In the case known as Citizens United, the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court essentially gave free reign to the wealthy and powerful to influence the political process by striking down certain requirements that political groups disclose their income sources.
The result in the 2010 election cycle was that huge amounts of cash with undisclosed sources were sank – or, as the donors might say, invested – in Republican Party candidates and causes. There is a direct line from the Citizens United case to the anti-working-class laws pushed by Republicans in Wisconsin, for example, and to the ending Medicare budget bill passed by House Republicans recently.
While the American political process has always allowed legalized bribery, it was the disclosure rules that provided a modicum of transparency. It allowed fact-checkers and watch-dogs the opportunity scrutinize the financial backers of a campaign and make public those facts. Disclosure gave the ordinary voter some power to know the special class interests behind a candidate, a bill, or an issue.
The Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United has all but eliminated that small counter-balance to big money in politics.
To remedy the problem, President Obama has circulated a draft Executive Order which builds on existing federal laws restricting political contributions by companies that get federal government contracts.
The draft EO states "every contracting department and agency shall require all entities submitting offers for federal contracts to disclose certain political contributions and expenditures that they have made within the two years prior to submission of their offer." The EO would specifically cover those kinds of disclosures the Supreme Court struck down. The disclosures would then be made available to the public.
Business groups, like the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable, went apoplectic when the read the draft order. Not surprisingly, the vast majority of the money given by these two groups has gone to Republicans, the main beneficiary of the Citizens United ruling. According to MapLight.org, a website devoted to "following the money" in politics, more than three-quarters of the disclosed money donated to members of Congress in the past decade by these two groups went to Republicans. In 2010, more than 81 percent went to Republicans.
Ironically, the cynical corporate opposition to the draft Executive Order centers on the belief that politicians will use the disclosure process to favor contractors that support their party or causes – as if favoritism and influence-peddling isn't now the norm.
The President's draft Executive Order follows on the heels of last fall's successful Republican filibuster of the DISCLOSE Act, which would have made the new rules in the Executive Order federal law.
The timeline for finalizing the Executive Order has not yet been made public.
