John Bambenek (BlogCritics) has filed a complaint with the Federal Elections Commission, alleging that DailyKos is a “political committee” that is subject to various federal elections law registration and reporting requirements with which it hasn’t complied. After all, Bambenek argues, the DailyKos itself says that it is “about electing Democrats,” and is therefore a political committee.
Fortunately, even partisan blogs are not covered by federal election law, because — as the FEC ruled in November 2005 — they are covered under the “press exception” to campaign finance law. The ruling, which came in response to a request by Fired Up, a Missouri democratic activist blog, concluded (citations omitted, some paragraph breaks added):
The Act and Commission regulations define the terms