On the recordJanuary 26, 2012
I rise today to talk about one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in the history of the Court. Two years ago the Supreme Court handed down the landmark decision Citizens United, and with it they gave corporations a blank check to utterly destroy our political system. I wish to take a few minutes this afternoon to tell my colleagues about the practical impact of this decision and how it threatens our democracy and why we need to do something about it. Let me start with the punch line. In Citizens United, the Supreme Court ruled for the first time that corporations are guaranteed the same free speech rights as real people to influence elections. I didn't say it was a funny punch line. The Court had previously held that money or campaign contributions are speech, so functionally that means the corporations are now able to spend as much money as they want, whenever they want, in any election in this country. Let me tell my colleagues how. My colleagues may have heard a lot about PACs. ``PAC'' is short for political action committee, and it is an entity that is separate from a campaign that can run political ads on issues or support or oppose a candidate. They can also give a limited amount of money directly to campaigns. The idea behind them is that if a number of citizens share views on issues, say, the environment, they can pool their resources, make their views known, and influence an election.…
