ALEC UNMASKED
America, do you know the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEX)? They are at it again, and if you don’t know who they are, you will after you read this article. ALEC is a non-profit 501(c) political organization founded in 1973. It is funded by several of the nations’ most influential corporations that you, we do business with and buy products from every day. ALEC and Friends’ overarching goals are to use Diabolical Creepy Moves to bring down our Democratic way of life as we know it.
The following corporations are just some of the funders behind ALEC: American Bail Coalition, American Water, Altria Group, AT&T, Diageo, Energy Future Holdings, ExxonMobil Corporation, Koch Companies, NetChoice, Peabody Energy, Pfizer Inc., PhRMA, State Budget Solutions, State Farm Insurance Co., United Parcel Service (UPS) and many others.
ALEC is very busy writing GOP voter suppression bills while spending millions to pass them. Working with other Right-wing conservative groups, ALEX has aggressively manufactured over 250 modeled voter suppression restrictions bills that will negatively affect millions of voters. They are well known as the nation’s best-known fill-in-the-blank model bill factory for a wide array of Republicans conservative causes.
Fact: Corporations use ALEC, a tax-exempted organization, to formulate, present and promote model legislation for mostly elected officials on the state level who are ALEC members, and hold leadership roles in the organization. Legislators across the nation introduce similar or identical bills designed to boost corporate power and profits, reduce worker’s rights, limit corporate accountability, or restricted voting rights. The very Legislation that you thought was written and pass into law was probably written for your state lawmaker by corporate lobbyists working through the American Legislative Exchange Council.
ALEC has produced model bills on a broad range of issues, such as reducing regulation and corporate taxation, combating immigration, loosening environmental restrictions, tightening voter identification rules, weakening labor unions, and opposing gun control. The expansion of concealed carry laws — and the push for unrestricted access to assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. ALEC is a one-stop-shop for corporations looking to identify friendly state legislators to work to get special-interest legislation introduced.
ALEC-modeled Legislation ensures that our governments’ tax dollars collected from the middle and low-income people will benefit the wealthiest 1%. It’s a win-win for corporations, their lobbyists, and right-wing legislators. But the big losers are citizens whose rights and best interests are sold off by elected officials to the highest bidder.
Knowing what you now know, should you/we support any corporation or Individuals that Support ALEC? ALEC’s significant funders include, but are not limited to the following: Exxon Mobil, the Scaife family (Allegheny Foundation and the Scaife Family Foundation), the Coors family (Castle Rock Foundation), Charles Koch (Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation and the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation), the Bradley family (The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation) and the Olin family (John M. Olin Foundation). These organizations consistently finance right-wing think tanks and political groups.
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) describes itself as the largest membership association of state legislators; however, over 98% of its revenue comes from corporations and corporate foundations. ALEC is not just a lobby or a front group; it is much more potent than that.
ALEC provides state legislators with wish lists of model legislation that benefit corporations and wealthy individuals’ bottom line. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER and knowledge of ALEC will help Americans identify ALEC-controlled/corrupted politicians IN THEIR STATE and work to remove them from office. Most importantly, Americans must understand that ALEC’s agenda extends into almost all areas and levels of legislation/law.
ALEC and their GOP puppets are attempting to pass voter suppression laws in 43 states. Greed is at the center of their efforts to undermine environmental regulations, deny climate change; support school privatization; undercut health care reform; defund unions and limit their political influence; restrain legislatures’ abilities to raise revenue through taxes; mandate strict election laws that disenfranchise voters; increase incarceration to benefit the private prison industry, and so much more. In Georgia, the Republicans’ dastardly deeds committed in secrecy have now come to light. Now we know exactly millions of Americans lives are being negatively affected by ALEC-controlled Republican funded Private Corporate Interests.