코흐 네트워크가 2016년 선거에 1조 4천억 원 이상을 지출할 계획이라고 발표한 것은 우리 민주주의를 구하기 위한 시민 행동을 촉구하는 분명한 신호라고 Common Cause 대표 마일스 라포포트가 화요일에 말했습니다.

“The Iowa caucus is no longer the first stop on the road to the White House. It’s now the Koch caucus that grabs candidates’ attention – and their gratitude,” Rapoport said. “Anyone who thought that the influence of billionaires in our elections is not a problem must surely be re-thinking that position today.”

The money the Koch network plans to pump into 2016 political races is nearly three times what small donors gave to the two main presidential candidates in 2012; it’s also more than what either major party spent on the 2012 elections.

Last week, Americans observed the fifth anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision. More than five million people have signed petitions calling for a constitutional amendment that would overturn the ruling. An unprecedented number of members of Congress jointly filed bills that would mitigate some of the damage and restore the voices of average ordinary Americans in the political process. The package of bills includes the DISCLOSE Act, which would bring transparency to the hundreds of millions of dollars being invested in politics by undisclosed sources; the Empowering Citizens Act and the Government By The People Act, which would fix the presidential public financing system and enact a similar system for Congressional candidates; and the Democracy for All amendment, which would restore the ability of Congress and the states to set reasonable limits on the amount of money – including from corporate coffers – that influences elections.