Follow the money and wind up in familiar places
So who's really running the show in California? If money speaks the loudest, it's six corporations, four business associations, three Indian tribes and two labor unions.
A new report from the Fair Political Practices Commission — California's elections watchdog — mines years of campaign and lobbyist reports and turns up this nugget: Over the past decade, 15 special-interest groups have spent more than $1 billion in an all-out bid to influence the state's affairs.
They spent that money to sink ballot initiatives and boost candidates. They fed it directly to political parties' war chests. (Democrats came out slightly ahead of Republicans.) And they spent hundreds of millions wining and dining lawmakers and other state officials.
Almost a fifth of the cash came from one group: the politically powerful California Teachers Association ($211.8 million). The teachers union was followed by an affiliate of the Service Employees Union International ($107.5 million), a pharmaceutical industry group ($104.9 million) and two deep-pocketed Indian tribes ($83.6 million and $69.3 million).
Rounding out the top 15 are some other big names, such as Pacific Gas & Electric, Chevron, AT&T and Philip Morris. (For the full report, go to www.fppc.ca.gov/reports/Report38104.pdf.)
If you don't think
all that money really means something, then consider this result: Indian tribes spent $125 million on six ballot measures that involved the lucrative gambling industry. And they got their way on all but one.
Big money, the report notes, doesn't just give leverage to a particular cause or candidate, but it also can drown out other, less-funded causes and candidates.
"The conclusion is inescapable," reads the report's executive summary. "A handful of special interests have a disproportionate amount of influence on California elections and public policy."
And that means some special interests might be more special than others.
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