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Hagelin Campaign To Appeal FEC Decision

Reform Party presidential candidate John Hagelin announced that he would immediately file an appeal in federal court in response to today's Federal Election Commission decision to award $12.6 million in federal funds to Pat Buchanan.

"As the presidential nominee for the true Reform Party, I of course feel strongly that the FEC should have awarded the entire $12.6 million in federal funds to the Hagelin campaign," Hagelin said. "We are disappointed by the FEC decision, and we intend to fight it to the end in order to defend the true Reform Party against Buchanan's assault on democratic principles."

Hagelin pointed out that the FEC decision had also gone against the wishes of Ross Perot, who had filed an affidavit saying that "the candidate of the Reform Party which is currently under the leadership of James Mangia is the only proper candidate to receive public funding based on the votes I received in the 1996 election."

"We feel the FEC's decision is not supported by the facts and will ultimately be overturned in court," said Bob Roth, press secretary for the Hagelin 2000 campaign. "Our first remedy is with the federal appeals court, where we will immediately file for an injunction against the certification of these federal funds to the Buchanan campaign.

"The FEC may not have had time to review all the additional documentation we submitted within the last 24 hours," Roth said. "For state parties where John Hagelin is listed with the Natural Law Party, we submitted proof of association with the national Reform Party. These state parties have filed an amended statement of organization with the FEC, certifying that they are the respective state party committees of the national Reform Party. We also included certification of three additional states--Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Nevada.

"This documentation strengthens our case--and makes our original submissions irrefutable," he said.

Hagelin added that the two factions of the Reform Party have already challenged each other in court concerning who is the rightful presidential nominee.

"The true presidential nominee of the Reform Party will be determined in California, not in Washington," Hagelin said. "Judge James Wright of the Superior Court of California in the County of Los Angeles will begin hearings tomorrow to make that decision. We feel confident that we will prevail."