Last Call

You don't see this very often, what amounts to a unanimous vote in the House to put an end to misleading "Census" campaign mailers.  The measure was sponsored by two House Republicans who objected to the NRCC's recent campaign mailers, and the measure passed 416-0.

Under the bill, co-sponsored by two House Republicans as well as several Democrats, mailers marked "census" will have to state the name and address of the sender, along with an unambiguous disclaimer that it's not affiliated with the federal government. It will be taken up by the Senate soon.

The Republican National Committee and the National Republican Campaign Committee have both sent out mailers recently that were designed to look like they came from the Census Bureau.

Paul Lindsay, an NRCC spokesman, denied to TPMmuckraker that a recent mailer from his group that read "You are one of a carefully selected group of Republican leaders nationwide receiving the enclosed CENSUS DOCUMENT containing your 2010 Census of America's Republican Leadership," was misleading. He added: "The NRCC remains opposed to misleading mailers, which is why we will continue to comply with the law."

Doug Heye, an RNC spokesman said: "Just as it has done in the past, the committee will continue to comply with the law."

The measure was co-sponsored by Reps. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Jason Chaffetz (R-UT). Recently, both men slammed the mailers. "Nothing could be more wrong," said Issa.

Both Issa and Chaffetz are pretty far to the right even by Republican standards (well into wingnut territory, actually) but not even these two can stomach fake Census mailers.  There really is no excuse for it for either party, but it's good to see the GOP attempt to come clean about this issue when they are the ones that look bad here.