Ellington

The Washington Post reports: "Leading campaign finance watchdog organizations as well as Republican activists intend to challenge the new 'shadow' Democratic Party -- a network of independent groups gearing up to spend as much as $300 million on voter mobilization and pro-Democratic TV ads. The organizations -- the Center for Responsive Politics, the Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 -- contend that the pro-Democratic groups are violating prohibitions on the use of corporate and labor money for partisan voter registration and mobilization drives. Trevor Potter, chairman of the Campaign Legal Center, said the groups have become 'the new soft money loophole. . . . This is the beginning of an important discussion about how these groups are going to operate.'" ... Harold Ickes, who runs the pro-Democratic Media Fund, contended the Republican and watchdog critics are "one, trying to tie us up; two, divert our attention; three, force us to spend money on legal fees rather than electoral activities; and four, to try to chill our contributors."