Election Board Raises Limits For Donations (FEC)

NY Times ^ | February 4, 2005 | GLEN JUSTICE

[neverdem]

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 - The Federal Election Commission voted Thursday to raise the limits for political contributions in the 2006 election, only the second time since the Watergate reforms of the 1970's that the numbers have been changed.

Donors can now give $2,100 to presidential and Congressional candidates in each election, up from $2,000, and $26,700 to national political parties each year, up from $25,000.

The modifications were required by the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law of 2002, which called for the commission to tie contribution limits to inflation every two years.

"I like to call it election law for math majors," said Michael Toner, a Republican commissioner. "It is a little more complicated, there's no doubt about it."

In total, an individual can contribute $101,400 to federal politics in every two-year election cycle, up from $95,000. That includes a maximum of $40,000 to federal candidates and $61,400 to political parties and other committees. Contribution limits for political action committees are not indexed to inflation and were not changed.

To complicate matters, the commission released the numbers for the new limits weeks after they technically became effective. Contribution limits that apply to each election took effect on Nov. 3, 2004, the day after the election, and those that apply annually took effect on Jan. 1 of this year.

Before setting the limits, the commission had to wait for the release of the Consumer Price Index, the best measure of inflation in the United States. The report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics came out in mid-January.

"People have been fund-raising at the old levels," said Bob Biersack, a commission spokesman. "If they want to go back and get a little more, they can."

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

Someone....quick...call George Soros!