Growth & Opportunity Project of the Republican National Committee Revealed

Yesterday, the RNC released a comprehensive analysis of where the Republican Party stands and how it plans to perform a massive overhaul called the Growthand Opportunity Project (GOP) .  The project refers to the Republican Party as having two tracks, one where we’re winning-the gubernatorial track, and one where we’re losing-the federal track. It aims to learn from the states, bring the party together, and become the party of growth to once again succeed as during the Reagan years. Its mission is“to remain America’s conservative alternative to big-government, redistribution-to-extremes liberalism, while building a route into our Party that a non-traditional Republican will want to travel. Our standard should not be universal purity; it should be a more welcoming conservatism.”

One of the areas discussed in the report is Campaign Finance with recommendations made in the following areas:

1. Federal Campaign Finance

2. Review and Revise State Campaign Finance Laws

3. Strengthening the State Parties

Federal Campaign Finance

Since the enactment of the McCain-Feingold act, both the party and third party groups have been stifled by the restrictive burdens of the law. The law must be changed to restore the rights to campaigns at the local and state levels and limits free speech, putting parties, candidates and voters at a disadvantage.

The Report Recommendations for Federal Campaign Finance:

1. Allow the national political parties to again raise and spend money that is legal under state law or use in those states.
2. Restore the ability of state parties to run Party-building programs with a combination of federal and state dollars depending on the number of federal and state candidates on the ballot for each election.
3. Increase contribution limits for federal campaigns.
4. Ensure that any campaign finance legislation in Congress takes into account the growing awareness among members of both parties that the parties need to be strengthened at the national, state and local levels in order to restore parties’ proper role in our political system.
5. Convince Congress to remove the biennial aggregate contribution limits.
6. Abolish the entire presidential public financing system, including the matching funds program for the primaries and the public grant for the general election.
7. Replace the system of taxpayer funding of national conventions with a system that allows additional contributions to the national party committees for convention activities.
8. Restore the building fund for political party committees.
9. Increase coordinated spending limits.

Review and Revise State Campaign Finance Laws

The Republican Party, with its majority of Republican governors and Republican-controlled legislatures, provides opportunities to pursue legislation and litigation regarding state campaign finance reform initiatives. The party’s hope is that it will eventually draw bipartisan support as it would benefit both parties and our entire democratic system as a whole. Because laws vary by state, the level of support and/or change will differ accordingly.

The Report Recommendations for Review and Revise State Campaign Finance Laws:

1. Legislative and regulatory reform should focus on making political speech more robust at the state and local level.
2. Involvement by multiple interested organizations should be encouraged.
3. Model legislation should be developed by interested organizations and state legislative leaders to improve state campaign finance laws.
4. Where legislation cannot be adopted, litigation should be considered to lessen the burden on the parties’ ability to support their candidates.

Strengthening the State Parties

State parties are the most highly regulated entities under federal campaign finance law, which should not be the case. They are the ones suffering the most and need the most support in training and education of fundraising and compliance.

The Report Recommendations for Strengthening the State Parties:

1. The RNC should increase campaign finance schools in field.
2. The RNC should manage a password-protected website to serve as a clearing house and resource for state parties on campaign finance issues.
3. State parties should more aggressively take advantage of existing training opportunities.
4. Every state party should have an identified campaign finance lawyer and compliance specialist.
5. The RNC should promote state party best practices.

While there is a long way to go to improve the current federal campaign finance laws, this Growth and Opportunity Project overhaul is a start to make the system healthier and more supportive in the long run for both parties.