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Area residents continue fight against big-money politics
By Chris Beattie, cbeattie@starlocalnews.com
"Corporations have their lobbyists in Washington, D.C. The people need advocates, too."
Local members of Public Citizen, a 40-year nonprofit political activist group, are taking its brandished motto to heart - and to politicians' doorsteps.
For the second time in as many months, area residents have taken their demands to a United States congressman's office in the form of a petition advocating for a constitutional amendment to overturn the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 "Citizens United" ruling, which gave corporations and individuals the freedom to spend unlimited money influencing federal elections.
Members of MoveOn.org, a political action group backed by supporters in every state, brought the petition to U.S. Congressman Sam Johnson's office in late June. More than 8,000 Texas citizens have signed the petition, with an aim to present it to every state and federal lawmaker who has not yet declared support for such an amendment.
Several of the same petitioners, including Kellye Kirkpatrick, Paul Heller, Joanne Groshardt and Anita Simpson, last week brought the petition to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn's office. They and other Public Citizen members spoke with Collin McLochlin, the congressman's North Texas deputy regional director.
"Money is not speech," Heller said, referencing the 1976 "Buckley v. Valeo" case that ruled campaign contributions is a constitutionally-protected form of free speech. "The more money, the more speech, and if we're a democracy, why should one person have more influence than another?"
Petitioners' first discussion centered on the DISCLOSE Act, which the U.S. Senate shot down last month. Had it passed, the bill would have required independent groups to disclose the names of contributors that gave more than $10,000 for use in political campaigns - in essence, a possible crippling of big-money donations and politically-based 501(c)4 organizations.
It was drafted in response to "Citizens United," and because unions and such nonprofit groups, dubbed "social welfare organizations," are not required to reveal their biggest donors. McLochlin reemphasized what several senators who voted against the act, including Cornyn and former presidential candidate John McCain, have said: that labor unions would get a pass because of their contributions from compulsory membership dues.
On the Senate vote to proceed to debate the bill in mid-July, 51 senators voted for and 44 voted against. All Democrats present voted to proceed while all Republicans voted against, including several known GOP advocates for campaign finance reform. McCain (R-Ariz.) and others argued the bill would unfairly favor labor unions.
In a statement released that week, McCain said the bill "forces some entities to inform the public about the origins of their financial support, while allowing others - most notably those affiliated with organized labor - to fly below the Federal Election Commission's regulatory radar."
But petitioners and other political activists have argued such statements are erroneous. Kirkpatrick, of Allen, read to McLochlin a letter from Bob Kirk, treasurer for the Fort-Worth based Transport Workers Union Local 567. Kirk said unions do not use membership dues for political purposes because such use is illegal.
He said the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) of 1971 provided for three exemptions to the prohibition of labor union political activities in federal elections: communications directed at members, non-partisan voter registration activities directed at members, and the establishment of a political action committee (PAC) for soliciting contributions.
McLochlin contended that unions have spent close to $4.4 billion for political purposes since 2005, and that such donations can be anonymous, hiding whether they came from dues or voluntary contributions. He said most senators agree that the political-funding system is imperfect but that the DISCLOSE Act is not the solution.
As he and petitioners agreed, a constitutional amendment could be an even tougher-reached solution. But petitioners said Cornyn's support could weigh heavily on its possibility, given his position on the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee for the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights.
"He's in the perfect place to launch some sort of effort," Heller said.
In response to that subcommittee's July 24 hearing, when more than 400 congress members discussed campaign finance transparency, petitioner Barbara Stafford, of Lewisville, said, "There are two races: the money race and then the election...As a result of the money race, the public does not get a real chance to know all the prospective candidates' politics clearly as they are deciding who would best represent them."
"The media will ignore, underplay and understate the candidate if they are raising noticeably less money than other candidates," Stafford continued in her letter to Cornyn. "The underdog candidates are overshadowed or annihilated commercially."
As they did at their delivery to Johnson, petitioners stressed that getting big money out of politics is a bi-partisan issue and desire. An ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted in March found that 69 percent of Americans would ban super PACs, and that 69 percent of Tea Party supporters say super PACs should be outlawed, according to Kirkpatrick.
"In poll after poll, it has been shown that the majority of Americans disagree with the 'Citizens United' ruling," she said in a letter to Cornyn. "Over the years, more and more Americans have lost faith in government because they feel that politicians have become indebted to their political contributors and not to the American people."
Other petitioners spoke on how big money has influenced the government's approach to environmental issues and its relation to prison privatization. Simpson described how Corrections Corporation of America and the GEO Group, members of the American Legislative Exchange Council, contract with state governments to build and manage prisons, thus receiving "guarantee of a constant capacity, typically 90 percent."
"Because the state is ultimately responsible for putting people in prison, this is not true privatization," Simpson said. "It is for-profit government."
McLochlin listened to and responded to petitioners, assuring them Cornyn would come to know of their calls-to-action. So far, 92 U.S. representatives and 29 U.S. senators have signed on in support of a constitutional amendment to repeal "Citizens United," Kirkpatrick said.
Until that support comes to fruition, and those numbers reach a majority, petitions will likely continue. And "people's advocates" will remain.
"Our constitutional framers intended politicians to be dependent on the people and not on a few individuals or a corporation or a special interest group," Kirkpatrick said. "Some politicians now seem to have made an about-face when it comes to democratic principles."
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How can we possibly expect our democracy to function when the influence of corporate funds overwhelm political campaigns? Should a single corporation or wealthy individual be allowed to drown out the political will of thousands of individual voters? Check out www.democracyisforpeople.org to learn more and become active in the movement to overturn Citizens United. "