The Corporate Insurrection: How companies have broken promises and funded seditionists

[CousinIT]

https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-reports/the-corporate-insurrection-how-companies-have-broken-promises-and-funded-seditionists/

. . .

Since January 2021, CREW has tracked the promises companies made — and broke — about giving to members of Congress who voted against the election results. In addition to donations to the 147 members of the Sedition Caucus and the GOP’s party committees, corporations have resumed giving to the state attorneys general challenging the election results in four battleground states. Many companies made anti-racist commitments following the summer 2020 racial justice protests and publicly denounced new discriminatory voting legislation. These same companies lined the pockets of lawmakers who tried to invalidate millions of votes cast by people of color. Here are the most important findings from one year of tracking corporate support for the Sedition Caucus:

Since the insurrection, 717 corporations and industry groups have donated over $18 million to 143 of the 147 members of Congress who objected to the results of the 2020 presidential election, as well as the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Companies that pledged to stop or pause their political giving to these members have contributed a total of $4,785,000 to insurrectionist political groups, including $2,381,250 directly to members of the Sedition Caucus’s campaigns and leadership PACs.

Boeing ($346,500), Koch Industries ($308,000), American Crystal Sugar ($285,000), General Dynamics ($233,500) and Valero Energy ($207,500) are the top corporate donors to those who objected to the election and their party committees.

Some companies resumed giving almost immediately. Toyota, which called the January 6 attack “horrific” and promised to reevaluate its giving criteria, poured $9,000 into the pockets of 9 Sedition Caucus members within a month of the riot. Cigna and AT&T also resumed giving to seditionists within two months of the riot.

After the attack, corporations rushed to pay lip service to democracy. Companies including Aflac, Ford Motors, and Valero Energy pledged to pause donations and re-evaluate their giving criteria, but these performative statements would soon give way to business as usual. These three companies have contributed more than $300,000 to seditionists, including lawmakers who sit on committees with power over the companies’ business interests.

Home Depot, JP Morgan, Delta Airlines, UPS, and many others issued statements, speaking out against new voting laws in Georgia as racist, while hundreds of other companies — including American Airlines, Ford, General Motors, and Johnson & Johnson — signed a full page New York Times ad condemning discriminatory voting legislation being passed nationwide. Despite taking pro-democracy stances in public, many of these companies have continued to fund members of Congress who voted against a free and fair election.

Corporate and industry PACs have also continued to support the Republican state attorneys general who attempted to invalidate the election results in four battleground states by falsely claiming that election procedures in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin violated federal law. Twenty companies including Boeing, Walmart, and Home Depot have donated $60,200 through their federal PACs to 12 attorneys general involved in the lawsuit, which was led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall collected the most in donations, bringing in $14,500. He is the head of the Rule of Law Defense Fund, a dark money organization that paid for robocalls promoting the “Save America” rally held on January 6 before the insurrection. . . .

[mathematic]

1. Just goes to show you corporate power is overrated. Even corps must bend to the voters.

It's nice to know that corps can't dictate the agenda of government. Though in this case I wish they could, since I agree with them that the insurrection was a very bad thing.

[Midnight Writer]

2. Corporations are people and money is speech. Lord have mercy.

[MagickMuffin]

3. No Real Big Surprise here

Lip Service, they only said such things to give the appearance of caring. They don't care.


MONEY IS THE NAME OF THE GAME.


And please notice that most of these companies get government funding, therefore it's a closed loop system. Government gives them money and the lobbyists give the money to candidates and members of congress. And the cycle continues.

[CrispyQ]

4. They don't care. Most of us will still use/buy their products.

Like me. I'm not going to stop using UPS. What's my choice? FedEx? The Post Office? I'll bet FedEx is on the list, too.

Our system is corrupt. What we need is to get money out of politics. But that will never happen as long as the very people who can change the current laws, benefit from the current laws. How many more Kristin Sinema's will we have? People who run on one platform, but sell out to corporate interests once their elected, cuz they see they can become a millionaire in less than six years. Love of money is the root of all evil. I'm not a Bible person, but that is a fundamental truth.

https://www.citizen.org/wp-content/uploads/money-doesnt-equal-speech-fact-sheet1.pdf

snip...
Democracy is for People
A Public Citizen Project

Constitutional Amendment to Keep Corporate Money out of Elections:
Overturning the “Money=Speech” Doctrine

Even before its disastrous 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the U.S.
Supreme Court had already developed a flawed reading of the First Amendment that struck
down reforms designed to prevent corruption and to ensure that the voices of the powerful did
not drown out “We the People” in the halls of our democratic institutions. Although the
extraordinary threat of unlimited corporate money in elections is a new expansion of the
doctrine that “money is speech”, decisions of the Court since the Watergate era have enabled
the richest one percent of society to buy outsized influence in our government.

It's a 5 page document mostly about the hazards of money in our political system. They suggest a constitutional amendment to fix the problem, but we all know the probability of that happening. Like the bumper sticker reads, we have the best government money can buy!

[Takket]

8. you absolutely nailed it..........

we can be mad at the corporations but they are playing with the cards that are dealt to them. We need publicly funded elections and if corporations want to put money in the pot that gets distributed to all the candidates (without them knowing where it comes from), then fine.

Then and money given directly to a candidate can be treated as it should: as a bribe, with a prosecution of the briber and bribee (if they don't refuse it). (Giving cash/gifts for lobbying should be treated as a bribe as well)

[tenderfoot]

5. I think what is happening here now is at the behest of US based billionaires/corporations.

They're behind the misinformation, the attacks on public education, the division, etc.

With friends like that, who needs Putin.

[XacerbatedDem]

6. "Despite taking pro-democracy stances in public, many of these companies have continued to fund...

members of Congress who voted against a free and fair election."

Think they might know which side of their toast is buttered? Some companies only keep up their public personna to throw shade upon what they have to do to protect their bottom line. Sick.

[AZProgressive]

7. K&R