A national think tank finds Wisconsin's campaign finance laws are in sad shape. The Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law released a a new report finding that Wisconsin's campaign finance system is broken and badly in need of reform. Mike McCabe with the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign says these are "the experts' experts." McCabe says attorneys at the Brennan Center have probable written more campaign finance bills than anyone in the country.
McCabe says the recently enacted ethics reform package in Wisconsin is a start, "but unless you get at the money in campaigns, the money in lobbying, you're not getting at the root of the problem, and I think echoes that." And he says the Brennan Center Report should serve as a wake up call on the need for reform.
Highlighted in the repo rt; the finding that almost 15 million dollars in undisclosed, unregulated special interest money was spent on so-called "issue ads," leading up to last November's elections. McCabe says the public ought to know were that money is coming from.