April 28, 2012
Dear members of the Securities and Exchange Commission:
I am writing to urge the SEC to issue a rule requiring publicly traded corporations to publicly disclose all their political spending.
The Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United has changed the playing field of American politics for the worse. For the worst. We desperately need transparency in our system and this ruling has allowed secret corporate spending to influence the political system in a way that individual spending NEVER can. It tilts the playing field in a very negative way.
Both shareholders and the public must be fully informed as to how much the corporation spends on politics and which candidates are being promoted or attacked. Disclosures should be posted promptly on the SEC's web site. At least by doing this, the public would have the opportunity to make their voices heard to the companies directly, in the way of letters or boycotts, thus showing that we do not support what they are doing. Secrecy in spending undermines the openness that our democracy needs to be vibrant. Corporations, through their lobbying already influence our government too much. By allowing them to "buy" campaigns and candidates, it further corrupts our political system. A really level playing field for all candidates would be public financing of campaigns. If only we had that system!!
Thank you for considering my comment.
Sincerely,
Linda Squires
Sincerely,
Linda Squires