July 25, 2013
Corporations are so predictable. They want only profits without regard to us the People and our "animal" friends, soil, water and air. They take our hard-earned money, which they get by over-charging for their products, and they buy judges, Congress members, and anyone else whose soul is for sale. Meanwhile, the rest of us suffer in a multitude of ways, health being the largest of them. But they would be the last to care.
I am writing to urge the Securities and Exchange Commission to issue a rule requiring publicly traded corporations to publicly disclose all their political spending – and to do so this year.
I'm sure you know this, but “Dark money” groups that accept contributions from corporations, but are not required to publicly identify their corporate donors, spent millions of dollars during the 2012 elections. It is a scandal that money from publicly traded corporations – which belongs to investors – can be secretly spent to distort our democracy.
The Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission created the loophole that enables this secret spending, but the SEC has the authority to close it.
Both shareholders and the public must be fully informed as to how much corporations spend on politics and which candidates are being promoted or attacked. Disclosures should be posted promptly on the SEC’s web site.
Thank you for considering my comment.
Linda Andersson
Medina, WA