Big Money's Spigot Will Stay Open
By Nick Anderson and Janet Hook
Times Staff Writers

December 11, 2003

WASHINGTON ? Even though it erected formidable new barriers between politicians and deep-pocketed donors, the election law upheld Wednesday by the Supreme Court has not shut down big money in politics.

Instead, creative operatives allied with both parties are constructing new groups to raise and spend political money to get around the law.[P6: emphasis added]

The law wiped out a vast source of unregulated funding, known as "soft money," that became a subject of scandal in the 1990s as corporations, unions and wealthy individuals wrote large checks to political parties. But as opponents of the law predicted, much of that money is finding its way back into the political system through other means.

"This law will not remove one dime from politics," said Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the law's leading congressional opponent. "Outside special interest groups have become the modern-day political parties. Soft money is not gone ? it has just changed its address."

It is too early to predict the law's full effect, but the unfolding 2003-04 campaign cycle is, to some degree, proving him right.