April 29, 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.
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.
To be clear, what we really must achieve is to get all corporate money out of politics, to roll back Citizens United, end corporate personhood and institute public financing of elections.
Don't let corporations hide their political spending. Given how corrupt the system is, disclosure of corporate political spending would be a meaningful, though small, step forward.
SEC, you MUST require publicly traded companies to disclose the money they spend on politics and STOP the CEOs free rein to make political expenditures that they would never be able to justify publicly -- including campaigns so toxic they would inevitably tarnish the company's brand were the funding source made public
We must protect our America from these profiteers, imediately.
Sincerely,
Elaine Balgemann