Over the past 30 years, no organization or group of individuals has had a more negative impact on our nation than ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council). Sponsored by many of the worlds largest corporations, ALEC’s membership consists of the most partisan conservative legislators. It maintains an ideological staff that writes legislation and peddles it to its members in every state legislature. In turn, those legislators sponsor the bills, often without even reading them.
ALEC’s website brags that, each year, nearly 1,000 ALEC-authored bills are introduced in legislatures throughout the US. ALEC has given us some of the nations most extreme bills, including the Stand Your Ground law that is at the center of the Trayvon Martin murder, Arizonas infamous SB 1070 anti-Latino bill, anti-union bills and many others designed to promote an extreme ideology and to serve ALEC’s corporate masters. And its legislation becomes more divisive every year.
How can we stop it?
Last week, several former sponsors showed us the way to defeat this insidious group. Due to the public attention focused on the Stand Your Ground law, Coca-Cola, the Gates Foundation, Intuit, Kraft Foods, McDonald’s, Pepsico and Wendy’s announced they would no longer sponsor ALEC.
We need to remind the other sponsors that they, too, are vulnerable to public backlash over ALECs extreme ideology. Following is a partial list of the organizations corporate sponsors according to www.SourceWatch.org. Contact them and tell them that you will hold them responsible for extreme legislation such as the Stand Your Ground law. If we’re successful, we can starve ALEC of the funds it needs to continue to make a mess of our political system.
Amazon.com, American Express, Amway, Anheuser-Busch, Arbys, ARCO, AT&T, Bank of America, Bankers Insurance Co., Bayer Corp., Bell Atlantic, Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, BP America, Bristol-Myers Squibb, CenturyLink, Chevron, Chrysler Corporation, Coldwell Banker, Comcast, ConocoPhillips, Cox Communications, Deere & Company, Dell Inc., Del Webb Corp., Dow Chemical, DuPont, Eli Lilly, Excel Telecommunications, ExxonMobil, Farmers Group Inc., FedEx, Fidelity Investments, Ford Motor Co., Frito-Lay, Fruit of the Loom, GEICO, General Electric, General Mills Restaurants, General Motors, Georgia-Pacific, Gerber Products, Harris Bank, Henkel, Honeywell, HP, Humana Corp., IBM, International Paper, JC Penney Co., Johnson & Johnson, Koch Industries, LaSalle National Bank, Liberty Mutual Insurance, Long Term Care, Inc., Marathon Oil, Mars Inc., Mary Kay Cosmetics, Microsoft, MillerCoors, Monsanto, Motorola, Nationwide Insurance, Nestlé USA, Northern Telecom, Novartis, Outback Steak House, Pennzoil, Pfizer Inc., Procter & Gamble, Prudential Financial, Reynolds American, Ryder Systems, Salt River Project, Sara Lee Corp., Schwan’s Sales Enterprises, Shell Oil, Sony Corp., Sprint Nextel, State Farm Insurance, Texaco, TicketMaster, Time Warner, The Traveler’s Companies, Unilever, United Airlines, UnitedHealthcare, UPS, VALIC, Verizon, Visa, Walgreens, Wall Street Journal, Wal-Mart, Washington Times, Wausau Insurance, WellPoint, Xcel Energy, and YUM! Brands (owner of Kentucky Fried Chicken, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Long John Silver’s and A&W).