July, 26 2012, 03:33pm EDT
Public Citizen Releases Updated 'White House For Sale' Website to Track Bundlers
On Site, Visitors Can Get Names, Home States and Employers of Major Fundraisers for 2012 Presidential Election
WASHINGTON
Public Citizen today released an updated version of its White House for Sale website, which has kept track of the presidential candidates' "bundlers" since 2004. Bundlers are major fundraisers whose efforts are monitored and credited by the campaigns to which they funnel contributions.
The website, available at www.citizen.org/WhiteHouseForSale, features a searchable database that lists all of the bundlers that President Barack Obama and presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney have disclosed in the 2012 campaign. So far, Obama has disclosed the names of 538 bundlers, including all who have raised at least $50,000.
Romney, on the other hand, is not releasing the names of any bundlers except those required by law: bundlers who are registered lobbyists and raise at least $15,000 in a quarterly period. As a result, Romney has disclosed the names of only 34 bundlers. Romney stands to be the first major party nominee since the 2000 election who has refused to voluntarily disclose his major bundlers.
"More money will be raised in 2012 by the presidential candidates than ever before - more secret corporate slush funds spent attacking the character of these candidates and more opportunities for corruption and scandal as the Big Money-bundlers seek returns on their investment," said Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen. "Public Citizen has revitalized the WhiteHouseForSale website to help voters sift through what is likely to be one of the loudest and corrosive presidential elections in recent history."
Visitors to the site can learn the bundlers' employers, the states where they live and ranges of how much they have raised. The website also gives users the ability to look at other presidential races and compare this season's spending totals and disclosures to historical spending. The website also includes materials on the history of bundling, the presidential public funding system and the use of public funding for elections in the states. It provides a discussion of activities at the party nominating conventions, including the corporate financing of the conventions and the late-night soirees that dominate convention activities.
"We believe this site can provide important information for the public, reporters, researchers and others who want to know who is amassing large amounts of money for the candidates," said Michael Lewis, researcher for Public Citizen's Congress Watch division.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
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Amid Spying Fight, House Passes Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act
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While applauding the U.S. House of Representatives' bipartisan passage of a bill to ensure that "law enforcement and intelligence agencies can't do an end-run around the Constitution by buying information from data brokers" on Wednesday, privacy advocates highlighted that Congress is trying to extend and expand a long-abused government spying program.
The House voted 219-199 for Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act (FANFSA), which won support from 96 Democrats and 123 Republicans, including the lead sponsor, Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio). Named for the constitutional amendment that protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, H.R. 4639 would close what campaigners call the data broker loophole.
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Wednesday's vote followed the House sending the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act to the Senate. H.R. 7888 would reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows for warrantless spying on noncitizens abroad but also sweeps up Americans' data.
The House notably included an amendment forcing a wide range of individuals and businesses to cooperate with government spying operations but rejected an amendment that would have added a warrant requirement to the bill, which the Senate could vote on as soon as Thursday.
Noting those decisions on the FISA reauthorization legislation, Ruddock stressed that "today's vote is a victory but follows a recent loss and ongoing threat as that Section 702 bill moves to the Senate this week too."
"As FANFSA and the 702 reauthorization move to the Senate, lawmakers in that chamber need to take a stand for the rights of people in the United States," she argued. "That means passing FANFSA and reforming Section 702 authority—and prioritizing everyone's First and Fourth Amendment rights."
Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center's Project on Surveillance Oversight, also praised the House's FANFSA passage on Wednesday.
"The passage of the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale underscores the extent to which reining in abusive warrantless surveillance is a bipartisan issue," Scott said. "We urge the Senate to take up this measure and close the data broker loophole."
Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel at ACLU, similarly said Wednesday that "the bipartisan passage of this bill is a flashing warning sign to the government that if it wants our data, it must get a warrant."
Hamadanchy added that "we hope this vote puts a fire under the Senate to protect their constituents and rein in the government's warrantless surveillance of Americans, once and for all."
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As The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw noted:
Since 2011, the U.N. Security Council has rejected the Palestinian Authority's request for full member status. On April 2, the Palestinian Observer Mission to the U.N. requested that the council once again take up consideration of its membership application. According to the first State Department cable, U.N. meetings since the beginning of April suggest that Algeria, China, Guyana, Mozambique, Russia, Slovenia, Sierra Leone, and Malta support granting Palestine full membership to the U.N. It also says that France, Japan, and Korea are undecided, while the United Kingdom will likely abstain from a vote.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who has also claimed to support a so-called "two-state solution"—has alternately boasted about thwarting Palestinian statehood.
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"After a year of preparation, we finally open the doors to our new research consortium, exposing the global network of reactionary forces that corrode our democracies, destroy our planet, and drive us closer to world war," the group added.
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Yanis Varoufakis, a PI member and secretary-general of the left-wing Democracy in Europe Movement 2025, called the database "a treasure chest of well-researched reports on how the reactionaries of the world unite."
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