(Image: Jared Rodriguez / Truthout)In Washington, it doesn’t matter if you are a Republican, Democrat or independent: Money reigns supreme. During the last election, a number of global corporations contributed to both candidates in hotly contested Senate races. Corporations don’t really care who does their bidding.
This year’s record-shattering $4 billion midterm elections sent a toxic message to average Americans: It doesn’t matter who won, when elections are funded by global corporations and special interests, everyone loses.
In Washington, it doesn’t matter if you are a Republican, Democrat or independent: Money reigns supreme. During the last elections, a number of global corporations contributed to both candidates in the hotly contested Senate races.
The multinational law firm DLA Piper spent money on both the Democrat and Republican Senate challengers in Alaska, Iowa and Kentucky. The Blackstone Group, a large investment management firm, gave away thousands of dollars to both of the main competitors in Louisiana, New Hampshire and Colorado’s Senate races. In Arkansas, both the American Resort Development Association and Google Inc provided funds to Sen. Mark Pryor (D) along with his main opponent, Tom Cotton (R). Intel Corp bet on both teams in the Senate battleground states of Colorado and New Hampshire.
For these corporations and many more, partisan politics don’t motivate them. They will pay court to whoever will get them what they want once elected into office. That’s because they know money talks. But the average American can’t afford top dollar donations or high-priced lobbyists: All they have is their voice and their vote. Our pay-to-play political system that says money equals voices has drowned out “we the people” and eclipsed the value of that vote.
A poll by Democracy Corps asked liberal and conservative voters what factors influenced how members of Congress vote and 90 percent of the answers went to special interest groups, their lobbyists and campaign donors.
Voters are right to distrust our unbalanced political system. These races paint a picture of a flourishing plutocracy – where only the wealthy can pay to have access and influence in our government. And when big money takes over our elections, we surrender crucial elements of our democratic ideals. Demoralized constituents stop voting. (These midterms had the worst voter turnout in 72 years.) We even miss out on good candidates who have outstanding merits, but are short on funds.
But there is good cause for hope. After all the sewer-money-funded attack ads, Americans of all stripes are ready to put an end to the nonsense and fight to get big money out of politics.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) recently said that he was “displeased” by the Supreme Court decision Citizens United and that “the public over time is going to rebel against this. But that’d be up to the public.” Well, 78 percent of Americans want to reduce the influence of money in politics and many are fighting hard to reverse this perverse trend in our government.
Sixty-seven percent of voters in Tallahassee, Florida, passed new ethics rules to reform campaign spending. Eleven Wisconsin communities successfully passed referenda to amend the US Constitution to overturn Citizens United, which allowed corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to influence elections. Anti-corruption measures were also passed in Massachusetts, Ohio and Illinois, along with more than 550 other towns and cities.
And more than 25,000 people across the country are stamping messages like “Not to be Used for Buying Elections” on dollar bills with StampStampede.org. It’s monetary jujitsu. We’re turning money into millions of miniature billboards to create a mass visual demonstration of support to get money out of politics.
Corruption may still be the norm in Washington, but the tide is turning away from big money and toward people power.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy