ALEC Fumes: Transparency Threatens Corporate Free Speech!

After spending hundreds of millions of undisclosed funds on state and federal elections, the corporate members of the American Legislative Exchange Council are demanding that state legislators preserve their "right" to anonymously spend money on politics and curry favor with elected officials, and to thwart shareholder efforts to hold the corporations they own accountable.

A December 3 workshop titled "Playing the Shame Game: A Campaign that Threatens Corporate Free Speech," held at ALEC's meeting this week in Washington, DC, warned of "an increasing chorus of anti-business activists calling for an end to corporate political participation in the name of ferreting out so-called 'dark money," according to an agenda obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy. Panelists set their sights on campaign finance disclosure laws and shareholder proposals aimed at promoting transparency in corporate political spending.

It is little surprise that corporate interests would peddle secrecy to the hundreds of Republican state legislators at ALEC.

ALEC's funders, like the billionaire Koch brothers, have spent millions in "dark money" -- electoral spending that evades donor disclosure laws -- in recent years, secret spending which has increased exponentially since the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United decision. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/27892-alec-fumes-transparency-threatens-corporate-free-speech