The following press release from the James Madison Center for Free Speech has arrived via email:

Yesterday, Wisconsin Right to Life (“WRTL”) asked the district court, in its challenge to the McCain-Feingold “electioneering communication” prohibition, to reconsider its decision to allow Sen. McCain and fellow campaign finance “reform” activists to intervene. WRTL also asked for a summary judgment briefing schedule as to a 2006 ad that it wanted to run, which issue was not resolved in the district court’s prior ruling.
When the Supreme Court ruled, in FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life Committee (“WRTL II”), that the electioneering communication prohibition is unconstitutional as applied to three anti-filibuster grassroots lobbying ads that WRTL wanted to run in 2004, the Court also set down some strict guidelines on the conduct of such cases in the future to assure that they are not burdensome. WRTL argued to the district court that allowing Sen. McCain and others to intervene was inconsistent with WRTL II’s guidelines. WRTL also argued that the Supreme Court’s holding that WRTL’s ads were constitutionally protected meant that Sen. McCain and his colleagues could no longer assert that they would be injured if similar ads were run, so they had no standing under Article III of the Constitution and must be removed from the case.
The 2006 grassroots lobbying ad that WRTL wanted to run in support of the Child Custody Protection Act (“CCPA”) is the last remaining part of WRTL’s challenge. The FEC in 2006 insisted that the district court could not rule on the ad because it needed more discovery of WRTL. But under the High Court’s guidelines, such discovery would be precluded. So WRTL asked the district court to set a schedule for summary judgment briefing as to the CCPA Ad.
James Bopp, Jr., lead counsel for WRTL, states: “The Supreme Court has said there can be no more of the burdensome, complex, intrusive, litigation that WRTL suffered at the hands of the FEC and Sen. McCain and his colleagues in this case. Allowing the rich campaign finance ‘reform’ gang to pile on in cases where nonprofit citizen groups are trying to vindicate their liberties is wrong, unconstitutional, and inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s mandate as to how these cases are to be conducted.”

UPDATE: A second press release from the Center indicates that the FEC has conceded that the ads in the Christian Civic League case are “genuine issue ads” entitled to an exemption from BRCA’s limit on spending corporate treasury funds. If the FEC is taking this position in litigation, it is no wonder that Bopp is trying to get the McCain lawyers removed from the case. They would be more likely to aggressively litigate this issue.
Second update: A few people have pointed out to me that the McCain lawyers joined in the motion in the CCL case. So my earlier theory is potentially overblown. But I’ll stick with my general point that the intervenors are likely to interpret WRTL more narrowly than the FEC.