| Eliminating Taxpayer Financing Of Presidential Elections |
January 26, 2011 |
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Rush Holt, D-NJ
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"Mr. Chair, I rise today in strong opposition to H.R. 359, a bill that would terminate the public financing system for presidential election campaigns. The vast majority of Americans oppose the damage done to the integrity of the electoral system by the Citizens United v. FEC, which opened the floodgates for corporate spending in elections. According to a Washington Post poll, 80 percent of Americans oppose the ruling, with little difference reflected by party affiliation (85 percent of Democrats oppose it, 76 percent of Republicans, and 81 percent of independents). Yet, inexplicably, the majority is celebrating the one-year anniversary of that disastrous and poorly-reasoned decision by offering a bill that would make that damage vastly worse."
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| Eliminating Taxpayer Financing Of Presidential Elections |
January 26, 2011 |
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Peter Roskam, R-IL
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"Also, I would just like to bring your attention to that same argument, and that is, a “Dear colleague” that was sent criticizing this bill said basically the same thing: By creating a viable alternative to private fundraising, the public financing system was designed to level the electoral playing field and ensure that candidates remain accountable to voters, not special interests."
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| Providing For Consideration Of H.R. 359, Eliminating Taxpayer Financing Of Presidential Elections |
January 26, 2011 |
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Virginia Foxx, R-NC
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"“In short, it provides taxpayer subsidies to political candidates and parties. Since 2000, some major candidates have chosen to forgo public financing. While some have argued that providing even more taxpayer funding for this program might entice more candidates to participate, eliminating the program altogether … would require candidates and political parties to rely on private donations rather than tax dollars. The amount of funding for the public financing system is determined by checkoffs on income tax returns, and taxpayer participation via the checkoffs has declined,” Mr. Speaker, “from 28.7 percent in 1980 to 7.3 percent in 2009.” And that’s the end of the quote from the Web site."
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| Make It In America |
January 24, 2011 |
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Frank Pallone, D-NJ
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"I mean, all I see is, again, 3 weeks on repealing health care reform, now some budget resolution that has no numbers about, you know, what the budget’s actually going to be, and nothing to indicate how it’s really going to create jobs or reduce the deficit. And then I saw that on Wednesday we are taking up a resolution which will repeal the Presidential election public financing system, which again is nothing but another corporate giveaway, because what it means is that if we don’t have public financing of the Presidential elections, then we are probably going to rely more and more on these corporate ads, these secret corporate ads that were used this last November that we don’t even know where the money came from. It’s all corporate money. And, again, I don’t see anything being done by our Republican colleagues to address the issue of jobs."
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| Statements On Introduced Bills And Joint Resolutions |
July 30, 2010 |
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Russ Feingold, D-WI
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"Mr. President, today I will reintroduce a bill to repair and strengthen the presidential public financing system. The Presidential Funding Act of 2010 will ensure that this system will continue to fulfill its promise in the 21st century. The bill will take effect in January 2011, so it will first apply in the 2012 presidential election."
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