Citizens United Anniversary

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, to all of my colleagues who have come to the floor today to talk about the critical nature of spending in our campaigns, I say I am pleased to join them to talk about the importance of preserving our representative democracy by restoring some commonsense restrictions to our Nation's campaign finance system.

As we have heard, Saturday was the second anniversary of the Supreme Court decision in the case of Citizens United v. The Federal Election Committee. Already we have seen how that decision has altered the landscape of politics in this country.

When the Supreme Court struck down limits on corporate financing of elections, it ushered in the age of the super PAC. These so-called super PACs can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money during political campaigns with very limited disclosure requirements.

This election cycle the floodgates have opened. Super PACs have already spent over $30 million in the 2012 cycle, and the election is still 10 months away. That amount of money is staggering.

When I was home over the holidays in New Hampshire, before our Presidential primary, I witnessed firsthand that influx of corporate cash and what it does to the Presidential election. Negative ads paid for by the super PACs contributed to disaffecting our voters and drowning out the voices of the people, those ordinary, everyday citizens of New Hampshire who aren't able to put in tens of thousands of dollars, in some cases millions, to affect the outcome of an election.
This has to stop. This is not a partisan issue. The commonsense restrictions that were struck down in the Citizens United decision were part of legislation like the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, otherwise known as McCain-Feingold. That thoughtful legislation which had broad, bipartisan support limited soft money and corporate funding of political ads and campaign spending in a way that made sense.

Our campaign finance system has gotten way off course. It is time for us in the Congress to help put it back on track. The unchecked influence of money in our elections compromises the very future of our representative democracy.

The monied special interests and corporations have been given free rein to spend unlimited amounts of money during campaigns, and they do not need our help being heard. It is homeowners struggling to pay their mortgages, parents who want to send their children to college but aren't sure how they can afford it, and unemployed workers who are looking for jobs and hoping tomorrow will be better than today--those are the voices that are being drowned out in a sea of corporate and special interest cash, and those are the voices of the American people who need to be heard in Washington.

So on the second anniversary of this decision, as we think about what we need to do to address this and to change the negative direction it is taking this country, I urge all of my colleagues to turn their attention to this important work and to reach across the aisle to build consensus on this issue. Let's all tell the American people that we hear their voices calling for change.

I look forward to speaking with all of my colleagues in the coming weeks and months about the specific approaches we can take to repair our broken campaign finance system, and I hope we will have the courage and the commitment to do something about this.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source