Bill passed to fix campaign finance law

Hartford, Conn. (WTNH) - The Connecticut Senate passed legislation following a special session Friday to fix the state's campaign finance reform law. 

The legislation passed  23 to 12 in favor of the bill. The House of Represenatives was expected to pass the legislation later in the evening.

Gov. Jodi Rell told News 8 she will veto this bill because we can’t afford it, even though the money is already funded. The Democrats are planning to pass it anyway, let her veto it and then attempt to override her veto.

"I am disappointed that the Legislature added $6 million in public spending on gubernatorial races at a time when our economy continues to be weak, jobs continue to be lost and families continue to struggle," said Gov. Rell. "It begs a question from the taxpayers: What is the Legislature thinking?"

In the current races, there is a Republican running for Governor whose using the state’s new public campaign funding law, Mike Fedele, and there’s a Democrat, Dan Malloy. A federal court struck down the part of Connecticut’s law that gives them additional campaign funds if they are running against a millionaire candidate spending his own money. The law has to be fixed, but Republicans and the governor don’t like the fix.

“Our homeless shelters could use that six million dollars, kids in our inner city could use that six million dollars, but no, we’re going to feed it to politicians to run that crap,” Republican Minority Leader Sen. John McKinney said.

The Republican leaders are referring to an attack ad from Malloy, which said in part:

[LAMONT] “It wasn’t easy but we made it.”
[ANNOUNCER] “Really, Ned Lamont reduced his work force by seventy percent and only has eight employees in Connecticut.”
[LAMONT] “It wasn’t easy but we made it.”
[ANNOUNCER] “The Courant reported Lamont was sued for racial discrimination.”

Lamont has cited this Malloy ad as a reason he now wants to do debates with Malloy to correct the record.

An ad for Republican Mike Fedele attacking his opponent Tom Foley was also cited by Republicans. The common factor is that both Fedele and Malloy are paying for these ads with money from the state’s public campaign funding law.

The Republicans say it’s a good reason not to pass a bill that’s being pushed by Democrats to put more public money in their hands if they win their primaries. But if Fedele wins his primary and ends up facing millionaire Democrat Ned Lamont, Fedele may not be able to compete because the campaign funding law will only give him three million dollars. The part of the law that would have given Fedele more money to complete was struck down by the court.

Likewise if Democrat Dan Malloy wins his primary and ends up facing millionaire Republican Tom Foley, Malloy will be in the same boat. That’s why the Democrats say the only fair thing to do is increase the public funding to candidates using the system to six million dollars.

“In recent history, candidates who have won have spent upwards of six million dollars, even more, almost seven million dollars in 1998,” said Rep. Peter Spallone, (D) Elections Committee.