CREW v. FEC

On November 15, 2005, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted the FEC’s motion for summary judgment finding that Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) lacked standing to challenge the Commission’s dismissal of its administrative complaint.

Background

According to the administrative complaint CREW filed during the 2004 campaign, Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform, provided Kenneth Mehlman, campaign manager for Bush-Cheney ’04, with a master list of conservative activists. On October 19, 2004, the Commission voted to take no further action in this matter and to close the file. Although the FEC found the master list to be an unreported in-kind contribution, it appeared to be “limited in size and impact.” The Office of General Counsel recommended that the Commission “exercise its prosecutorial discretion and take no further action” in the matter.

Court decision

On December 13, 2004, CREW filed suit to challenge the FEC’s decision not to pursue further investigation. The FEC filed a motion for summary judgment on April 15, 2005, arguing that CREW lacked standing to pursue the action.

In order to have standing, the plaintiff must satisfy three requirements: injury, causation and redressability. The injury standard is met when the plaintiff suffers an actual, not abstract, invasion of a concrete, legally protected interest. Causation is proved when the injury is fairly traceable to the defendant’s action in question. Lastly, it must be likely, not merely speculative, that a favorable court decision will redress the injury.

CREW argued that the FEC should assign a monetary value to the master list and publicly disclose that figure, to facilitate CREW in its mission of “empowering citizens.” In order to have standing, however, the plaintiff must prove it has suffered an injury in fact to its own interests, not simply assert that it would be unable to help others achieve abstract goals. CREW cannot vote, nor does it have any members who participate in the political process. Therefore, the court held that CREW could not have suffered from a lack of information in the voting process.