The Center for Public Integrity

In the 2000 elections, Democratic and Republican state party committees raised $570 million, with 46 percent comprised of soft money transfers from national party organizations, according to an unprecedented study of party activity at the state level.

The transfers of unregulated soft money from federal party committees to their state counterparts confirm a commonly held perception that state parties are used to launder soft money and influence presidential and congressional elections in a way never envisioned nor intended by federal election law. Of immediate concern to state parties is the fact that after the 2002 mid-term elections, those national soft money transfers will in effect be banned as a result of the passage of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act—more familiarly known as McCain-Feingold or Shays-Meehan, after its Senate and House sponsors. The act, which Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed earlier this year, bans soft money contributions at the federal level.

However, the Federal Election Commission is adopting rules that will allow members of Congress to raise soft money for state parties. The sponsors of the act claim this exemption is counter to the law and will create a huge loophole that simply transfers soft money activity from Washington to the states.

The year-long study of state parties' role in federal elections was conducted by the Center for Public Integrity, the Center for Responsive Politics and the National Institute on Money in State Politics. The end result is a unique, detailed roadmap of the party money system at the state level in American politics. Records used to compile the report were collected from elections officials in every state as well the FEC.