Ninety-seven cents of every dollar the Civitas Institute spends comes from Art Pope via the Pope Foundation, according to a new report by Facing South. So does four dollars out of every five that John Hood and the John Locke Foundation spend to promote the Art Pope brand of me-first, libertarian conservatism. This is the [...]
The NC Voters from Clean Elections coalition released its 2010 scorecard that evaluates the support of state legislators for “voter-owned” public financing and related campaign reform measures. NCVCE points out that more legislators received perfect scores in 2010 than in previous reports. Meanwhile, three more judicial candidates have demonstrated enough public support to qualify for [...]
Continuing the theme from the last couple of days, the Institute for Southern Studies has an eye-popping feature about Art Pope. Among other nuggets: Pope basically owns the Civitas Institute, the source of those so-called non-biased polls you see in the press; an amazing 99% of Civitas’ income comes from Pope through his foundation! Pope’s [...]
A front group for ultra-conservative Art Pope is jumping into new territory with the encouragement of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision. It is using money from Pope’s business to run attack ads against Democratic leaders in the General Assembly. The 501(c)(4) group, called Civitas Action, has the same executive director, office, and dominating financial [...]
The insidious corporate takeover of the U.S. Congress is gaining momentum and going global. A new report reveals that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is soliciting foreign donations to bolster its political operations, which include a $75 million budget for attack ads to elect its proxies to Congress. That’s probably the biggest political budget of [...]
Secret sponsors: Interest groups are spending five times as much in this election as in the last midterm election – and the identities of the money suppliers behind these groups are mostly unknown, in contrast to 2006 when 90% of the donors were disclosed. Public Citizens has a new report analyzing “fading disclosure” and the New [...]
A new poll in swing Congressional districts finds that voters heavily favor the Fair Elections Now Act – the bill to provide Congressional candidates with a practical campaign-financing alternative that orients them to small donors and constituents rather than Washington lobbyists and PACs. How the question is asked in a poll always influences the answer, [...]
Wilmington businessman Rusty Carter got slapped with a $100,000 fine today for funneling illegal contributions to state politicians. The Associated Press story describes what happened at the State Board of Elections meeting and references the letter Democracy North Carolina sent in June, urging the Board to assess a hefty penalty against Carter for his actions. [...]
The divide between rich and poor is widening in the United States, thanks in part to a political system driven by money. “The top-earning 20 percent of Americans — those making more than $100,000 each year — received 49% of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3% earned by those below the [...]
The New York Times exposes the simple function of Americans for Job Security: serve as a front for corporations and business owners with a political agenda “to sidestep campaign disclosure rules.” It is set up as a 501(c)(6) trade association with members paying “dues” that are often one-time payments for attack-ad campaigns against specific politicians [...]