On Monday, the House of Representatives passed legislation [0] that would ban the use of campaign funds to pay spouses.  CREW documented this abusive practice in our report, Family Affair [0].  Yesterday, The Politico [1] reports that some members of Congress who have utilized this practice are none too happy:

House members are complaining that their spouses could lose their jobs, their family incomes could drop and, perhaps, the entire pattern of their family lives could change if an ethics reform bill just passed by the House becomes law.

The bill would bar campaigns from employing a lawmaker's spouse. Its backers argue that employing a spouse creates an implicit conflict of interest, tempting lawmakers to overpay and tipping off contributors that some of their largesse will go directly to the lawmaker's family.

But what seems an obvious conflict to some is a way of life to others.

Rhonda Rohrabacher has 3-year-old triplets and a work-at-home job as campaign manager to her husband, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.).

She made $57,000 in the 2006 election cycle, according to a recent report by the liberal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

Under the proposed ban, Rhonda Rohrabacher would be out of a job.

"It's gonna hurt me," Rep. Rohrabacher said. "My family would be deprived of that income. I think it's baloney. I think it's just a way of not having to look at issues by making it a personal matter."

Unlike other ethics reforms, which prohibit lobbyists from buying meals for lawmakers or curtail congressional travel, the spouse proposal strikes an intimate blow to a handful of legislators.

Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) paid his wife, Patricia, $110,000 in the last election cycle to do fundraising and prepare campaign finance reports, according to CREW.

He found the new reform proposal so alarming that he sought out one of the bill's original sponsors, Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.), to personally voice his opposition.

"It would definitely cause me some problems, probably financial problems," McKeon said. "And if I had to bring in someone else to do the same work, I wouldn't have that same kind of trust."