Monday, March 01, 2010

Burnett: Tilley doing everything he can to stop return of campaign contribution limits


In his latest report, Rep. John Burnett, D-Kansas City, a member of Kevin Wilson's Committee on Government Accountability and Ethics, says Majority Leader Steve Tilley, R-Perryville, is doing everything he can to stop the restoration of campaign contribution limits:

In the special Committee on Government Accountability and Ethics Reform that I serve on we are still working of drafting a bill to bring "ethics reform" to Jeff City. Not nearly as easy as it sounds. So far we have identified about fifty issues that should be addressed.

The big ticket item is campaign finance limits on donations. That issue is admittedly hot and holds the key to other problems as well such as transparency and reporting.

And we have to try to reach a consensus on this very difficult issue while Republican leaders do their level best to sabotage the effort. This week we had a committee meeting and had been discussing the limit issue for over an hour when Steve Tilley, the Majority Floor Leader, and one of the dozen who filed bills just popped into the meeting and joined the discussion. Now he has that right as a member of the leadership but this is the first time in 7 years I have seen such a thing happen. He makes no pretense he will do all he can to stop limits. Oh. It is his job to raise big bucks for the Republican House candidates and he is doing a very good job at it and limits would make his job more difficult. I understand. I just do not agree. 74% of the Missouri citizens voted for campaign limits in Proposition A a few years ago. Beyond me how they can keep a straight face in this argument.

The Chair of the Committee is doing a fantastic job in keeping this issue on track. I expect we will have the skeleton done this next week.

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