The Infestation of Corporate Lobbyists

The response is extraordinary.

Public Citizen supporters across the country are answering my urgent call for financial support with incredible generosity.

We’re pulling out all the stops to challenge corporate power from the moment the new Congress convenes in early January.

In the next four days—before the clock strikes midnight this Friday, December 31—we must reach our $150,000 goal to have a fighting chance against the infestation of corporate lobbyists in Washington, D.C.!

Please contribute $10, $20, $35 or whatever you can right now.

From winning the fight that created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, to mobilizing more than half a million people in support of a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United v. FEC ruling, we’ve done good and great things this year.

Your online activism has been instrumental to the success we’ve achieved together. Now, as we prepare to take on a Congress more beholden to corporate greed than any in recent memory, I’m asking you to supplement your grassroots advocacy with financial support.

We can’t afford to face the new Congress wishing we had done more to strengthen our defenses. Contribute today!

We can’t do what we do without your grassroots advocacy. But we can’t organize and coordinate that grassroots effort without your generous support.

We need to raise $150,000 by midnight this Friday so that corporate lobbyists don’t get even one day’s head start in the new Congress.

Corporate lobbyists have risen to a new level of influence in Washington. They’re not just raising money for members of Congress, they’re joining congressional staffs and writing the very laws that directly benefit their former, and future, employers.

For example, Speaker of the House-elect John Boehner—who once handed out checks from tobacco company PACs on the House floor—hired the chief lobbyist for the medical device industry as his policy director. This example of the “revolving door” is representative of the pro-corporate mindset that dominates the Republican Party and even many Democrats.

Stand with Public Citizen against this corporate faction by contributing $10, $20, $35 or whatever you can.

There’s no question, we’re going to have to work in a more hostile political environment. But Public Citizen has met challenges like this in the past. We took on Nixon. We took on Reagan. We took on Bush. Both of them. And we consistently won substantive reforms and protections that make life better for ordinary Americans like you and me.

Public Citizen’s strength comes from the grassroots activism and financial generosity of our members. I want to thank you for all you’ve contributed by staying informed and taking action as part of our online community. And I want you to know that I’m counting on your financial support, too.

We will do this.

Together.

Robert Weissman, President

P.S. Contribute $100 or more right now and we’ll send you a DVD from a selection of progressive films like Battle in Seattle, An Unreasonable Man and The Story of Stuff as our thanks for your support.

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Close an absurd legal loophole that allows "insider trading" by government officials.

We need you to take action today to close an absurd legal loophole that allows "insider trading" by government officials.

Stop "insider trading" on Capitol Hill!
Believe it or not, members of Congress, high-ranking appointees in the executive branch, and other federal employees who have access to non-public information about publicly traded companies can use that information to buy or sell securities or commodities for personal gain.

Lobbyists--and "political intelligence consultants" paid specifically to haunt the halls of Congress for insider tips--can also get away with this crooked and potentially corrupt practice.

This kind of insider trading is already illegal for corporate executives, Wall Street brokers, and ordinary citizens. This kind of insider trading should be illegal for people who work in and around the government, too.

The Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, introduced by Representatives Brian Baird (D-Wash.), Louise McIntosh Slaughter (D-N.Y.), and Tim Walz (D-Minn.), would close this loophole and prohibit insider trading by federal employees and others who try to cash in on non-public knowledge gleaned from public officials.

This is a no-brainer. The people entrusted to monitor the financial services industry on our behalf must not be tempted to exploit their privileged status for personal gain.

An important hearing on this bill is taking place next week. Use our simple online form and urge your representative to support the STOCK Act today!

Thank you for all you do!

Angela, Eric, Glenn & Maureen
Your Action Team at Public Citizen's Congress Watch Division
action@citizen.org


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