WASHINGTON (AFP) — Democrat Barack Obama Thursday rejected public financing for his presidential campaign, freeing him up to deploy unlimited cash from his army of private donors against Republican John McCain.
McCain accused Obama of breaking his pledge to preserve the public financing system, which was instituted in 1976 to control spending by White House candidates after the Watergate scandal that felled president Richard Nixon.
But the Democratic senator said the system was "broken" and the stakes were too high to allow unrestrained spending by the Republican Party and right-wing groups on behalf of McCain.
"We've made the decision not to participate in the public financing system for the general election," Obama said in a video message to his supporters, becoming the first White House runner since Watergate to shun the system.
The Democrat had pledged last year to work "aggressively" with the Republicans on a deal to keep public financing, under which candidates limit their spending in return for matching funds from the federal Treasury.
"It's not an easy decision, and especially because I support a robust system of public financing of elections," said the Illinois senator, who can now spend far more than the Treasury-mandated limit of 85 million dollars.
But listing the Iraq war, healthcare, education and the economy as defining issues for November's election, Obama said: "This is our moment and our country is depending on us.
"So join me, and declare your independence from this broken system and let's build the first general election campaign that's truly funded by the American people."
Obama has raised a record-breaking 265.4 million dollars so far in his bid for the presidency, fueled by more than 1.5 million small donors who give repeatedly over the Internet.
But most of that money was committed to Obama's primary race against Hillary Clinton, and he has now shifted to raising money for the phase between the Democratic convention in late August and November's vote.
McCain, who has raised just one-third of Obama's total in the primary season, confirmed to reporters in Iowa that he plans to take Treasury money and abide by the spending limits.
The Arizona senator said of Obama: "He signed his name himself on a piece of paper that said that he would, if I the Republican nominee took public financing in the general election, that he would too.
"He has completely reversed himself and gone back, not on his word to me, but the commitment that he made to the American people. That's disturbing," McCain said.
But the Obama campaign said McCain, helped by unregulated Republican money, had spent freely since emerging on top of the party's nominating pack in February and so was in no position to lecture.
And Obama said he refused to let the Democrats be hampered when the Republican National Committee (RNC), political action committees and "527" groups plan to spend millions on "smears and attacks."
So-called 527 organizations, named after the section of the US tax code governing their activities, are political pressure groups that are meant to be unaffiliated with a candidate.
One 527 called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth contributed to Democratic nominee John Kerry's defeat in the 2004 election with a series of ads that damned his military service in Vietnam.
Lawyers for the two campaigns met in the past fortnight to discuss public financing "and it was immediately clear that McCain's campaign had no interest in the possibility of an agreement," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said.
"And shortly thereafter, Senator McCain signaled to the 527s that they were free to run wild, without objection," he said, adding the RNC was far outspending the Democratic National Committee.
The McCain campaign's chief counsel, Trevor Potter, angrily disputed Burton's assertions. There was just one informal contact at which each side stated its well-known position, he said.
"There were no negotiations. There were no attempted negotiations. There was no offer from the Obama campaign to negotiate," Potter told reporters, adding that McCain wanted nothing to do with 527 groups.
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