Over the weekend, Mitt Romney called for repealing McCain-Feingold. Which made me wonder about the candidates' record on the issue. McCain's we know about.
Romney, it turns out, has—surprise, surprise—been on both sides of campaign-finance reform. In his 1994 race, Romney came out for banning political action committees, limiting spending on federal races (something the Supreme Court has not allowed), and opposed allowing larger contributions. All told, those positions place him to the left of McCain-Feingold, which doubled the allowable size of individual donations to candidates. In his 2002 race, he took the position that campaign contributions should be taxed at a 10 percent race, with the proceeds going to public funding of all campaigns.