The Supreme Court is currently considering whether to hear a case that will enable it tocorrect its error in Citizens United and overrule its indefensible decision to allow unlimited corporate and other wealthy donor money to influence elections. Neither the corporate lobby nor the Senate’s top Republican are eager to see this occur, however. Both of them filed briefs in the Supreme Court yesterday urging the justices to not only reaffirm Citizens United, but to do so without even hearing argument in the case.
Neither one of these briefs are surprising. The Chamber is one of the nation’s biggest spenderson elections, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has long been an opponent of campaign finance regulation. Before President Bush appointed Justice Alito, who became the fifth vote to tear down much of America’s checks on big money in politics, the seminal case upholding America’s ability to defend against such money was McConnell v. FEC. In that case, Sen. McConnell was the lead plaintiff who sued — mostly unsuccessfully — to toss out the McCain/Feingold campaign finance law.
Yet while the briefs are unsurprising, they demonstrate both the corporate lobby and the Republican Party’s commitment to keeping wealthy interest groups’ ability to buy and sell elections intact.
But there is a large element of hypocrisy and contradiction in the spots. One typical ad praises former Sen. George Allen (R-VA), who was defeated in 2006 following his infamous bullying of an Indian-American campaign tracker who he called “macaca” and is seeking his party’s nomination for the same senate seat this November. The narrator says:
Big government isn’t going to help the American recovery. We need to focus on jobs to get our economy back on track. In the Senate, George Allen supported tax cuts that spurred economic growth. He supports a Balanced Budget Amendment. And as Virginia’s governor, Allen cut spending and waste with bipartisan support. Call George Allen. Tell him to keep fighting to promote Virginia jobs.
Watch the ad:
But the Chamber has a selective memory. It was a leading proponent of President Obama’s 2009 stimulus legislation promising that the tax cuts and even many of law’s spending provisions would “provide stimulus and get Americans back to work.” Allen has called the law a “jobless stimulus.”
Though the measure passed almost entirely along party lines, the Chamber spent millions in 2010 to defeat the Democrats who backed the bill — and some of that money may have come from foreign businesses. The $789 billion law has been the largest increase in spending in the Obama presidency.
A constitutional amendment requiring a balanced budget would have rendered this stimulus bill — and the preservation of the Allen-backed tax cuts that the Chamber claims spurred growth — impossible.
But even if three years is too long ago for the Chamber to remember, one would think they could remember back to last week. For just as the group blitzed Americans with messages that a smaller government was a panacea to solve the woes of a demonstrably improving economy, its own “Americans for Transportation Mobility Coalition” launched an ad last week calling formore federal government spending on transportation. With clips of President Ronald Reagan, the spot demands “new investments in transportation to keep America moving and jobs growing.” That would likely mean more “big government.”
Last week, ThinkProgress raised questions about the timing of a $1 million contribution from News Corp. to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that came shortly before theChamber launched a high-profile campaign to weaken the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) — the very same anti-bribery law that News Corp. could be prosecuted under in the United States. The Chamber quickly dismissed any links between the News Corp contribution and its campaign as “preposterous.”
Today, however, it was revealed that News Corp. has retained Debevoise & Plimpton, the firm of former Bush Attorney General Michael Mukasey, the very same lawyer who just so happens to be leading the Chamber’s campaign to weaken the FCPA.
The legal blog Main Justice, which has been covering the unfolding scandal, spoke to a legal expert about News Corp.’s new lawyers and writes:
The reports linking the two “might have been described fairly speculative before today,” said Heather Lowe, legal counsel at Global Financial Integrity. But the decision to hire Mukasey “goes a long way toward shoring up that allegation,” Lowe said.
Last month, Mukasey testified before Congress and suggested changes to the FCPA, some of which would appear to potentially benefit News Corp., such as limiting the liability of a parent company if it can prove it was not aware of its foreign subsidiary’s criminal activities. (Yesterday during testimony before Parliament, James and Rupert Murdoch both disclaimed any knowledge of the alleged criminal activities taking place at U.S.-based News Corps’ U.K. subsidiary, News International.)
For Mukasey’s services fronting their campaign to weaken the anti-bribery law, the U.S. Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform (ILR) paid Debevoise & Plimpton, News Corp’s new firm,$10,000 during the first quarter of this year. Just two days ago, Debevoise & Plimpton reported that it had been paid another $110,000 by the Chamber’s ILR during the second quarter. The Chamber’s ILR has also engaged several other DC lobbying firms to assist it with its campaign.
The Chamber’s campaign to weaken the FCPA is already paying dividends, with Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), the chair of a key subcommittee on the House Judiciary Committee,indicating that he is writing a bill to weaken the FCPA based on the Chamber’s complaints andMukasey’s testimony before his committee during last month’s hearing.
For its part, News Corp’s PAC has contributed $28,000 to Sensenbrenner’s campaigns since 1989 (the oldest year available) — enough to make News Corp. Sensenbrenner’s 11th largest all-time donor.
As ThinkProgress reported in October, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is pushing to overhaulthe Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), the government’s main enforcement mechanism to stop American-based multinational firms from bribing foreign governments in order to win special business advantages. The Chamber thinks the law is too burdensome for American businesses and makes them less competitive compared to foreign companies, which are freer to engage in corruption.
The Blog of Legal Times reports the Chamber has now enlisted a powerful ally to fight the scourge of anti-corruption — President Bush’s Attorney General Michael Mukasey:
Debevoise & Plimpton, where Mukasey is a partner, filed lobbying registration papers on his behalf this month, according to Senate records. The registration is for the Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform and is effective back to March 3. It covers possible FCPA amendments and other issues “related to criminal law and policies affecting U.S. corporations.” [...]
Harold Kim, senior vice president at the Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform, said he’s pleased with Mukasey’s hiring. “He brings a wealth of experience on these matters given his past positions as attorney general of the United States as well as chief judge of the Southern District of New York,” Kim said in an interview. “I think he’ll be a good advocate as part of our overall efforts to secure some more clarity and certainty with respect to the current statute.”
The Chamber may have decided to take on the FCPA now because President Obama’s Department of Justice has decided to do what Bush’s Department of Justice under Mukasey didn’t — thoroughly enforce the law. Under Obama, the department collectedmore than $1 billion in fines during fiscal year 2010, the most the government has collected in the law’s 38-year history, and more than ten times the $87 million collected in 2007 by the Bush Administration.
Yesterday, ThinkProgress released an exclusive investigation into the underhanded and surreptitious campaign waged by a lobbying firm representing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a right-wing association representing big business. The report detailed how Hunton & Williams, a lobbying firm hired by the Chamber, solicited “private security” companies to investigate the Chamber’s political opponents, including ThinkProgress, the labor coalition Change to Win, SEIU, US Chamber Watch, and StopTheChamber.com. Their tactics included planting false documents, creating fake personas, and targeting opponents’ families and children.
In response, the Chamber of Commerce said these were “baseless attacks” because the Chamber had “never seen the document in question.” In addition, they mention that the security firm in question (presumably HBGary) had not been “hired” by the Chamber or on the Chamber’s behalf.
However, as Marcy Wheeler wrote, their response is a “carefully worded nondenial denial.” In reality, the reason why the Chamber can claim not to have “hired” HBGary is because until as recently as a week ago, the security firm was working on spec. As Wheeler pointed out, a February 3 email shows that Hunton & Williams simply got “HBGary to do a month of work for free to decide whether they want to hire them.”
In fact, the Chamber conveniently used Hunton & Williams as a go-between for the Chamber and private security firms including HBGary, as the following graphic shows:
Indeed, leaked emails show that Hunton & Williams met with the security firms in late 2010, including a November 3 meeting at H&W’s offices and a phone discussion onNovember 8.
On January 13, 2011, an email shows that the private security firms assumed the project was “a go.” However, an email on February 3 showed that Hunton & Williams wanted the firms to work on spec “and then present jointly with H&W to the Chamber” on or around February 14. Then, after their work was approved, the security firms planned to “begin enduring work at agreed upon rates (approx. $250-300k per month for the entire team – both services and license fees).”
It is not clear if that meeting will still happen after HBGary’s emails were leaked.
Earlier today, ThinkProgress published an exclusive report that the law firm representing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a right-wing trade association representing big business, is working with set of “private security” companies and lobbying firms to undermine their political opponents, including ThinkProgress. According to e-mails obtained by ThinkProgress, the Chamber hired the lobbying firm Hunton and Williams. Attorneys for the firm solicited a set of private security firms — HB Gary Federal, Palantir, and Berico Technologies (collectively called Team Themis) — to develop a sabotage campaign against progressive groups and labor unions, including ThinkProgress, the labor coalition Change to Win, SEIU, US Chamber Watch, and StopTheChamber.com.
New emails reveal that the private spy company investigated the families and children of the Chamber’s political opponents. The apparent spearhead of this project was Aaron Barr, an executive at HB Gary. Barr circulated numerous emails and documents detailing information about political opponents’ children, spouses, and personal lives.
One of the targets was Mike Gehrke, a former staffer with Change to Win. Among the information circulated about Gehrke was the specific “Jewish church” he attended and a link to pictures of his wife and two children (sensitive information was redacted by ThinkProgress):
Another target was Brad Friedman, co-founder of The Brad Blog. Barr’s profile of Freidman included information about his life partner and his home address (sensitive information redacted by ThinkProgress):
This tactic of targeting opponents’ personal lives and family was not simply a random event. Rather, it was a concerted and deliberate effort to use anything possible to smear the Chamber’s political opponents. To dramatize his firm’s intimidation tactics, Barr sent an email to Hunton & Williams attorney John Woods that contained personal details about fellow Hunton attorney Richard Wyatt, who was representing the Chamber. The email was intended to show Woods and Wyatt how “vulnerable” they are:
ThinkProgress will continue to report on this developing story as more details emerge.
Today, President Obama addressed the leaders of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a highly ideologicalright-wing trade association representing mostlylarge international corporations. Obama urged the audience of business executives to “get in the game” and spend some of the trillions of dollars corporations have compiled in the past year on job creation. Indeed, much of the executive leadership of the Chamber has spent the past few years rewarding themselves with millions in additional compensation while eliminating American jobs.
Trucking Manufacturer Navistar Inc Is On The US Chamber’s Board Of Directors:
– In 2010, Naivstar CEO Daniel Ustianincreased his total compensation by 27%, from $6.64 million in FY 2009 to $8.43 million in the year that ended October 31. The company has enjoyed healthy profits: in 2009, it earned $320 million, or $4.46 a share, and in 2010, it made $223 million, or $3.11 a share.
– Navistar has slashed jobs at factories across the country. In Springfield, Ohio, Navistar laid off250 workers from a truck assembly plant. At itsplant in Arkansas, the company laid off 477 in 2009 after letting 300workers go in 2008. Amid the layoffs and plant closures, Navistar, a major military contractor, openeda new factory in Mexico last year.
Telecommunications Giant AT&T Is On The US Chamber’s Board Of Directors:
– AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson was awarded a compensation package valued at $20.3 million in 2009, a jump of 35% from 2008. Last year, AT&T devoted an extra $8.99 million into Stephenson’s pension plan, ensuring that his retirement will include a pension “equal to 60 percent of his highest average salary and bonus in three of his last 10 years at the company. Although he’s not currently eligible for retirement, his pension is valued at an estimated $31 million today.”
– In recent years, AT&T has aggressively downsized its American workforce. In 2008, the company killed over 16,000 jobs as the recession hit. But in the last two years as AT&T enjoyed record profits, the company announced layoffs of “hundreds” in Kansas, 96 in Reynoldsburg, Ohio,150 in Connecticut, 525 technicians in California, and 140 jobs inOklahoma.
Agricultural Manufacturer Deere And Co. (John Deere Company) Is On The US Chamber’s Board Of Directors:
– Samuel Allen, the CEO and Chairman of Deere and Co., was awarded a compensation package in 2010 three times the size of his pay in 2009. Allen’s compensation was $12.29 million in 2010.
– As Deere and Co. recorded high profits, the company slashed jobs. The company killed 367 jobs in East Moline, Illinois, 325 in Iowa, and 89jobs in North Dakota.
Health Insurance Company WellPoint Is On The US Chamber’s Board Of Directors:
– In recent years, WellPoint has reported record profits and extraordinary executive compensation. In 2009, WellPoint CEO Angela Braly was awarded a 51% compensation boost from $8.7 million in 2008 to $13.1 million.
– During the same period of high profits and highly compensated executives, WellPoint shed thousands of jobs. In 2009, WellPoint laid off1,500 employees across the nation. Following the first round of layoffs, the company got rid of an additional 136 jobs in Missouri and 111 inWisconsin. Notably, during this same period WellPoint’s trade association secretly transfered $86 million to the Chamber to fight health reform.
Despite bloated rhetoric about the virtues of “free enterprise,” the Chamber demanded taxpayer bailouts for its bank members (AIG, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, etc.), billions in taxpayer money for its defense contract members, taxpayer money forcleaning up BP’s oil spill, and preferential tax cuts for its millionaire executives.
As ThinkProgress has documented, the Chamber has a history of being singularly focused on boosting profits, not creating American jobs. The Chamber has pushed for unfettered free trade deals, sponsored a series of conferences to teach businesses how to outsource jobs to China, and even lobbied against legislation that would have created over 1.7 million jobs.
Several dozen protesters demonstrated in front of the Chamber today as Obama walked across Lafayette Park from the White House to the business lobby. Watch a video produced by ThinkProgress interns Kevin Donohue and Paul Breer:
– Lee Fang, Zaid Jilani, Kevin Donohue and Paul Breer
At a Washington DC press conference, U.S. Chamber of Commerce officials blasted President Obama’s call for a clean energy future. Christopher Guith, vice president for policy at the Chamber’s Institute for 21st Century Energy, said a national clean-energy standard is “ridiculously premature,” even though 25 states have renewable and alternative energy standards, the first established in 1983. The Institute’s president, former Bush official Karen Harbert, said that the United States should instead allow “increased access to land for oil and gas drilling both onshore and offshore,” drilling a deeper holewith fossil fuel dependence.
This opposition to clean-energy job creation on behalf of big oil is nothing new for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Throughout the 2000s, the chamber led the opposition to action on climate change, promoting global warming denial. Its history of defending pollution at the expense of the health of the American public and American jobs, however, goes deeper:
1999: Chamber of Commerce opposes reinstating Superfund taxes on toxic polluters. In a letter earlier this month to the Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate, two large pro-business groups urged Congress not to reinstate the taxes. “Raising taxes on industry runs directly counter to congressional efforts to reduce taxes,” said the top officials at the National Association of Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. [National Journal, 10/19/99]
1997: Chamber of Commerce fights stronger smog and soot standards.The Chamber questioned the scientific studies used by the EPA to justify the tougher health standards, arguing that more research should be done before businesses are burden with standards that will require new and expensive additional pollution controls. [AP, 5/28/97]
1993: Chamber of Commerce opposes trade sanctions in NAFTA for failure to enforce environmental laws. “Authority to impose sanctions against private interests in any of the three countries should remain with the individual governments, and not be ceded to some supranational body not accountable to voters,” said Willard Workman, vice president, international, of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. [Journal of Commerce, 4/13/93]
1992: Chamber of Commerce opposes binding global warming treaty.The U.S. Chamber of Commerce warned that it would block any attempts to include binding commitments to reduce gases related to global warming. [Greenwire, 9/16/92]
1990: Chamber of Commerce attacks Clean Air Act revision. The Chamber said that the proposed legislation would ”vastly increase the cost and complexity” of environmental regulations – perhaps costing U.S. industry $20 billion more a year. The Chamber of Commerce particularly objected to provisions of the Clean Air bill that would tighten pollution controls related to motor vehicles, smog, coal and toxic chemicals. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 8/23/90]
1988: Chamber of Commerce criticizes call for action on global warming as a “scare statement.” The Chamber’s Harvey Alter called the ”Blueprint for the Environment”’ prepared by 30 environmental groups full of ‘broad scare statements,” including: that ”…global warming threatens to devastate the world, but no timeframe is mentioned. Depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer will damage agriculture and marine life and cause an epidemic of skin cancer, but no mention of the remedial actions now in place is made.” [Inside Energy, 12/19/88]
1984: Chamber of Commerce opposes hazardous waste dumping ban.Harvey Alter, manager of the natural resources office at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, argued a ban on the dumping of wastes containing dioxin, polychlorinated biphenyls, heavy metals, halogenated organic compounds and cyanides would only “promote illegal dumping”. [Chemical Week, 8/8/84]
1982: Chamber of Commerce petitions to weaken Clean Air Act, claiming it kills jobs. “Obviously, the Clean Air Act needs to be changed,” said Dr. Harvey Alter, manager of the chamber’s resources and environmental quality department. “The construction ban has no place in this country. It is an inherently unfair punishment of communities and does not clean the air.” [Associated Press, 7/15/82]
1981: Chamber of Commerce compiles secret hit list of federal employees for Reagan. In 1981, the Chamber compiled a ”hit list” of 18 government employees it urged the Reagan White House to dump from their jobs, including 10 EPA officials; Anthony Roisman, former chief of the Justice Department’s hazardous waste section; a half dozen Labor Department employes, and Maxine Savitz, deputy assistant energy secretary. [UPI, 9/6/84]
Last night, the Daily Show’s Jon Stewart skewered Republicans for killing deficit neutral legislation to provide health care to the 9/11 first responders and emergency workers who suffered illnesses from working at Ground Zero. He also mocked the celebrity-obsessed media that has completely ignored the story. Republicans, like Sen. John Thune (R-SD), filibustered the bill because they said tax cuts for the richest 2 percent were a higher priority for Congress. While Republicans quietly snuffed out efforts to compensate 9/11 heroes, they were aided by a quiet lobbying campaign by the powerful lobbying front — the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The Chamber fought to help kill the 9/11 compensation bill because it was funded by ending a special tax loophole exploited by foreign corporations doing business in the United States.
The “U.S.” part of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a misnomer. As ThinkProgress reported, the Chamber represents dozens of foreign businesses in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia, Bahrain, India, Brazil, and other countries. An investigation of the Chamber turned up recent fundraising documents from the Chamber soliciting foreign contributions to the Chamber’s 501(c)(6), the tax entity the Chamber used to run nasty campaign ads against Democrats earlier this year.
In September, the Chamber sent a letter officially opposing the 9/11 first responders bill, called the “James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010.” The Chamber warned that ending the tax loophole would “damage U.S. relationships with major trading partners” and “aggravate already unsettled financial markets.” A lobbying disclosure filed with the Senate confirms the Chamber contacted lawmakers to help kill the bill.
In typical fashion, the Chamber has not revealed which of its foreign members had asked them to kill the 9/11 bill. As the Chamber CEO explained to the Washington Monthly’s James Verini, the entire purpose of the Chamber is to provide “deniability” to corporations that want to affect the outcomes of elections or of public policy. In 2009, the Chamber secretly used a $86 million donation from the health insurance industry to fight health reform. At the time, the Chamber lied and claimed to the public that they were simply acting on behalf of the entire “business community.”
Republicans are continuing to protest any renewed attempts to pass the 9/11 first responders bill because of the tax issue raised by the Chamber. Yesterday, Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) sent out a statement that mirrored the Chamber’s opposition to ending the foreign corporate tax loophole.
By Lee Fang
Over the weekend, CNN’s Ed Henry drummed up the idea that President Obama should to go to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest right-wing big business lobby, to give a speech as a “peace offering.” The Chamber, which helped kill President Obama’s initiatives on climate change, clean energy, labor reform, and lobbied against Obama’s reforms on health care and Wall Street reform, also funneled $75 million into helping elect Republicans in the midterm elections. “It would be particularly good timing for Obama to try and set the agenda and tee up his State of the Union address later in the month, not to mention hit the reset button on his fractured relationship with the business community,” wrote Henry, eagerly cheering on the move. Yesterday, the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein confirmed that administration officials are indeed interested in reaching out to the Chamber.
As ThinkProgress has noted, journalists often give undue credit to the Chamber as the “voice for business” simply because the Chamber is an old institution, they associate it with separate and distinct local Chambers that actually represent small businesses, and because the U.S. Chamber has one of the most sophisticated media outreach programs in Washington, D.C. But the Chamber does not deserve such respect, either from journalists or President Obama. Despite the “U.S.” in the Chamber’s name, the Chamber has consistently placed the priorities of its select corporate members over the interest of the American people:
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has long opposed women’s rights. For example, the Chamber lobbied against Sen. Al Franken’s (D-MN) bill to allow victims of rape to file a lawsuit against their defense contractor employers. The Chamber also lobbied against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the Paycheck Fairness Act, and numerous other bills to address systematic gender inequality.
– The U.S Chamber of Commerce has been the driving force against consumer, worker, and public safety laws for nearly a century. This year, it lobbied against regulating BPA, a chemical found to cause birth defects and genital mutations. The Chamber has a history of fighting work place safety regulations, the Clean Air Act, the Mine Safety Act, and other fundamental programs used to strengthen American society.
— The U.S. Chamber of Commerce helped President Bush in his attempt to privatize Social Security and his drive to deregulate Wall Street. Even during President Roosevelt’s era, the Chamber lobbied against the New Deal agenda, especially the passage of Social Security. After its members helped cause the Great Depression, the Chamber still fought against regulating Wall Street as well as measures such as unemployment insurance. Chamber officials charged that Roosevelt was attempting to “Sovietize America.”
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is responsible for many of the policies that have made America the most unequal in terms of income/wealth distribution in the industrialized world. On tax policy, the Chamber has pushed efforts to repeal the estate tax while helping to pass the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. Corporate tax loopholes promoted by the Chamber ensure that corporations like ExxonMobil pay zero corporate income taxes while regular American workers foot much of the Treasury’s bill. The Chamber also opposed the creation of a minimum wage, and has lobbied against nearly every increase in the federal minimum wage.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce doesn’t even necessarily represent American businesses. As first reported by ThinkProgress, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce recently began a fundraising program soliciting foreign corporations to give to the Chamber’s account that in turn was used to run attack ads during the midterm elections. The Chamber admitted that it fundraises from foreign donors, but has refused to reveal how it finances its political campaign expenditures. ThinkProgress noted that the Chamber has aided its foreign members by lobbying this year to kill a bill to close tax loopholes for businesses that ship jobs overseas, and has even sponsored seminars to teach businesses how to ship their jobs to places like China.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has consistently sided with polluters and the fossil fuel industry. Not only has the Chamber challenged the science of climate change, but after BP’s oil spill, Chamber CEO Tom Donohue said American taxpayers should pay for the clean up.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce practices the politics of division and hate when it serves their corporate interests. Throughout 2010, the Chamber worked closely with hate television star Glenn Beck, who calls President Obama a “racist” who has a “deep-seated hatred for white people.” Top Chamber lobbyists met secretly with Beck at a meeting in June to plan the midterm elections, and Beck has sponsored on-air fundraisers for the Chamber. Similarly, the Chamber joined Sen. Joseph McCarthy (R-WI) to eagerly brand political opponents — like labor organizers and liberal intellectuals — as communists during McCarthy’s red scare.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has worked to give corporations unfettered control of government. For instance, the Chamber successfully filed an amicus brief in the Citizens United case to roll back nearly a century of campaign finance laws. Because of the Chamber’s efforts, corporations can spend unlimited amounts in American elections. Now the Chamber is attempting to repeal legislation aimed at discouraging American businesses from bribing foreign governments.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce fought every attempt at health reform, from Truman to Johnson to Nixon to Clinton to Obama’s efforts to help the American people gain access to quality health care. The Chamber even tried to stop the passage of Medicare under President Johnson.
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce often places the profits of its member companies over American foreign policy objectives. Last year, the Chamber lobbied against President Obama’s efforts to place economic sanctions on Iran. In 1941, the Chamber was one of the most outspokenopponents of intervening in World War II (Chamber officials feared that war would give Roosevelt more power and wartime spending would lead to higher deficits, then higher taxes).
– The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has a sordid history with civil rights. It opposed key planks of the Civil Rights Act, and lobbied against the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Recently, the Chamber paid for campaign advertising to help Sen.-elect Rand Paul (R-KY), who told ThinkProgress he too opposed the ADA.
If Obama chooses to address the Chamber, he should draw a line in the sand, as Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) did when he spoke to the Chamber in October. President Obama should work with any stakeholder when it serves the American people and America’s best interests. If he chooses to make peace with the Chamber, it should be on mutual terms and on policies which benefit America — not only the Chamber’s tiny clique of corporate members.
By Lee Fang
This morning, Bloomberg reporter Drew Armstrong broke an incredible story revealing that
health insurance companies, like UnitedHealth and CIGNA, funneled $86.2 million into the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2009 to pay for the Chamber’s multifaceted campaign to kill President Obama’s health reform legislation. In January of this year, the National Journal’s Peter Stone reported that insurers had pumped $20 million into the Chamber for its anti-health reform campaign. Armstrong’s report exposes the true extent to which insurers worked to fool the public and defeat health reform. However, the report also poses new questions about the role of insurance companies in the health reform debate.
Why did insurance companies try to hide their donations to the Chamber’s anti-health reform campaign? Given their own unpopularity and Obama’s pledge to be the first leader to successfully reform America’s broken health system, the health insurance industry hatched a plan to fundamentally deceive the public, the press, and politicians. Instead of fighting reform tooth and nail, the insurance industry worked to manipulate the process and ultimately kill reforms by adopting what ThinkProgress termed “The Duplicitous Campaign.” In public, health insurance lobbyists and executives promised to support reform and work closely with reform advocates. The top health insurance lobbyist, Karen Ignagni, went to the White House early in the reform debate and promised Obama, “You have our commitment to play, to contribute and to help pass health-care reform this year.”
In private, the health insurance industry worked with conservative think tanks and media, right-wing front groups, and highly ideological trade associations like the National Association of Manufacturers and the Chamber to kill the bill. By using third party groups and ideological cover, the health insurance industry sought to trick Americans into hating reform. In September of 2009, while many in the media still believed insurance executives were honestly supporting reform, ThinkProgress released a report detailing the ways in which the health insurance industry secretly worked to undermine the process and poison public opinion (read it here). We also produced a video with health insurance whistle-blower Wendell Potter, who explained how insurers control the debate to defeat reform:
ThinkProgress busted several anti-reform groups, like Conservatives for Patients’ Rights, Coalition to Protect Patients’ Rights and Center for Medicine in the Public Interest as industry-created fronts used to deceive the public. As ThinkProgress also first reported, health insurance companies like WellPoint and Blue Cross Blue Shield paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to anti-reform talking heads like former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. In December of 2009, ThinkProgress produced an exclusive investigation showing how health insurance executives are also secretly working to undermine and undo reform on the state level by orchestrating state-based constitutional challenges to the law. The question for the press and for politicians becomes: we now know that health insurance companies absolutely lied to the public about its role in the reform process in 2009. How much are health insurers funding efforts to repeal the law and weaken health reform regulations?
According to a new report by HCAN, a pro-reform group, health insurers posted a 22 percent increase in profits for 2010, largely by shedding customers. How much of that money — money from health insurance premiums — is being used on right-wing lobbying campaigns instead of actual treatments and health care for the sick?
By Tanya Somanader
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has become a behemoth of political influence, making high-powered and well-funded attempts to reshapepolicies to fititsagenda. Thanks to the Citizens United Supreme Court decision and its trade association designation, the Chamber can leverage significant funds from its 501(c)(6) account — which includes donations solicited from foreign corporations — in campaign attacks against Democrats without ever having to disclose its donors. Despite significantscrutiny and criticism, the Chamber refusesto disclose how dues and other contributions are being spent.
But not all of the Chamber’s members are happy about its opaque political activities. Last week, a coalition of 275 institutional shareholders with $100 billion in assets under management from the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) sent a letter to company directors who are members of the Chamber to express deep concern over the Chamber’s “extremely antagonistic position” on the Affordable Care Act. Concerned that the Chamber’s pursuit of an anti-health care agenda — especially with the possible use of “foreign monies” — may damage their reputation, these investors are demanding the Chamber reveal whether company dues are being used in this “ill-conceived strategy,” and that company directors withhold all dues or withdraw membership “until the Chamber refrains from further investment in negative advertising”:
The Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility and its members…are writing to express our profound concerns about our company’s potential role in furthering the highly politicized agenda of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in the 2010 mid-term election and the Chamber’s continued hostile opposition to health care reform. [...]
The Chamber’s punitive campaign, a veritable “hit list” of health care supporters, is counter-productive and explicitly partisan. … As [our company]‘s board representative to the Chamber, it is vitally important to ensure that the company is not seen to be the unwitting supporter of this initiative. We strongly believe that the media attention this issue has generated, particularly surrounding allegations of the co-mingling of foreign monies, poses significant risk to our company’s reputation. Further, we fully expect that you will use your influence to encourage other Chamber members to abandon this ill-conceived strategy.
As concerned shareholders, many of us working in the health care industry, we ask that you take steps to eliminate any risks associated with this issue, and make available all information regarding the use of our membership dues to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for review no later than October 30th. Further, as we believe that dues to the Chamber support the infrastructure which coordinates this campaign, we request that you publicly declare your opposition by either withholding your dues until the Chamber refrains from further investment in negative advertising, or if necessary, withdraw your membership in protest.
This is the ICCR’s second appeal to Chamber members on health care reform. In November 2009, ICCR members “called on Chamber members with stated positions similar to ICCR’s Health Care Reform principles to challenge the Chamber’s lobbying efforts against the passage of health care legislation.”
While the ICCR issues final warnings, Chamber members like Nike and Apple have left the Chamber altogether. In a newly-released comprehensiveinvestigativeseries, Harry Hanbury and GRITtv reveal the ubiquitous role the Chamber plays in American politics and why companies may blanche at its secretive activities.
By Lee Fang
Earlier this month, ThinkProgress published an exclusive series of investigative pieces into the fundraising program of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the far right corporate lobbying juggernaut. We uncovered millions from corporations like Procter and Gamble, outsourcing giant CSC, and Microsoft, but also discovered that the Chamber has been actively fundraising from foreign corporations like the Bahrain Petroleum Company and the State Bank of India. We provided documentation for over 80 foreign corporations donating at least $885,000 to the same Chamber 501(c)(6) general account the Chamber is now using to run an unprecedented $75 million attack campaign against Democrats.
Responding to our posts, the Chamber launched a massive smear campaign using its large in-house communications staff and a network of well funded public relations firms:
– Manipulating Google And Blogs: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce retains public relations giant Fleishman-Hillard for much of their online communications work. Fleishman-Hillard VP Pat Cleary posts on the Chamber’s blog, and says he works closely with conservative bloggers through RedState. Other Chamber lobbyists collaborateroutinely with conservative bloggers through the Heritage Foundation’s Bloggers Briefing to help get the message out for business lobbyists. As Cleary has told conferences of business lobbyists, he helps trade associations like the Chamber buy AdWords to promote the business lobby’s message. For example, when anyone Googles the words “US Chamber” and “foreign,” they see a link to the Chamber’s false response that it receives only $100,000 from foreign affiliates.
– Paying For Television Pundits: GOP lobbyist John Feehery has appeared on cable television to attack ThinkProgress’ reporting, taken to Twitter call President Obama a “business-hating socialist” for calling attention to this story, and even penned an article in The Hill newspaper to defend the Chamber and lie about our investigation. Feehery never mentioned the foreign corporate direct donations to the Chamber’s 501(c)(6). But more importantly, neither The Hill nor any of television outlets Feehery appears on disclosed the fact that Feehery’s public relations firm, The Feehery Group, counts the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as one of its clients. Shortly after our story broke, Feehery was hired by another public relations/lobbying firm, Quinn Gillespie, which is also a client of the Chamber. Moreover, Fox News’ parent company is an active member of the Chamber, and hate-talker Glenn Beck met with the Chamber’s second in command earlier this year to plot the 2010 election. While Fox hosts and Beck have endlessly defended the Chamber’s secret money, there has been no disclosure of the network’s financial ties to Chamber lobbyists.
– The Chamber Owns Fake News Sites: As the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard reported, the Chamber owns a variety of news websites in West Virginia, Illinois, and elsewhere, while also maintaining a wire service called Legal Newsline. All of these websites posture as independently owned and objective journalism outfits, and do not disclose that they are fully owned subsidiaries of Chamber lobbyists.
Unfortunately, the Chamber’s sophisticated smear campaign deceived many reputable media organizations into distorting our reporting. Reporters from the New York Times (Eric Lichtblau), the Associated Press (Alan Fram, Jim Kuhnhenn), McClatchy (David Lightman), Time (Mark Halperin), and other outlets misrepresented ThinkProgress’ reporting by refusing to acknowledge any of our key revelations about the Chamber’s foreign fundraising (the fundraising documents we published, the Bahrainian or Indianian corporate donations). None of these reporters directly contacted ThinkProgress, and instead opted to only interview Chamber lobbyists.
In many cases, these traditional reporters reprinted the Chamber’s lie that it only fundraises from foreign affiliates called AmChams, and that AmChams are composed of only American companies (this has been thoroughlydebunked). Ignoring ThinkProgess’ reporting, these journalists reprinted the Chamber’s unproven assertion that it only accepts $100,000 from foreign affiliates. In other cases, these reporters reprinted the Chamber’s false claim that it’s political operation is equivalent to labor unions. In fact, labor unions face double disclosure because they must reveal their donors to the public through both the Department of Labor and the Federal Election Commission. The Chamber, on the other hand, refuses to disclose both its American and foreign donors to anyone. Although ThinkProgress has demonstrated that the Chamber receives at a minimum of $885,000 in foreign cash every year to its primary 501(c)(6) campaign account, few journalists have bothered to cover the thrust of our story.
