Pascrell Calls on ABC to End Wal-Mart's Sponsorship of "Only in America"

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Sabrina Glavan 973-523-5152

March 29, 2005


Congressman Bill Pascrell Calls on ABC to End Wal-Mart's Sponsorship of "Only in America" Series

Twenty-One Members Sign Letter Urging ABC News to Drop Wal-Mart


Washington, DC - U.S. Representative Bill Pascrell, Jr, (D-NJ-08) released a letter today calling on ABC News to drop Wal-Mart as a sponsor of Good Morning America's "Only in America" series. The letter to David Westin, President of ABC News, states that in the "name of honesty and accuracy in the media we ask that ABC News remove Wal-Mart Stores, Inc." as a sponsor.

"ABC News must end Wal-Mart's sponsorship. This is just another cynical attempt by Wal-Mart to sell a corporate image based on lies and myths," said Congressman Pascrell. "One only has to look at the real Wal-Mart record to realize the severe damage this company has done to American families and communities."

The letter, signed by twenty-one Members of Congress, highlights Wal-Mart's effort to use misleading advertising and slogans to confuse consumers and the American public about their true record. Wal-Mart's actual record is that of a corporate giant that wraps itself in patriotic symbols, while contributing to the dramatic decline in manufacturing jobs that have had a devastating effect on American families. In fact, "80 percent of the six thousand factories in Wal-Mart's worldwide database of suppliers are in China." Amazingly, if Wal-Mart were a country, it would be China's seventh-largest export market - ahead of Germany and Great Britain. According to Ted Fishman, author of China, Inc., "Wal-Mart's growth as an economic force is inseparable from China's rise as a manufacturing giant ... no company has been a bigger catalyst in pushing American" manufacturing jobs to China.



Wal-Mart's sponsorship of the "Only in America" series exemplifies the company's recent attempts to rely on marketing campaigns to improve its image, rather than actually changing its corporate behavior that damages the American family, local communities, and the nation at large.
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http://www.politicsnj.com/pascrell032905.htm

Before I moved Bill was my congressman. I had the privilege to vote for him.