WASHINGTON — Senate appropriators folded into a draft spending bill a provision long sought by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell that would relax campaign finance coordination rules between candidates and the political parties.

This marks the second time in less than a year that lawmakers have sought major changes to campaign finance regulations through must-pass appropriations measures. But with work on spending bills stalled on both sides of the Capitol, the potential for getting looser campaign regulations enacted into law this time is still unclear.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, of Kentucky, remains a foe of campaign-finance restrictions. The Associated Press

The provision would effectively consolidate power within the national parties including the Republican and Democratic committees raising money for House and Senate candidates. Republican appropriators tucked the provision into the $20.56 billion fiscal 2016 Financial Services spending bill the full committee is slated to mark up Thursday.

McConnell, R-Kentucky, a longtime foe of campaign finance restrictions, sought similar language last year.

“Let me just sum it up: It would strengthen the parties, who have frankly not as much clout anymore, much of the firepower, it is now outside the parties,” McConnell told CQ Roll Call in December. “I don’t think there is anything good about weakening the parties.”

Leaders instead settled on language that dramatically increased the amount of money an individual could donate to the national party committees for special accounts to pay for conventions, buildings and recounts. The inclusion prompted criticism from Democrats, who nearly killed the underlying bill over their opposition to that provision, as well as a banking-related rider.

Democratic appropriators on Wednesday were quick to label the campaign finance provision as objectionable and said it would create a loophole that “effectively overrides” current spending limits for coordinated spending between campaigns and political parties.

The spending bill as written would “open the floodgates of money in our politics,” said Chris Coons of Delaware.

House Republicans have introduced bills chipping away at campaign finance disclosure for years, which rarely made it through the Democrat-controlled Senate. But Republicans now control both chambers.

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