In this earlier post, I discussed the media exemption and how this plays into the current debate over the constitutionality of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law.
Now comes word out of the FEC (via BNA’s Money and Politics report) that the media exemption may get expanded as a way around the ban on corporate contributions. BNA reports: “The FEC voted to drop a complaint that Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest retailer, made an illegal contribution worth millions of dollars to the Dole campaign by prominently featuring Dole in a company-sponsored magazine distributed to Wal-Mart customers a few weeks before last November’s election. FEC Republicans argued that the magazine was covered by the “press exemption” contained in campaign finance law.” BNA also reports that commissioner Scott Thomas had filed a written statement opposing this decision. It is possible that this statement is somewhere on the Federal Election Commission’s awful website, but if it is, I could not find it. I’ll post a link later if someone can locate the statement on the web.
UPDATE: The Campaign Legal Center has posted some commentary and the relevant documents here.
UPDATE 2 Marty Lederman here offers some very persuasive reasons why the Smith plurality opinion could open up a gaping loophole in campaign finance laws.