From the Battle Ground Bulliten 3-28-2012

Colorado Secretary of State Attacks Voting Rights; Promotes Corporate Agenda

Voting rights advocates are waging an on-line campaign to hold CO Secretary of State Scott Gessler accountable for his actions. (Image courtesy of gesslerwatch.com)
The coordinated national attack on voting rights sponsored by corporations like Koch Industries through groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has found an ally in the State of Colorado. Secretary of State Scott Gessler has made it his mission to advance an agenda that disenfranchises ordinary voters while giving corporate interests a bigger stake in campaign funding in the Rocky Mountain State. He has openly acknowledged that he believes his function is to “further the conservative agenda” through the policies and rules issued by the Secretary of State’s office. This is a markedly different vision from most elections officials, who view it as their mission to conduct fair and free elections to promote a healthy democracy.
Gessler has worked toward his goal by loosening campaign finance rules for corporations and tightening the rules for ordinary voters trying to exercise their constitutional rights. He has pursued this anti-working family agenda while still trying to moonlight at a law firm that advises the Colorado Republican Party and shadowy, right-wing political front groups working to elect anti-worker politicians. Progressive groups have launched a website to track and expose Gessler’s over-the-top partisanship at http://gesslerwatch.com/.

Gessler’s assertions in the media have been so provocative that Congress last year asked the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate his office, following his dubious assertions that as many as 11,805 undocumented residents were illegally registered to vote in Colorado and more than 4,000 had voted in the 2010 elections. Gessler never provided adequate evidence for this or other assertions that were primarily intended to increase doubt among the voters in the security of what is a model national voting system.

Gessler later filed suit against several Colorado counties to keep them from sending ballots (in an all-mail election last year) to eligible voters who missed the 2010 election. He argued that anyone who missed the last election, including active-duty military personnel who were defending our country abroad during 2010, should be declared inactive and not receive a ballot.
Just this week, Gessler is putting in place rules that open the doors to unlimited, unregulated, unreported corporate money in Colorado politics. One loophole in the new rules could allow Koch Industries or the Coors Corporation to give millions to a county party committee which could then turn the cash over to the state party to evade long-standing contribution limits. Gesler’s rules would also allow corporations like Walmart to spend up to 30% of their annual revenue to support anti-worker ballot measures without ever filing a report with state elections officials.

Our allies in this fight for voters’ rights filed a ballot initiative last week that would take the role of administering elections away from Gessler’s highly partisan Secretary of State’s office and put it in the hands of a non-partisan election administrator. AFSCME members in Colorado will continue these and other efforts to hold Gessler accountable and protect voters’ rights for the critical 2012 elections.

*Note: I did not write this, mearly copied it for dissemation of information to members of Local 1335. This post was sent out on the AFSCME Battleground Bulliten 3-28-2012

Pure Garbage!

Welcome back to the world of blogging, Josa! Its been a few weeks....

I am constantly amazed how journalists misreport campaign finance issues. After reading the article in the Pueblo Chieftain titled "Incestuous" I took some time to ground myself, and think of what I wanted to write as a response to such nonsense. I am hoping everyone takes the time to read this, so for those purposes I will refrain from my usual language. If you haven't read that mess you can see the piece here: http://m.chieftain.com/mobile/opinion/editorials/incestuous/article_36d9155e-7303-11e1-8c29-0019bb2963f4.html

The opinion piece references an article in the Denver Post that was both incomplete and inaccurate. It reports that liberal Independent Expenditure groups spent 150 times more money than the conservatives. This statement is simply absurd! The right wing, conservative forces move more money through 527s than independent expenditures, and they also move a lot of their money through their 501(c)4s, which do NOT report donors. The charge that big oil, payday lenders and Wall Street are being outspent by unions is just silly. The right wing is just more interested in hiding their money, while our side (labor, in case you didnt know what side im on!) believes in transparency and accountability. All of these negative assertions are being put forward because conservatives do not have a positive agenda to promote, and they can only point fingers at the successful campaign operations of their opponents. I would also imagine fear is a large factor in the deceptive and critic nature of their general arguments!

Corporate interests have always outspent unions by more than 10 to 1. Union members ability to pool their meager resources together is the only way to stem the gigantic tide of corporate spending and support an agenda for ALL working families. The rise of super PACs (political action committees), following the Citizens United decision, has seen that disparity grow. It is difficult to track how much more the Koch brothers and other big Wall Street interests groups are outspending unions, but conservative Super PACs have already spent $76 million and raised $121 million. Liberal Super PACs have only raised $23 million (source: http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/superpacs.php). And the campaign season has just started…in fact, election day is 223 days away!

As a union member, I also believe strongly in supporting policies and candidates that help ALL working families. While we do support positions that directly help our members, our larger effort is directed at improving the quality of life for all working families. A recent example of this is the Lilly Ledbetter Act. This act expanded workers rights to include equal pay for women! Did I mention this act helped ALL women not just union women! Corporate interests would have women working the same job, with the same duties, for less pay! This makes sense to them because it's a profit issue NOT a people issue. So, while organized labor is pooling their money so people like Lilly Ledbetter can be compensated at a rate that is EQUAL of her male counter parts, what is the GOP spending their money on?

Lastly, I would like to comment on the irresponsible lazy journalism in our local paper! Instead of doing their own research, they rely on the skewed, inaccurate reporting of the Denver Post. Is our editorial board too lazy to do their own research and provide the people of Pueblo with accurate reporting, or will they continue to take the information that best suits them and go off on tangents to mislead the public?! That is my rant for the day hope that helped shed some light on this issue! Until the next post…..

-Josa