Posts Tagged ‘Campaign Finance’

January27

Money and Democracy Update: A pact on Super PACs, advice from Scalia

By: Angela Bradbery

Stunning Statistics of the Week:

  • $3.27 billion: Amount spent on lobbying in 2011
  • $3.51 billion: Amount spent on lobbying in 2010

Note: The drop is attributed to political gridlock.

Citizens United anniversary: Everything it was cracked up to be and more
We’ve been telling you for a while about the momentum that built toward protest events slated for Saturday, Jan. 21, the second anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The anniversary was everything we thought it would be and then some. Citizens and elected officials took to the streets in cities throughout the country to call for a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision. Check out these pieces in Mother Jones, Truthout.org and Firedoglake. If you haven’t joined the movement, it’s not too late. Visit www.DemocracyIsForPeople.org.

Candidates say “Enough already with the Super PACs”
It might not work but it’s worth a shot. U.S. Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) and his opponent Harvard Professor Elizabeth Warren have signed a “People’s Pledge agreement” designed to keep Super PACs and the negative ads they pay for out of the race. Under the agreement, whichever candidate is aided by an ad paid for by a third party must contribute an amount worth half the ad to his or her opponent’s charity of choice.

House lawmakers draft new DISCLOSE Act
The DISCLOSE Act, designed to mitigate the harmful effects of Citizens United, fell victim in 2011 to GOP intransigence. Now, some lawmakers are making another run at it. U.S. Reps. Bob Brady (D-Pa.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) have drafted a bill that would, among other things, enhance disclosure by Super PACs, corporations and outside groups, and require corporations to tell shareholders about campaign expenditures.

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January20

Money and Democracy Update: People take to the streets, Citizens United anniversary is upon us, Bain likes Dems

By: Angela Bradbery

Stunning Statistics of the Week:

  • $27.5 million: The amount that Super PACs have spent to influence the 2012 presidential election
  • $8.1 million: The amount Restore Our Future, the Super PAC backing GOP contender Mitt Romney, has spent
  • $5.4 million: The amount candidates have spent on TV ads for the South Carolina primary to date
  • $6.9 million: The amount Super PACs have spent on TV ads in South Carolina

Taking to the streets as Jan. 21 Citizens United anniversary approaches
What a week! Saturday, Jan. 21, marks the second anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s disastrous Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, and activists have been engaged in – or gearing up for – hundreds of events around the country. Public Citizen and other groups held rallies and press events with state officials in Maryland, Vermont and Massachusetts to call for a constitutional amendment to overturn the court’s decision. Another big rally is scheduled Saturday in Sacramento, Calif. In addition, activists are planning about 300 demonstrations around the country. It’s not too late to get involved in your area! Check out www.DemocracyIsForPeople.org. Or if you are a Facebook fan, check this out. Also worth reading is today’s Huffington Post piece by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Public Citizen President Robert Weissman.

CEOs, investors, others call on SEC to require disclosure of corporate political spending
The Corporate Reform Coalition, made up of institutional investors, CEOs, good government organizations and others, is calling on the Securities and Exchange Commission to require publicly traded corporations to disclose political spending. U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), who joined a coalition press call Thursday, released a letter to the SEC from himself and 13 Senate colleagues. “Many shareholders remain in the dark, unaware that their money could be funding political activities, or even political attack ads. The rights of shareholders must be protected and at present, we believe that they are being compromised,” the letter said. A citizens petition to the SEC has already garnered more than 20,000 signatures. Add yours here.

Well, this is a bit awkward: Democrats get more money from Bain than Republicans
Bain Capital has been in the spotlight because of Mitt Romney’s tenure at the private equity firm. But truth be told, Democrats have taken more donations from Bain executives than Republicans over the past three election cycles ($1.2 million vs. $480,000), The Hill reports.

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January13

Money and Democracy Update: Activists gear up to overturn Citizens United, Colbert pledges not to coordinate

By: Angela Bradbery

Stunning Statistics of the Week:

  • $5.7 million: The amount that Elizabeth Warren has raised in the last three months of 2011 for her race to unseat U.S. Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.)
  • $3.2 million: Amount that Brown raised in the same period

Activists gearing up as second anniversary of Citizens United looms
As the second anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s damaging Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling looms, thousands of people across the country will stage demonstrations, rallies, protests and other actions to magnify the urgent need to overturn the decision and ensure democracy is for people – not corporations. It’s not too late to get involved.

Occupy Congress
Just ahead of #J21 actions to protest the Jan, 21, 2012 anniversary of Citizens United, thousands upon thousands of occupiers will be filing into DC, where the DC Occupy Camp just passed a resolution against corporate personhood! Find out more about their planned actions here. 

Disclosure order on horizon?
Could it really be? The Obama administration is considering issuing that long-awaited executive order requiring federal contractors to disclose political donations. Yes, the one that was imminent last summer. Public Citizen’s Craig Holman heard this at a recent White House meeting.

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January6

Money and Democracy Update: Nationwide protests, more cities take action, poor Newt

By: Angela Bradbery

Stunning Statistics of the Week:

  • $13 million: The amount that outside groups have spent on ads and direct mail in early battleground states
  • $7.9 million: The amount outside groups had spent at this point in the 2008 presidential campaign

Nationwide protests planned the week of Jan. 21
The nationwide days of protest around the second anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (Jan. 21) are almost upon us! You can attend or host an organizing party to plan an anniversary action. These parties will occur on and around Tuesday, January 10. The night before (Monday, January 9), The Dylan Ratigan Show on MSNBC is expected to host a representative of our coalition, and we hope to share clips of that show with party hosts for their meetings. Sign up to attend a party or host one if there is not one in your area.

Montana says its corporate spending ban survives Citizens United
The Montana Supreme Court has upheld a state law banning corporations from spending money to support or oppose candidates. The court did so despite the fact that the U.S. Supreme Court said in Citizens United that a similar federal law was unconstitutional. The state court held that Montana’s unique history of corporate corruption provided the compelling justification the Supreme Court said was necessary to bar corporations from spending to help candidates through such things as ads and mailings. The challengers likely will try to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

New York City, Duluth and California weigh in on corporate personhood
Momentum grows to overturn Citizens United. This week, New York City passed a resolution calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision, and legislation calling for an amendment was introduced in the California Legislature. Duluth, Minn., also passed a resolution in late December. Check out these great discussions on Democracy Now! and the Thom Hartmann show.

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December21

Seizing the Populist Moment: The Movement to Overturn Citizens United Steps Out

By: Sean Siperstein

Mark your calendars for the week of January 21, 2012!

In just one month—approximately two years after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v Federal Election Commission opened the floodgates to unprecedented corporate influence over our democracy—the growing grassroots movement to take back the Constitution for We the People is going to make its presence very much known on the national stage. 

Like MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan, we’re “Mad as Hell” that corporations have shamelessly gotten the courts to grant them the rights of natural persons when it can buy them outsized influence and drown out the rest of our voices…while insisting they’re quite different from the rest of us when it suits their interests, like when they’re being sued for human rights violations.

Demonstrators at the U.S. Capitol on the one-year anniversary of the Citizens United ruling. Mark your calendars for bigger and stronger actions nationwide surrounding the two-year anniversary next month!

And we’re far from alone. In a recent Pew poll, 77 percent of Americans agree that too much power is in the hands of the wealthiest among us and large corporations.   As former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich aptly puts it, the defining issue of this populist moment is not the size of government, but who exactly it stands for.

That’s where this Citizens United anniversary comes in as a “movement moment.”  Citizens will be taking a variety of different approaches to mark this troubling anniversary, but they’ll be unified in rallying their communities behind the need for a constitutional amendment to rein in corporate influence over the political process.

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Posted in: Activism, Campaign Finance, Climate Change, Congress, Environment, Regulation, Social Justice4 comments

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