On April 6, Congressmen Jim Renacci (R-Ohio) and Derek Kilmer (D-Washington) re-introduced their 2015 bill that restructures the Federal Election Commission. The 2015 bill, which did not pass, was HR 2931. The new bill doesn’t have a bill number yet. It shrinks the FEC from six commissioners to five, and says no more than two commissioners could be members of the same party. Thanks to the Center for Competitive Elections for this news.
Well, this would at least give the appearance of a nonpartisan body. We’ll have to wait and see if this passes to determine if it has any real world effect.
Kilmer’s aim is help the effort to nationalize the top-two so-called primaries, all bipartisan electoral reform of his should figure this in.
How is it determined what party an FEC member belongs to? What prevents a Republican President from appointing a Republican into a Democratic seat or vise versa?
There are no numbered seats. There is no such thing as a “Democratic seat.” There is just the law that no more than two commissioners may be members of the same party. A person’s party can be known objectively if he or she lives in a state that has registration by party. But if the person lives in one of the 19 states without party registration, then it would all depend on what the individual said about himself or herself.