Republicans Who’ve Spoken Out Against Money in Politics

Last month, Texans United to Amend set up an exhibition table at the Texas State Republican Convention in Ft. Worth (thanks to Mike Badzioch). On one of the days, I helped out. We were all glad to hear that Republican delegates shared the same concerns we had about the influence of too much money in politics. It’s hard to say what percentage of all the delegates agreed with us, but of the delegates who stopped at our table to talk, 95% of them agreed with us on the 2 issues that we discussed with them.

Besides the issue of too much money influencing our political process, the other issue we discussed with them was our belief that corporations are not people and should not have the same constitutional rights as individuals. From what I could tell, none of them had heard of a constitutional amendment to solve these 2 issues. However, those in agreement with us, did not seem adverse to a constitutional amendment.

None of this should be too surprising. Republicans and Republican leaders, past and present, have spoken out against money in politics, the Citizens United decision, and corporate personhood. Here is a sampling:

John McCain Calls Citizens United Decision the Worst Ever

John McCain with Naval Academy midshipmen

by Kellye

Republican Senator John McCain recently called the Citizens United decision the “worst decision ever.”  This isn’t the first time that he has spoken out against the decision.  In a PBS interview in June of this year, McCain called it “the most misguided, naive, uninformed, egregious decision of the United States Supreme Court in the 21st century.”  He continued, “To somehow view money as not having an effect on elections, a corrupting effect on elections, flies in the face of reality.”

In reference to the five Supreme Court justices who voted in favor of the decision, McCain added, “I just wish one of them had run for county sheriff.”  He said that “we need a level playing field and we need to go back to the realization that Teddy Roosevelt had: that we have to have a limit on the flow of money and that corporations are not people.”  McCain is predicting huge scandals in future elections due to the influence of unlimited money in the political process.