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Minnesota Dems Advance Bill to Ban Election Interference by Multinational Corporations
"The Democracy for the People Act will help put power back in the hands of citizens," said one campaigner.
Apr 14, 2023
Campaigners who have long pushed cities and states to adopt bans on foreign corporate interference in elections applauded Friday after the Minnesota House of Representatives passed legislation that would make the state the first to prohibit foreign-influenced corporations from spending money on electoral campaigns.
The provision is part of the Democracy for the People Act, which passed 70-57 along party lines late Thursday night after several hours of debate.
The national nonprofit organization Free Speech for People successfully advocated for Democrats in the state House to include the new rule, which would prohibit companies with at least a 5% ownership stake by multiple foreign owners or a 1% stake by a single foreign owner from spending money in Minnesota state and local elections. The companies would also be barred from donating to super PACs.
"Multinational corporations are corrupting representative democracy by drowning out the voices of the people," said Alexandra Flores-Quilty, campaign director at Free Speech For People. "The Democracy for the People Act will help put power back in the hands of citizens."
The organization pushed lawmakers in Seattle to pass similar legislation in 2020, and Hawaii, California, Washington, New York, and Massachusetts are all considering state-level bans modeled on a proposal developed by Free Speech for People.
The group worked closely with state Rep. Emma Greenman (DFL-63B) to pass the legislation.
"This package of commonsense solutions rests on a simple premise," said Greenman during the debate over the bill, "that our state works best when Minnesota voices are at the center of our democracy."
\u201cRep. Emma Greenman [@emmagreenman] talks about what the Democracy for the People Act would mean for Minnesota. #mnleg\u201d— Minnesota House DFL Majority (@Minnesota House DFL Majority) 1681418475
The legislation now heads to the state Senate, where the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (DFL)—the state's affiliate of the Democratic Party—has a majority of seats. Gov. Tim Walz (DFL) has said he supports the bill.
We Choose Us, a statewide grassroots coalition of advocacy groups and unions, conducted polling last November and found that 80% of Minnesota voters back the provision barring election interference by multinational companies.
"Minnesota has long been a leader in democracy and so it's no surprise that the House voted today to put Minnesota on the path to becoming the first state to prohibit foreign-influenced corporations from spending in our elections," said Lilly Sasse, campaign director for We Choose Us. "It's clear to the people of Minnesota that prohibiting foreign-influenced corporations from spending in our elections is good for our democracy. And after today, it's clear that we're on the path to signing it into law."
The group also found broad support for other provisions in the Democracy for the People Act, including automatic voter registration, backed by 73% of Minnesota voters.
The legislation would also permit 16- and 17-year-olds to preregister to vote, establish a statewide vote-by-mail system, protect election workers and voters from harassment, and require voting instructions and ballots to be provided in non-English languages.
"Minnesotans want to ensure that voters always will have the biggest say in the decisions that will impact their lives," state House Speaker Melissa Hortman (DFL-34B) told the ABC affiliate KSTP. "Our legislation will strengthen the freedom to vote, protect our democratic institutions and Minnesota voters, and empower voters, not corporations or wealthy special interests in our elections.”
Free Speech for People is also backing a federal proposal by U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) to bar multinational corporations from interfering in elections.
"By banning multinational corporations spending unlimited sums of money to influence our elections," said the group, "we are upholding the letter of the law and getting us one step closer to a democracy that is truly by and for the people.
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Rightwing vs. Leftwing Populists on Global Trade
Jul 01, 2016
It must have given the earnest wonks at the Economic Policy Institute a bit of a start when Donald Trump touted their research in a speech courting white, working-class voters by criticizing NAFTA and U.S. trade policy with China.
EPI president Lawrence Mishel was moved to respond in a blog post titled "Trump's Trade Scam."
"If he is so keen to help working people, why does he steer the discussion back toward the traditional corporate agenda of tax cuts for corporations and the rich?" Mishel wrote, hastening to distance himself from Trump.
Progressives who have long criticized trade deals that favor multinational corporations, suppress wages, accelerate outsourcing, and replace local democracy with unelected tribunals shrink from keeping company with the racist, isolationist right.
This is equally true in Trump's America and Britain, which is newly divorced from the rest of Europe. Guardian columnist Gary Younge concurs with Michel on the fraudulence of rightwing anti-globalism, and particularly the immigrant-bashing Brexit campaign:
"The very people who are slashing resources--the Tory right-- and diverting what's left to the wealthy are the ones rallying the poor by blaming migrants for the lack of resources," Younge wrote.
"Not content with urinating on our leg and telling us it's raining, they have found someone to blame for the weather."
Rightwing populists are making a lot of noise about the weather lately--that is, the lousy economic climate brought on by trade deals that favor corporations at the expense of labor. As a result, they are making inroads with an anxious working class.
"Progressives can't afford to cede economic populism to the man who could prove to be the most effective white nationalist campaigner of our generation," Tarso Luis Ramos, executive director of the rightwing watchdog group Political Research Associates, put it to me recently, when I interviewed him about Donald Trump.
I spoke with Melinda St. Louis, International Campaigns Director for Public Citizens' Global Trade Watch to get a progressive view on globalization. St. Louis has spent her career working on fair trade.
She is optimistic about a global movement for economic justice.
"I don't think we're ceding talking points on this," she says, pointing to the campaign to defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which she calls "kind of exciting."
Both major parties pushed multinational corporations' agenda in big trade deals for years. But not this year. Growing public ire over NAFTA, especially in the Rust Belt, which has seen more than 57,000 factories offshored, has changed the political debate. St. Louis points out:
"Now the candidates are fighting over who hates the TPP more. That is a prudent response since all of the trade unions, environmental groups, LGBT organizations, women, retirees--the entire progressive base is opposing TPP.
It's not about trade or not trade, it's about who writes the rules and who benefits."
Human rights advocates see no reason for the TPP to make it easier for Malaysia, which has a problem with human trafficking, to access U.S. markets. LGBT activists don't want to roll out the red carpet for Brunei, which is bad on LGBT rights.
Overall, the trouble with the TPP is that it "doesn't learn the lessons of NAFTA," St. Louis says. "It expands incentives for offshoring and creates more opportunities to challenge environmental and health and safety laws through secret tribunals."
The public is increasingly unhappy with such deals.
St. Louis notes the TransCanada corporation's recent Keystone claim against the United States under NAFTA's rules. "Obama listened to activists, who pointed to the environmental and economic damage, and now we, the taxpayers, could be on the hook for $15 billion because of an unaccountable trade deal. Why on earth would we want to expand that through the TPP?"
Perhaps the biggest difference between left and right-wing views of global trade is that while right-wing populists blame immigrants and foreign workers, progressives see workers across borders making common causes.
"I worked in Central America during the Central America Free Trade Agreement negotiations, and the people in Central America said at the time, 'This is going to decimate us,'" says St. Louis. "Sure enough, we've seen an increase in inequality and instability in the region since CAFTA passed."
St. Louis speaks with feeling about "the brightest, most entrepreneurial people" leaving Southern Mexico and Central America to make the dangerous trek North, not because they think the streets in the United States are paved with gold, but because there are no other opportunities for them:
"To see these families in a place where family is so important being broken up for years--parents sending money to their children, but not seeing them for fifteen years--it's devastating."
Scapegoating these immigrants is particularly outrageous, she says, since economic and trade policies have been a major contributor to their plight.
Take the two million Mexican farmers who lost their livelihoods under NAFTA when U.S.-subsidized corn flooded the market at lower prices than the production cost.
Despite the bad economic news and the ominous rightwing backlash, St. Louis is optimistic about the global movement for economic justice:
"When there is this level of overreach of corporate greed people do mobilize and beat it back. A couple of years ago it was unthinkable that the TPP would be a major issue in the presidential campaign."
There have been other victories. Massive opposition to the Free Trade Area of the Americas--a proposed NAFTA expansion--killed that plan. Likewise, citizen organizing helped kill the Multilateral Agreement on Investments.
Liberal economists, including Paul Krugman, Larry Summers, and Robert Reich, have moved away from their pro-NAFTA positions and begun to support the call for fair trade. St. Louis sums it up:
"There is a populist response from the left and the right. Elites should pay attention."
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The TPP 'Lame Duck' Push Insults Democracy
Jun 22, 2016
In the United States, "We the People" are supposed to have a say in how we are governed, right? So shouldn't we have a say in how we are governed?
President Obama, Wall Street and the giant, multinational corporations are pushing - and pushing hard - for a vote in Congress in the "lame duck" congressional session after the election to ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The most recent pitch by Obama was on Monday at a summit of business leaders in Washington, where he said the TPP "will do even more to lower the cost of exporting, eliminating taxes and customs duties, and raising intellectual property standards that protect data and ideas and jobs."
Here is why the push is on. The so-called "lame duck" session of Congress is particularly unaccountable. Those who might have been tossed in the November elections can still vote. Newly elected and reelected legislators are not yet sworn in, so they can't vote. And reelected legislators have the opportunity to pay back the big donors who funded their campaigns, knowing voters have two long years to forget what they did.
For example, Rep. Randy Forbes, a Republican representing Virginia's 4th congressional district and a proponent of TPP, lost his primary to Scott Taylor, a TPP opponent who called the deal "Obamatrade" in the Republican primary. The TPP, and Forbes' earlier vote for "fast track" trade authority to grease the skids for TPP, was a major issue in the primary.
But even though Forbes was tossed out by his constituents because of his support for fast track and TPP, he will still be able to vote if TPP comes up in the lame-duck session of Congress. Forbes will be looking for a job - probably from the very corporations that support TPP.
See if you can guess which way he will vote on TPP, after being tossed out for supporting "free trade."
Send Obama a message with this petition: Don't undermine our presidential nominee. No lame-duck vote on the TPP!.
Meanwhile, Obama Makes His Pitch
Reuters reported Monday that when President Obama was out pitching the TPP, it was not simply as a "trade" deal.
"So let me just remind you that this is not just about jobs and trade, it's not just about hard, cold cash. It's also about building relationships across borders. When your companies come together, you help bring countries and cultures together."
That is all well and good, but shouldn't the President be selling a "trade" deal on the merits of the "trade" and jobs it will bring? The problem is this is not about "trade" at all; it's about elevating corporations above governments so corporations can seek the cheapest labor and fewest regulations - and governments can't stop them. The president is talking about non-trade aspects of the agreement because he can't promote the economic benefits to Americans. There aren't any.
The president is not focusing here on the issues the public cares about: the economy and jobs. And, by the way, the president's TPP push undermines the Democratic Party's candidate for president against Republican Donald Trump.
Insult To Democracy
The president, Wall Street and the big corporations are pushing for this vote to occur at this time because they know this is the last time to push it through before the will of the public can take hold. This vote will occur with a lame-duck Congress, a lame-duck president, and a lame-duck "free-trade" policy that is finally being shown the door by the voters.
The corporate/Wall Street elites know the public has figured out how "free trade" has cost us so much. The middle class is being wiped out. Entire regions of the country are being wiped out. Our manufacturing ecosystem is being wiped out. Inequality is soaring and democracy is being replaced by plutocracy.
Opinion polls show that the public is fed up with corporate-dominated trade agreement that enrich a few Wall Street investors and corporate executives at the expense of the rest of the people in the world. Elites know the public wants a new trade paradigm that takes into account the interests - from labor to consumers, from environmental to human rights - of all "stakeholders" in the world's economy.
Elites know the new Congress won't pass it. Elites know that in this election candidates supporting "free trade" are facing obstacles and opponents, even losing their primaries. They know that candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump oppose it. This means that the next president will stop TPP from coming to a vote.
The economic elites want this vote to occur after the election because the new president will oppose it, and the public and the next Congress will stop it.
Leaders should care deeply about the will of the public, not scheme to subvert it. This push for a vote on TPP after the election is an insult to democracy. It is an insult to our economy. It is an insult to the candidates. It is an insult to voters. Don't do it.
What Can You Do?
First, vote. Second, prepare to come to Washington after the election if they try to hold a TPP vote. A million people in the streets might be able to block it.
Sign this petition to "Ask Leader Pelosi to Help Stop a Lame Duck TPP Vote."
Thanks to massive public opposition, there's little chance that the job-killing, planet-destroying Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will be voted on before the November election. As a result of millions of people like you speaking out, being pro-TPP has become a huge political liability for any elected official.
So what are the corporations behind the TPP trying to do? They want to schedule a TPP vote immediately after the election.
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