With tongue partly in cheek, but with real gratitude, the
Campaign Legal Center Friday reacted publicly to the news that Stephen Colbert
was donating $135,000 from the Ham Rove Memorial Fund he created with
funds left over from his mock (yet real) Super PAC, Americans for a Better
Tomorrow, Tomorrow.
Colbert gave a similar sum to the Center for Responsive
Politics, according to the Center. Both groups are nonprofits working for
greater transparency in campaign financing.
"We vow to do our best to ensure that groups like Americans for
a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow will not be able to get away with their anonymous
shell game shenanigans in future election cycles," said Trevor Potter,
president of the Legal Center.
Potter served as Colbert's legal counsel on setting up the
PAC, which he used to satirize the new wave of funding made possible by the
Citizen's United Supreme Court decision allowing corporations and unions to
fund campaign ads advocating or opposing the election of particular candidates.
That included producing ads for his own PAC.
The center is renaming its conference room the Ham Rove
Memorial Conference Room, per Colbert's wishes. The Center for Responsive
Politics will now boast the Colbert Super Pac Memorial Conference Room, also
per Colbert's stipulation. "The room needed a little personality,"
said the Center on its website.
"Of course, what the super PAC did most effectively was
raise public awareness about the complexities, and sometimes absurdities, of
the post-Citizens United world of campaign finance," said the center.
Colbert announced the grants on his
show Thursday night.
