Newt Gingrich suffers from super PAC buyer’s remorse
After weeks of withering attacks by a super PAC supporting his rival Mitt Romney, Gingrich won’t stop talking about the injustices of unchecked spending — specifically the $3 million spent attacking him. He even coined a name for it, saying he got “Romney-boated” by his chief opponent’s “millionaire friends.”
Though Gingrich says he still supports the court decision, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, his shift in attitude illustrates the difficulty that the free-wheeling big-money election landscape can pose for politicians — even, and perhaps especially, conservatives who philosophically oppose campaign rules as restrictions on free speech.
“It’s one thing to oppose regulation in theory, but when they hit the practical reality of millions of dollars of negative ads, they don’t like the way the new system works,” said Trevor Potter, a former Federal Election Commission chairman and top adviser to Sen. John McCain, who authored the seminal 2002 McCain-Feingold bill restricting campaign fundraising and spending.