The United States is the only developed nation that does not require employers to give their employees paid sick leave. For many Americans, that means choosing between their pay and their health — a devil’s choice if there ever was one. Philadelphia’s Claudia Rendon had to face that choice late last year. She was fired
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On Saturday, Republic Report’s Zaid Jilani reported that the National Association of Charter School Authorizers was one of the many covert members of the American Legislative Exchange Council, the controversial front group that helps lobbyists ghostwrite state law. As Jilani noted, NACSA is funded in large part by taxpayer dollars: NACSA is financed in part
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This morning Thomas Edsall has a piece in the New York Times exploring the “corporatization of K Street” by big lobbying conglomerates. Few have noticed, but multinational lobbying firms have bought up many of the largest names in lobbying over the past few years. One firm in particular, the London-based WPP Group, owns dozens of
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It’s simple common sense that pollution is a bad thing. We all know that breathing dirtier air, drinking less clean water, and having an unsanitary environment is bad for human beings. But did you know that American taxpayers spend over $10 billion a year subsidizing it? Last week, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and Sen. Bernie
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The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a powerful corporate front group that works to pass Big Business-written laws in state legislatures. Following the outcry over the group pushing “Stand Your Ground” laws, at least fifteen major corporations, foundations, and other organizations have decided to end their funding commitments to ALEC. But ALEC has another way of
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Yesterday, climate change pioneer Bill McKibben and his organization, 350.org, joined with Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Keith Ellison to launch a new bill that would cut $113 billion in subsidies to the coal, oil, and gas lobby over the next decade. The oil industry received about $7 billion in tax breaks in 2011, despite
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The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is the most powerful corporate front group you’ve never heard of ,or at least until more than a dozen major corporations recently quit in the wake of the controversies over it pushing the “Stand Your Ground” laws. ALEC lets corporations write model legislation that it then secretly ships to state legislatures
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When you’re a lobbyist, you’ve got to find all sorts of ways to influence Congress. Last Thursday, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) found a quirky way to lobby about the benefits of chlorine — hold an ice cream social in the Rayburn House Office Building by the U.S. Capitol. We were there. Because Congress was officially
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