Breaking news: On June 24th, the House of Representatives passed the DISCLOSE Act to mitigate the effects of Citizens United (see below). It will require groups to stand by the ads they create and will ban corporations that are 20% or more foreign-owned from electioneering. Unfortunately, it allows exemptions for groups like the NRA and others. It now goes to the Senate, where Sen. Schumer will take the lead.
Please call his office: (212) 486-4430 or the Capital Switchboard at (202) 224-3121, or
send an email to ask (1) that exemptions be removed, and (2) that an amendment be added to require shareholder approval before a corporation can buy ads to help elect or defeat candidates.
Background: In January 2010, the Supreme Court ruled 5 to 4 that corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money to help defeat or elect candidates of their choice. This ruling declared that “corporations are persons” with the same First Amendment rights as we have. President Obama has called the decision “a strike on democracy itself.”
A recent poll (pfaw.org) showed that 85% of Americans feel that corporations have too much power and 93% believe that citizens have too little influence. It also showed that over 3/4 of the American people support a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.
The American public are now fighting back. The state of Massachusetts just introduced a resolution to call on Congress “to pass and send to the states for ratification a constitutional amendment to restore the First Amendment and fair elections to the people.” Hawaii and Oregon have already passed similar resolutions and many others are in the process of doing so.