Dems demand disclosure of super-PAC donors

More than a dozen congressional Democrats want to force super-PACs to disclose the names of their biggest donors when they run TV ads.

Seventeen House Democrats on Friday introduced the Keeping Our Campaigns Honest Act, which would require new Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations to force political groups to list the names of their “significant donors” when they run advertisements.

{mosads}“The American people are owed a level honesty when it comes to identifying who is trying to influence their vote,” Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.), the bill’s author, said in a statement. “So long as these individuals are allowed to continue to spend hundreds of millions of dollars attempting to impact our elections and our democracy, they should also be required to step out into the light and let voters know just who they are.”

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Energy and Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) are among the lawmakers co-sponsoring the bill.

In the Senate, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) said he would introduce similar legislation soon.

In the meantime, he urged the FCC to make the move on its own.

“In an era where billions of dollars are being spent to market products and influence political races with TV advertising, it is high time that the FCC update its rules to ensure viewers know who actually is footing the bill for these advertisements,” he wrote.

Under current law, organizations are required to name on-air the sponsors of their advertisements. But the agency has not updated those rules in more than two decades.

That has given super-PACs free license to spread their message without saying who is paying for it, critics say.

Democrats have repeatedly tried to roll back the Supreme Court decision that opened the door to super-PACs, but they have so far fallen short in either nullifying that decision or imposing new transparency provisions.