Citizens United Fights to Keep Donor Names Secret
Andrew Denney, New York Law Journal
Citizens United’s general counsel argued at the Second Circuit today that Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s policy that all charities soliciting donations in New York submit forms listing all donors is unconstitutional, but the panel appeared skeptical of the group’s contention that Schneiderman acted outside of the bounds of his authority.
You get this, right? Not only did the Supreme Court allow hugely rich people to buy politicians and states with dark money PACs, they don’t want us voters to know who they are.
What are they scared of? Us? They should be because they do not represent anything like the majority in this country. Indeed, they are a tiny minority of obscenely rich oligarchs who intend to use their money to dismantle our democracy. (See Nancy MacLean’s Democracy in Chains for the history of this “libertarian” danger.)
Before any Citizens United repeal effort can be effectively mounted, we need to see labels on all political TV and print ads stating clearly who paid for those ads. You know, like the labels politicians themselves put on ads, such as “Paid for by the campaign to elect [fill in the politician],” i.e., paid for by campaign contributions.
Remember the Gorsuch TV ads? The New York Times did good work in picking out who paid for them. But the responsibility for naming names should not be put onto the shoulders of investigative media.
Bravo, my AG Eric Schneiderman!
Name yourselves, rich people! Stop hiding behind the clan hoods and tiki torches of your rotten secretive movement.