In the face of a well-funded attack machine that will dog her throughout her campaign, Hillary Clinton has overlooked her most potent tool for fighting back: her own sweeping democracy reform platform.
Campaign Spending
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Trump Fallout Hurts GOP Campaign Coffers
Donald Trump’s role as GOP standard-bearer widens the growing rift between the Republican Party and its longtime business allies and corporate donors.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Fighting Over Secret Money
Curbing undisclosed political spending can be tricky, but unilateral GOP opposition is at odds with public opinion and with the Supreme Court.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
The Emerging Wealthy White Male Donor Class: A Chicago Case Study
Riding on the coattails of the nation’s bursting wealth gap is another crisis of inequality-political inequality, campaign-finance watchdogs warn. Fueled by unprecedented levels of wealth, rich white men, in particular, have formed an elite political donor class that has gained an outsized influence over policy, reform advocates say. Meanwhile, people of color and women who […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Charles Koch Bemoans Money in Politics But Lobbies Against Reform
The latest front in the Koch brothers’ perpetual public relations campaign (which recently included a feeble admission that climate change is real) found Charles Koch sitting down with ABC News for an exclusive interview. The conversation with Jonathan Karl that aired last Sunday cast Koch in the unlikely role of benevolent billionaire. The man who […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Clinton Campaign Money Legal but Problematic
Bernie Sanders’s campaign-finance complaint against Hillary Clinton doesn’t hold water, but flags fundraising practices that pose political and other dangers.
Posted inCivil Rights in America
Springtime for Democracy
Activists who just wrapped up more than a week of protests and civil disobedience on Capitol Hill this week say their broad-based coalition captures mounting voter anger over political money, voting rights and legislative dysfunction in Washington.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Activists Swarm Capitol for Democracy Protests
On Sunday, more than a thousand people gathered on Capitol Hill for a “Democracy Awakening” rally to demand that Congress move to protect voting rights, limit political spending, and create a public financing system for political campaigns. Activists also want the Senate to take up President Barack Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to replace the […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
The Climate Counts
Environmental concerns—bolstered by more precinct walkers and political spending—loom large in this year’s election.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Dark Money Was the Real Winner in Wisconsin
With the nation’s attention riveted by the Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz victories in Wisconsin’s presidential primary, an arguably far more important political battle came to a head as a state district judge tried to unseat Republican Governor Scott Walker’s hand-picked choice for the state Supreme Court. In a bid to shift the ideological makeup […]
