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An Act To Exempt Contributions for the Retirement of Old Campaign Debt from Contribution Limits
Be it enacted by the People of the State of Maine as follows:
Sec. 1.  21-A MRSA §1015, sub-§2-A  is enacted to read:
 
2-A.  Retiring campaign debt; exception to contribution limits.     The contribution limits described in subsections 1 and 2 do not apply for the purposes of retiring debt incurred by a campaign for any state or county office as long as:
 
A.  The date on which the campaign debt was incurred is at least 6 years before the date on which the contributions in excess of the limit are received;
 
B.  The former candidate who is accepting the contribution is not currently serving in a state or county office and has not been a candidate for a state or county office since the debt was incurred; and
 
C.  Any contribution in excess of the limits described in subsection 1 or 2 received is for the sole purpose of retiring the campaign debt and is reported in accordance with section 1017, subsection 3-A, paragraph E.
 
SUMMARY
This bill provides an exception to the law that limits campaign contributions. It provides that contributions may exceed the limit if their purpose is to retire campaign debt that is at least 6 years old. In order to accept these contributions in excess of the limit, the former candidate may not be serving in office or be a candidate for office.