Under new federal rules, a traditional PAC and super PAC may operate under one roof. | REUTERS Meet the super super PAC

Super PACs are just so 2011.

Meet the next big thing in U.S. politics: the super super PAC.


These nascent groups can not only raise mega cash to promote candidates, but give money to candidates’ campaigns — a kind of political power and intimacy today’s super PACs alone can’t achieve.

Here’s how it works: under new federal rules, a traditional PAC and super PAC may operate under one roof. These hybrid operations can raise and spend unlimited amounts of cash to promote or oppose candidates, as any super PAC can, while simultaneously giving limited amounts of money directly to campaigns and committees, like a traditional political action committee.

Already, 11 of these hybrids have emerged, representing a range of political ideologies and purposes. They foreshadow even further tumult within the nation’s campaign finance system as the two-year anniversary of the seminal Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision arrives Saturday.

Several operatives involved with them predict the popularity of special interest hybrid PACs will explode during the next year as more organizations become aware of them and realize their benefits.

“Any PAC that doesn’t become a hybrid PAC is run by idiots. The default is going to be hybrid PACs,” said Dan Backer, the principal attorney at DB Capitol Strategies who successfully argued last year’s Carey v. Federal Election Commission case , the decision in which legalized hybrid PACs for those not tied to corporations and unions.

“It’d be ludicrous to limit your ability when you have this right,” he said. “My thought is that we’ll never say ‘super PAC’ again in 10, maybe five years.”

PACs connected to corporations and unions, meanwhile, could soon win the same right, thanks to a case also initiated by Backer and pending before the Federal Election Commission. It’s expected to be settled by late winter.

Two major super PACs, both of which have poured millions of dollars into this year’s presidential campaign, confirm to POLITICO they’re considering morphing into hybrid PACs.

“If Newt Gingrich gets the nomination, we would want a very strong ticket up and down the line, and this would definitely help in that regard, giving us the ability to donate direct to candidates,” said Rick Tyler, an official at pro-Gingrich super PAC Winning Our Future, which to date has spent several million dollars promoting the House speaker or attacking his opponents. “We’re not going to leave any weapon in the the arsenal.”

Said Abe Niederhauser, treasurer of the pro-Ron Paul Endorse Liberty super PAC: “It seems like a big advantage. I’d be interested in learning more about it. We might want to do it.”

For PACs that have already gone hybrid — they range from the Conservative Action Fund to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund — the advantages are notable and immediate, several officials said.

One likened it to the difference between paying high home utility bills issued by several different companies versus paying one bill from single provider who bundles services together for a lower overall rate.

“It really makes it a lot easier to organize your efforts and fundraise. You’re looking at a 30, 40, 50 percent savings on overhead costs and administration alone,” said Dave Mason, a two-time FEC chairman who helped create PURO PAC, a hybrid formed last month to advocate for the premium cigar industry and support candidates who oppose federal cigar regulations. “You can put that savings into politics, like ads or contributions. And for traditional PACs, it’s going to contribute to pushing their activity in the direction of more independent expenditures — and I’m not saying whether that’s good or bad.”

The Business-Industry Political Action Committee, among the nation’s oldest PACs, itself went hybrid in October.

The decision to do so, said President and Chief Executive Officer Greg Casey, was a “no-brainer” since the PAC could begin operating a super PAC element simply by opening a new bank account, as opposed to creating an entirely new organization.

Expect the Business-Industry Political Action Committee to begin making more independent expenditures, which aim to directly support or oppose political candidates through media, in earnest, Casey said.

“At this point in time, hybrid PACs are still an unknown entity, it’s an experiment for some,” Casey said. “But since there’s such ease in becoming a hybrid, that it can be implemented immediately, this makes it a very efficient and effective tool.”

Democratic fundraising organization ActBlue in October also became a hybrid committee in October in order to accept unlimited donations that it could direct to Democrat-supporting super PACs.

Until then, ActBlue, which has raised more than $204 million since forming online in 2004, accepted only limited donations for candidate and political committees.

At the time of the switch, ActBlue spokesman Adrian Arroyo explained the becoming a hybrid is recognition that super PACs are “for better or worse, part of the campaign finance landscape,” adding, “We need to encompass the scope of Democratic fundraising that is being done here.”

POLITICO also asked a dozen large unions and corporations that operate traditional PACs, including AT&T, the AFL-CIO and the Communication Workers of America, whether they’d consider turning them into hybrid PACs if the FEC later this year allowed them to do so. All either declined comment or did not respond to requests.

The advent of hybrid PACs shouldn’t be confused as a transformative event at par with the pair of 2010 federal court decisions — Citizens United v. FEC and SpeechNow.org v. FEC — that gave rise to super PACs, said Paul Ryan, a lawyer at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, which advocates for campaign finance reforms.

Instead, he said, hybrid PACs are more hard evidence that federal laws governing the nation’s campaign finance system are becoming increasingly laissez-faire.

Not that campaign finance reformers are resigned to such a situation.

In observance of the Citizens United v. FEC decision anniversary, numerous reform groups are planning protest events.

Common Cause, for example, launched a campaign called “Amend2012,” which aims to undo the Supreme Court’s decision and fight against super PACs, hybrid PACs and otherwise prompt states to pass ballot resolutions calling on Congress to pass an anti- Citizens United constitutional amendment.

“The increase in hybrid PACs speaks to the fundraising arms race that is on in politics,” Common Cause’s Mary Boyle said. “Candidates are using every means, every vehicle out there, to raise money for their arsenals to protect against super PAC hits, be competitive and pay for the ever escalating costs of campaigns.”

Backer, the attorney advocating for hybrid PAC expansion, isn’t much concerned, however, about their growth being stunted.

He predicted success in his case before the FEC and a broader recognition of hybrid PACs as a leading political influence tool.

“It’s the best demonstration yet,” Backer said, “of flexibility and power and the ability to get results for your dollar.”