To:  ANA Washington and Legal Representatives

From:  Dan Jaffe

RE:  Markup on FTC provisions in the CFPA legislation

Date:  October 27, 2009

 

The markup is expected on the CFPA bill imminently. Apparently, Chairman Waxman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee appears poised to give the FTC its complete wish list as described in the attached letter from FTC Chairman Leibowitz without any hearings or careful consideration. We will have another letter out opposing all this later today and hope others will be weighing in as loudly as possible. It appears that we will be facing a new powerful CFPA, a dramatically strengthened FTC and states that can have even more extensive regulation. This multiple overlapping regulation is particularly harmful for those who need to run coordinated national advertising campaigns. If the FTC gets immediate civil penalty authority, the dollar risk for every company will also go up astronomically. Not a pretty picture. Hopefully, the opposition will increase and we can chip away at some of this as we go through the process.

If you have any questions or comments about the impact of the CFPA on the marketing community, please contact Dan Jaffe (djaffe@ana.net) or Keith Scarborough (kscarborough@ana.net) in ANA’s Washington, DC office at (202) 296-1883.