GOP Senators May Shift Hearing Focus to Reform

WASHINGTON — In a surprising development that could improve prospects for an overhaul of the campaign finance system, Senate Republicans tentatively agreed Thursday to pull back on their investigation into political fund-raising abuses to pave the way for a full floor debate on fund-raising reform.

Such an arrangement also could signal a truce--for a while, at least--in the hearings’ steady Republican barrage against Democratic fund-raising practices, including some activities of Vice President Al Gore.

Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Senate investigating committee, signaled to his colleagues a willingness to truncate the initial phase of his panel’s probe into foreign money and improper fund-raising activities for the purpose of building momentum for revamping federal election laws, committee sources said.

The Senate’s anti-reform Republican majority, confronted by Democratic solidarity on the issue, seemed all but resigned to considering reform legislation within the next few weeks.

Republican and Democratic Senate leaders continued to meet late Thursday night to negotiate a deal.

Thompson declined to comment, but a committee spokesman said the panel would meet in closed session this morning, and an announcement outlining the committee’s new direction would follow.

The shift in strategy was embraced by Republicans and Democrats on the committee.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said she strongly backed the decision to concentrate on passing a reform measure. “I think most of the information [on fund-raising practices] is out at this point,” Collins said.

Sen. Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.) said “the hearings should at least be relevant” if the Senate considers the need to rewrite campaign finance laws.

As part of the breakthrough, the Senate’s leading advocates of reform, John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Russell D. Feingold (D-Wis.), planned to offer a new version of their sweeping proposal to ban unlimited “soft money” donations, McCain told reporters Thursday. The revised proposal would leave intact the current $5,000 limit on contributions from political action committees; the current version would have halved that limit.

The White House appeared to welcome the developments, although administration officials said they were under no illusion that partisan warfare over the issue would cease any time soon. They predicted that Republicans would use a separate House investigation to continue attacking the fund-raising activities of President Clinton and Gore during last year’s election.

“If, however, the end result of this process is comprehensive campaign finance reform, we’ve always said it will have been worth it,” said Lanny Davis, White House deputy counsel.

The unexpected developments came as the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs was wrapping up its seventh week of hearings into campaign finance abuses.

Thompson clearly indicated his belief that the hearings reached a high point this week, with incriminating testimony by former National Security Council aide Sheila Heslin about political interference in U.S. foreign policy and frank discussion by donor Roger Tamraz about his efforts to buy his way into the White House.

“I think if more people had an opportunity to see the last couple days, we would wind up with a bit of a different [campaign fund-raising] system,” Thompson said Thursday.

Committee sources said that Thompson, one of only three Senate Republicans to support the McCain-Feingold legislation, is eager to refocus the hearings on fixing the system before the issue is addressed on the Senate floor.

“It’s become a timing question,” said one GOP committee staffer. “He certainly doesn’t want to wait to discuss the subject until after it’s gone for the year.”

Thompson proposed that Democrats give up their three days of hearings into Republican fund-raising activities, which were scheduled to begin next week. In exchange, Republicans would agree not to continue scrutinizing Democratic fund-raising practices for the remaining two weeks of the initial phase of the hearings.

Under Thompson’s plan, the committee would begin next week to focus on soft money, review lessons learned from the hearings, and call on campaign finance experts to discuss proposed changes to the current system, Republican staffers said. Later next month, the panel would continue with the second phase of the hearings by scrutinizing the fund-raising practices of nonprofit special interest groups such as conservative organizations and labor unions.

McCain was urged by Thompson not to begin trying to force a Senate floor debate on campaign finance reform next week, telling McCain the committee was about to move into a “new phase,” according to a Senate Republican. This would not prevent Republicans from bringing up new cases of improper fund-raising at a later date.

Committee sources said Thompson appeared to have a majority of Republicans and Democrats on board, but still faced stiff opposition from some members on both sides.

Staff writer Marc Lacey contributed to this story.