How to stop the rich from purchasing your Representatives
For some time, I have been reporting the influence of the moneyed elite, notably George Soros and Tom Steyers, in choosing our elected officers from the White House with the “billionaire club” down to local races. This happens when money flows in from outside where the candidate will serve, allowing those of wealth to replace constituent influence and effectively purchasing the Representatives from outside the districts.
If constituents have lost their power to decide their leaders, how can we pretend any longer that we have a democratic republic?
On the congressional level, those holding “safe seats,” as for example Democrat Nancy Pelosi and Republican Kevin McCarthy, can either build up gigantic arsenals to “nuke” a threatening contender or, worse, hand off their unneeded donations to a like-minded candidate in another state to favorably impact elections, often adverse to the will of its citizens. These outside influences have to stop.
More funding allows more signs and literature to be distributed and more newspaper, radio, and television ads to destroy an opponent or get a message out, resulting in a higher probability of winning. Candidates with the most money and publicity usually win, and the rich, by their funding, select contenders long before the people vote. Therefore, they dominate the result. In many cases more money originates from outside a voting district than within. If no candidate could receive money or influence from outside their district, it would stop much influence peddling.
I advocate for ending outside influences in our nation’s elections and thus offer the following new amendment to the Constitution: “All election funding, outside candidates’ personal wealth (individuals or organizations), in all elections shall originate from eligible voters in the district served by the election and donated since the last election for the same office.”
Propositions are a part of most elections and can be considered without attachment to a candidate. This would not stop the funding or creation of ads for or against a candidate or ballot issues so long as all money used in such originates from voters within the district served by the candidate. The word “original” is designed to stop donation transfer from outside district sources to inside donors to circumvent the amendment.
Under this amendment, the 1996 Bill Clinton campaign could not have received money from China to influence the election, nor from any individual not eligible to vote for president, nor could Clinton Foundation money be used to influence elections as much of that money comes from international contributors. Some of us still remember the Bill Clinton Chinese Fundraising Scandal involving DNC finance chairman John Huang and Chinese nationalist Johnny Chung. The DNC was forced to return more than $2.8 million in illegal or improper donations from foreign nationals, largely from China, to gain favor in the Clinton Administration.
Neither could Koch brothers Charles and David, who fund many Republican Party candidates on the right side of the political spectrum, and George Soros or Tom Steyer, who fund Democratic Party candidates and issues on the left, influence any contest to which they cannot personally vote. This amendment would limit the billionaire class to the “purchase” of only their congressman or senators — not a large group of them.
Both Soros and Steyer bankrolled far-left candidate Andrew Gillum’s Florida campaign for governor, hoping to flip the state from red to blue in anticipation that the resulting electoral count increase could sway the nation for decades. Gillum courted Soros’ organizations and spoke at a number of their gatherings. When they met at San Francisco, he promised to back Gillum’s gubernatorial run. Steyer funneled about $800,000 into the Get Out the Vote initiative prior to the Gillum run, an activity that was targeted to get Gillum elected and hence would be denied Steyer with the new amendment as with most of the $30 million he spent on the midterms. Steyer is a resident of California, not Florida.
Congressmen from “safe” districts could not “handoff” their unneeded donations to like-minded candidates in other districts. Nor could they holdover funding from previous victories to “nuke” future opponents. Contributions are a form of voting normally intended for one candidate only, and for one election only, and they could only be accumulated since the last election for that office. Laws presently limit the amount of individual contributions, but the rich find loopholes in donating, as in the case of Gillum.
The rich have been involved in influencing elections at least since the 1896 “giants of the Industrial Revolution” buyout of William McKinley for president when they used their money to bury opponent William Jennings Bryan. This amendment would not have stopped that as all citizens elect the president — only a rigorous enforcement of present law restricting individual contributions could do that. But today, it would stop international campaign funding as happened in 1996 for Clinton.
Nor will it today stop all of George Soros’ 11 major influence groups, some of which sponsor activities that border on treason. His funding of Antifa, Kavanaugh “Hearing disruptors,” those accosting Senate committee members, and caravans of illegal immigrants from Central America may have to wait for other solutions. But the amendment will prevent him and other rich from replacing constituents in choosing representatives. Expect amendment bipartisan opposition from the rich.
The viewpoints expressed above are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The Independent.
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