government follows it up with another $600 contribution to go toward that candidate. Maybe you would personally never support Bernie Sanders, or Donald Trump, or me. But you don't have a choice under this bill. That's un-American."

H.R. 1 also would require presidential and vice presidential candidates to disclose a decade worth of personal tax information and give the Office of Government Ethics more oversight and enforcement power.

It would also make Election Day a holiday for all federal employees, encourage private businesses to do the same and attempt to expand voter participation by making a national register of voters that automatically "opts-in" all eligible citizens.

In the media release, Herrera Beutler also said she was worried about how such a register might compromise election security.

"We're considering a bill that would weaken the integrity of the voter rolls in many cases by severely limiting the ability of officials to remove ineligible voters from the rolls and making it much more difficult to verify the accuracy of voter information," she said.

"Why would we make it harder to prevent ballots from deceased individuals, or illegal immigrants, or people illegally registered multiple times from being cast in our elections? And the federal commission in charge of regulating elections would be restructured in a way that would make it all too easy to turn it into a partisan tool, rather than a neutral watchdog."

Multiple studies over decades have shown that fraudulent ballots and voting by illegal immigrants is a relative non-issue. Following President Trump's claims of voter fraud in the 2016 election, a nationwide survey of election and law enforcement by The New York Times found two possible cases of an illegal immigrant voting out of 137.7 million voters. A similar survey from The Washington Post found possibly four cases of voter fraud, none of which were linked to noncitizens