This file contains archived live captions of the open meeting of the Federal Election Commission held on March 11, 2021. This file is not a transcript of the meeting, and it has not been reviewed for accuracy or approved by the Federal Election Commission. Good morning, this is the Federal Election Commission for March 11, 2021 , coming to order. Mr. vice chair. >> Madam chair, with apologies for my slow juggling of the screens on my computer. I moved to suspend the rules in the time of submission of documents, for late submission of document to 1 214 . to 1 1 for A and 21 15 a . All in favor indicate by saying A. Motion passes 6 to 0. The 1st item on the agenda is possible use of campaign funds for residential and personal security. Given that no Commissioner has asked to make any draft public I will go over item 1B, opinion 121 03. item 1 A is the use of campaign funds by Congress for personal. [indiscernible] prior to the opening discussion I wanted to say a few words. The issue of the use of campaign funds for officeholders to pay for certain security expenses is not a new one. However over the past few years we've seen past members of Congress use of this has increased. The invasion of the capital January 6, 2021 , I can only imagine how terrifying it was to experience it in person. That event along with other acts of violence, harassment, against members of the US House and Senate, have made members understand the concerns for their own safety, and that of the family members. The draft interpretive rule, Commissioner NRSC , Ellen Weintraub and I have put out. As for the heightened threat environment, using campaign funds for security, the draft interpretive rule would build on the existing body in which the commission has approved the use of campaign funds to pay for security services for safety due to the roles of officeholders. It would not provide the exclusive circumstances under which a member could use campaign funds for security purposes. Members of Congress and candidates would continue to be seeking advisory opinions on proposed rules for use of funds. We have opened a draft for public on the, comment through March 18. We have received one today. I'm hoping interested parties will comment. For the solutions that will give meaningful guidance to Congress . Is there any discussion? Madam chair. Just very briefly, with the understanding that the opinion from the comments, to address this. With my personal thanks for leadership. What I believe is an important question. I have I think to general thoughts, which may set the stage for future comments requiring discussion. The 1st one is one of procedure. And again I have sympathy for what they are trying to accomplish with this draft. My concern is procedure one. And that this looks to me like general applicability interpreting of statutes. Therefore possibly something we can more appropriately handle through formal notice. I have an informed you on that but I hope that is something we can discuss, maybe anyone listening on this, can form opinions on that . And the other is a practical concern. As written in the draft, turns largely on the threat of termination on the US counsel, insurgents at arms, and the chief legislative members of Congress. I understand where that came from. I have use that in past advisory opinions. It does make certain intuitive sense. My concern, and hopefully others will weigh in. With this potential road for , with those particular law enforcement agencies we are potentially creating a result where incumbent members of Congress are more able to avail themselves of this, and challengers or individuals, not yet elected to Congress. I would be concerned to provide better security for certain candidates than others. But those general thoughts, I understand there will be discussion at the next meeting. Thank you again for the work on those. Thank you vice Chair . Any other Commissioner comments or discussion? None . I always appreciate Commissioner , hearing from you. . Com Weintraub . >> Thank you for taking leadership on this issue. I feel confident we will get to a resolution on this. And I too am looking forward to getting comments from the . We received one comment that came in late last night. I will . deeper into it. And I hope people will weigh in on this. Because it is , the document we put out is a draft and therefore is capable of amendment. As I said I'm looking forward to working with my colleagues to get to a good result, but I think everybody will be able to be proud of and feel good about. Thank you Commissioner Weintraub, I want to make sure I've given everyone an opportunity. If everyone could give me a sign we are ready to move on . Thank you . With that we will move on to the next item. I do want to note that items 2 and 3 are being talked over so moving on to item 4. The memorization memorandum. We have Mr. Chris Correll and Nicole Burgess. Mr. Carell and Miss Burgess if you would like to speak go ahead. >> Chris you are muted. >> I didn't realize I was on mute. Good morning madam Chair, commissioners . Before you is the audit division recommendation memorandum for The Grassroots Victory PAC . February 11, 2021. This memorandum prevents, presents and recommendation for financial activity, increased activity finding. The committee received the draft report October 14, 2020 . Provided its response to the finding and requesting an audit for June 20, 2020. And then November 30 2020 , the commission held an audit hearing on January 28, 2021. The The Grassroots Victory PAC requested that the Commissioner remove financial activity from finding. The report can come before you continues to present financial activity, increased activity. This with prior similar findings for increases in activity. We are available to answer any questions. Thank you. Thank you to the audit division . Is there any discussion? Commissioner Weintraub . Thank you madam Chair. It was an interesting audit hearing, all about headings. A lot of discussion recently about the headings on our reports. Not something I give a lot of thought to , until recently. Now I have been thinking about it and I think some of the audited committees have made some good points on this. The major thrust of the hearing was the committee's perspective that regardless of what we have done in the past, it is certainly true that inside the building, virtual building, we do think of increased activity as a subset of misstatement a financial activity. They point out rightly that if you look at our materiality threshold document, which is a published document, this statement is one category. Increased activity is just an entirely separate category that follows it. It is not a subset. My suggestion is, given they have days when I believe it's a valid point that the heading appears to be inconsistent with the other published documents. Is that we can form the heading to the materiality threshold, and just call it increased activity. Raising the statement of financial activity, which seems to cover things. Thank you Commissioner Weintraub . Any further Commissioner questions or discussion? Madam Chair . Yes Commissioner trainer . I want to say I appreciate Commissioner Weintraub's suggestion there. And I believe that is something I can be supportive of. Thank you Commissioner trainer I would like the audit commission to give us some thoughts on how this could be possible in cases or future activity. >> Yes, good morning commissioners. I guess the one concern I would have, is if we are saying increased activity would no longer be a portion of misstatement, are the co-we highlighting in the future this would be [indiscernible] finding. So committees could potentially have more findings in the audit reports. Correct me if I'm wrong with that. Is that correct because currently misstatement has subcategories, and increased activity is one of the subcategories . That is correct. So it would be a matter of the presentation, the number of findings wouldn't change but the presentation findings would change and increased activity would now become its own standalone finding, especially within our website, where it currently appears as a subcategory to the statement lines. So from the audit division perspective, given the fact that we have this complacent 2004. and Commissioner Weintraub, I greatly appreciate , especially coming from the regulated community, you are correct. As we go through our daily jobs sometimes it's difficult to see what others perceptions are. And so unfortunately, the regulated community doesn't have the aspect of the additional training that goes along with that actual document. That the auditors used to conduct audits. So there is training in place as well. My suggestion would be that we actually address this in a future document. As we are looking at the actual activity versus changes now. >> Commissioner Weintraub . Thank you madam Chair and thank you for that suggestion . I don't think that people who are out in the real world but don't have the benefit of our training, really are is concerned about the training that our auditors get and how it is understood inside the Federal Election Commission as it is in the real world. As we pointed out, most people in the world don't have the training that our auditors have . If they read a phrase like this statement of financial activity, that has a negative aspect to it. I assume the reason that they requested this hearing and asked for this was because they thought having a finding of increased activity didn't sound as bad as having a finding of misstatement of financial activity . and I think whether, wherever it shows up, that is their perception. It is based on other documents available to the public. I don't think it's a satisfying response to say, well of everybody in the world have the training our auditors had, they would understand what this means. These words have meeting to people in a common sense. Real world, meaning the people in the real world sense. Statement of financial activity doesn't sound like a highly technical phrase, only in auditor or lawyer would understand. If we want to rewrite the audit threshold, the document that we make available to the public and use internally for training, such that increased activity is plainly delineated, as a subset , of the statement, I think we could do that. And we could continue on the way we have in the past. The problem is, there's a disconnect and I agree with you, nobody is pointed this out before. There is a disconnect between our public documents, in a way we describe things that are audit reports and the way we describe things in the audit threshold, that are also published. I think we should fix that, and I agree we should fix it going forward if we thanks it needs fixing , think it needs fixing. In the audit thresholds, but I don't think we should ask people out there who are receiving audit reports in the meantime, to put up with something that is inconsistent with between our documents . I have to respectfully disagree with you. I don't think that is the way to address this. Thank you, Miss Orrick I do have a question for you. Is there some way for the finding to reflect a correction, in and of itself. Can we make some change to that finding in this instance, you say it's being corrected. I'm not sure if that has been done. Any guidance you have on that would be appreciated . Madam Chair . Commissioner Trainer . On that same point, to miss Orrick, I would ask if it would be possible as I distributed to commissioners earlier this morning, get a parenthetical after that to say it had been corrected, if that might come when people are searching the website, they will at least find that it is, that it has been corrected so we don't necessarily change the initial findings so the search comes out the same. When they pull up the report it actually says it has been corrected. In a parenthetical. I think that might be a solution, that along with your question. Commissioner Trainer, I want to make sure, this idea comes to my head, through Commissioner Trainer , I want to give credit where credit is due. Miss Orrick and Ms. Brown. >> Yes Miss Brown, I want to address one thing, I very much prefer that the language Commissioner Trainer used, the reason being it wouldn't require any additional work from staff to make any changes to the audit report search system. So I 100% agree with that. Ms. Brown . Good morning commissioners. Again, I wanted to follow up on that point, and also say the audit division would be in favor of Commissioner Trainer's recommendation. Because from our standpoint, the committee still did misstate those original reports that were filed with the commission. As comparing the original reports with the bank record activity. There was a misstatement of the activity. So that was reflected in the reports, not what was disclosed, reflected in the bank records cannot disclosed on the original reports. From that standpoint it was a misstatement. So to clarify to the public they did correct it for us, would be the preference. Thank you. Madam Chair . Commissioner Trainer . I think audit may be misunderstanding me at this point, based upon what Commissioner , Commissioner Trainer recommended. I would support Commissioner Weintraub's motion with the addition of adding the words corrected in a parenthetical afterwards, as opposed to my original statement I distributed this morning. >> Yes Miss Brown. Madam Chair if I may clarify, the recommendation at this point is that the finding title would be increased activity, and corrected. That is correct. Thank you. If Commissioner Weintraub would be amenable to it. Yes. I would consider that a friendly amendment. Thank you . Miss Orrick. I'm sorry, I would need clarification from the commission as to what this means for the audit report search system. Does this mean that increased activity is not part of the misstatements ? And stands alone. We would have to go in and make those coding changes? >> Commissioner Weintraub . I would like some clarification , when you talk about the search system are you talking about an internal system, or are you talking about the public website? The public website, within the public website there is something the commission, I can't pick , can't recall how many years ago that they asked we create. So the regulated community, and commissioners, could more easily find past findings. And that's where the category and subcategories come into play. So if I may Madam Chair , if somebody searches for increased activity, is that a term that comes up quick Increased activity isn't searchable . What you would actually find 1st is misstatement. Under misstatements there are numerous subcategories, increased activity being one of those. It is not a standalone. From the conversation we are having today, it sounds like increased activity would be its own, searchable category. Which means it no longer is with the statements. So the question is, what can we do with this audit, as well as with the audits in the past . I think it goes back to 2004. All right, I'm still a little bit confused. If you search for the term increased activity, you get a blank screen, or do you get findings? Do things pop up? >> That is not one of the qualifiers. If you actually go to the FEC website and you are taking a look at those categories of audit, what you 1st come to is misstatements. Under misstatement , it gives you an option to then choose subcategories. For instance, increased activity. Once you choose that it will then show you all those misstatements that had increased activity. How do you get there in the 1st place? If you enter increased activity and you telling me that is not a search term, then how would you get to misstatements? So again, the way , you have a filter , where you can go in and under findings you can say misuse , misstatements of financial activity. There you would have to select the increased activity, . Disbursement receipts. It will go back and bring up all of those findings and issues. >> Hence the reason why, I'm just concerned to make sure we are actually , that the changes we are requesting of staff, just so we understand what the commission's direction is . Madam Chair . Vice Chair it I don't want to preempt. I also see Miss Lee is trying to be recognized. If she has something pertinent and specific to this I'm happy to hear her. Miss Lee go ahead and. Thank you. Commissioner Weintraub . The way the search, audit report works is it's not searchable via word. So you can't save increased activity. The way it works, there are drop-down menus that you select a category in the drop-down menu. In the 1st drop-down menu the category for financial activity. From there you do a selection to subcategories, of increased activity. If that clarifies it a little bit . >> Thank you miss Lee. Thank you Madam Chair. I think I understand miss Orrick's concern. My part, I agree with Commissioner Weintraub and her view . The document say this is a separate finding, I understand we've been doing this for 16 or 17 years. But it is never too late to do the right thing. And, to clean up what we have been doing after the fact. I would not support going back and changing old audit findings that we already approved. I think that is like let sleeping dogs lie. But I think going forward, if we need to tweak our filters, for the database searches, for anything, reports we do that have separate findings of misstatement versus increased activity. I think that seems like something that would need to be changed in our search functions and our tech behind so we can figure it out after the fact. That I am pretty paired from my part at least to submit Commissioner Weintraub's change. And also Commissioner Trainer's change, I also supported the original proposal Commissioner Trainer's up had circulated a earlier. Happy to get a consensus, thank you. Vice Chair . >> Briefly on way and, I agree with everything the speakers have said. The only thing I would add, our agenda items, this particular matter, I think this is all important. And I would be happy for my part to work through these issues off-line. But I do think it would be a mistake for us to not go with the better option, as we see it in the matter before us. Because of the inertia in the system. I think we can address that, I think it's a big shift and it takes time to turn it. But I think we should take it. >> Belabor the metaphor. I see it a little differently. I do understand the need for the correction but I think the correction should be moving forward. We still have a couple of issues for how the search engine would apply. I do see we have some consensus. I just want to highlight, I think the correction should be done in the future. But just for this particular instance, the concerns that I have, I would abstain from this. But I think we have space to move forward, is there a desire for further discussion? None, then I believe we have, Commissioner Weintraub ? >> A couple of sentences before making a motion. I think that, I think my colleagues for their thoughtfulness on this. And I am sure it was not intended this way. But I think we cannot put the convenience of our staff ahead of the fairness to people who are out there operating under the rules we administer. And of this causes a little bit of internal angst, about how we will adjust our categories, then I think we will just have to deal with that. I agree entirely with the Vice Chair . That we have actually 2 audit matters in front of us. But we have the specific audit matters in front of us, and we have to deal with the concerns that have been expressed with regard to these particular matters. And I am happy to get into it with my colleagues and the staff got to figure out how we want to more broadly deal with these issues going forward. Having said that, I'm prepared to make a motion if it is timely to do so Madam Chair . It is. In audit division recommendation memorandum on the The Grassroots Victory PAC, I moved to approve the audit recommendation subject to deleting the statement of financial activity, the for increased activity, on page 3, the cover page 5, table of contents compay Jacob the summary, and 9 part 4, of agenda document 21 11 A. And adding after the phrase increased activity, and parentheticals, corrected. Thank you for the motion, any further discussion? Hearing known, I will call the question. All those in favor say Aye . All those abstain? The motion passed. One abstention, with the Vice Chair, Commissioner Weintraub, Commissioner Trainer [indiscernible] thank you. The next matter, the National Tooling & Machining Association . We have Jonathon Fonseca/Nicole Burgess . Moving forward with the presentation, thank you. Good morning Madam Chair and commissioners. The for you is the proposed final audit report for national tooling. Committee for a strong economy for consideration on February April 20, 2021. With the audit division recommendation memorandum approved by the commission on January 14, 2021. >> Finding one is the statement for financial activity, increased activity. Fighting number 2 is disclosure of contributions made to annual committees, and we are available for any questions, thank you. Thank you Mr. Fonseca. Any questions for the audit division? Request excuse me. >> I think this, as was highlighted , similarly situated. Let me ask if there is a motion ready for this one. Yes. Commissioner Weintraub . Thank you Madam Chair, in fairness we should make the same change to this document that we made to the other document . So if we are ready for a motion, and proposed final audit report on national tooling and machining Association, NTMA committee for a strong economy the , A 19 10. I moved to approve, subject to the deletion a phrase financial activity, increased activity, for the cover page, content 7 in the summary, and 8. And part 4 of agenda document 21 12 A. And that we add the phrase corrected in parentheses, after increased activity in all of those places. Let me just, I should've said this before, let me thank the audit staff for the good work you did on this audit in the previous audit. Thank you for that motion. I think we all agree and also thank the audit commission for all their good work. Any discussion? None. As previously , I will call the question. All those in favor say Aye . All those opposed ? Abstention . The motion passes 5 with one abstention. The Vice Chair, [indiscernible] and myself, thank you for the audit division. We will move on to the next agenda item. Item number 6. and resolve item number 7 will be held over . So the final item on the agenda is administrative matters. This is where we ask, Mr. staff director, are there any management or administrative matters before us today ? Madam Chair, there are no such matters. Thank you. Then the meeting stands adjourned.