For Immediate Release: 
October 8, 2010
Contact: 

Katie Grant
202-225-3130

Democrats Calling for Corporate Special Interest Groups Funding Attack Ads to Come Clean

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This Fall, corporate special interests are trying to drown out the voices of the American people with a flood of negative advertising funded by shadowy front groups. These groups are taking advantage of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision that has enabled them to collect unlimited and undisclosed money from powerful, wealthy and sometimes foreign corporations – all without telling anyone where the money is coming from.  The American people deserve to know exactly who is funding nasty attack ads and trying to sway their elections.
 
Democrats fought for the DISCLOSE Act – critical legislation that would require the disclosure of donations in the wake the Citizens United case that opened up the floodgates for special interest money. House Republicans voted in lockstep against this bill, while Senate Republicans and their special interest allies made sure the bill wasn’t even debated on the Senate floor.
 
And now, well-funded special interest groups like Karl Rove’s American Crossroads and the Chamber of Commerce are pumping in millions of dollars, possibly from foreign interests and foreign governments, to try and overwhelm the voices of average Americans.
 
Highlights from the growing chorus against this tidal wave of shadowy funding:
 
Craig Holman, Public Citizen:
 
“Because of the lack of disclosure laws people are buying the election but we don't know exactly who.” [UK Telegraph, 10/5/10]
 
Larry Kudlow, CNBC television host, editor and columnist for the conservative magazine National Review and former Reagan Administration official:
 
“Why not have the media posting of the contribution information on the Internet? That's all. And let everybody decide… Who, what, when, how, where, who got it? Put it up on the net and let free speech and free politics take its work… American Crossroads and Karl Rove and all them should post also.” [10/6/10]
 
Eugene Robinson, Washington Post columnist:
 
“The result is a system in which oil companies opposed to an energy bill that would begin to steer the country away from fossil fuels, or Wall Street firms that want to undo financial regulatory reform and return to the days of the Big Casino, or gazillionaires who want to keep George W. Bush's tax breaks, can all spend as much as they like to try to buy Congress for the Republican Party.   And they can do it secretly, in the dark, without anyone knowing.”  [Washington Post, 10/05/10]
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