30 Jun 2004 // Washington, D.C. - Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) alleging that Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE), The Oregon Family Council (OFC), Bush-Cheney '04 (BC'04) and Nader for President 2004 (Nader '04) have violated federal campaign laws through the use of prohibited in-kind contributions.

Two groups allied with President Bush, CSE and OFC, directed employees of those groups to call members, using prepared scripts, to encourage them to sign a petition that allowed Ralph Nader to put his name on the November ballot in the presidential election. CSE's script stated "Liberals are trying to unite in Oregon and keep Nader off the ballot to help their chances of electing John Kerry. We could divide this base of support ..."

OFC's script stated "We're calling about a great opportunity for you to help President Bush ... If Ralph Nader gets on the ballot, he would pull thousands of liberal votes that would otherwise go to Kerry and perhaps cause President Bush [sic] to lose the election."

BC '04 spokesman Steve Schmidt said that "some volunteers may well have made calls" from the campaign's office."

CSE and OFC are both corporations and, therefore, prohibited from making contributions to political campaigns. The costs of creating the scripts as well as the costs of the telephone calls constitute prohibited in-kind contributions. The Oregon Republican Party, which could not have legally made the telephone calls on its own, violated conspiracy laws by working with OFC on the phone bank. BC '04 improperly allowed so called "volunteers" to use BC '04 resources to assist Ralph Nader's campaign. Finally, if the Nader campaign knew about the scripts and the calls, then it violated FEC law by accepting those contributions. In any event Nader must reimburse the corporations for the costs of the phone banks.

CREW has previously filed FEC complaints against Bush-Cheney '04, Americans for Tax Reform and Nader for President 2004 for similar violations. A pattern and practice of using tax exempt corporations to provide substantial illegal assistance to presidential campaigns has developed. As the names of the donors to tax exempt organizations are not reported, this allows campaigns to avoid the transparency called for by the Bi-Partisan Campaign Reform Act.

CREW's executive director Melanie Sloan stated, "A corporation is a corporation whether it has tax exempt status or not and corporations are simply not permitted to make contributions to political campaigns. The fact that these organizations are offering in-kind assistance rather than cash makes no difference under the law. The FEC should take immediate steps to put an end to this abusive practice and it should require that the names of donors to organizations involved in clear political activity be reported."