ALEC Exposed

ALEC Holds Tight Grip on Arizona Legislature

April 12, 2012

PRESS RELEASE FROM PEOPLE FOR THE AMERICAN WAY

Contact: Justin Greenberg or Miranda Blue at media@pfaw.org

PHOENIX -- Legislators in Arizona continue to advance extremist legislation inspired by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and its out-of-state corporate backers, according to a new analysis by People For the American Way Foundation, Common Cause, the Center for Media and Democracy and Progress Now. This report shines a new light on the Arizona Legislature's unprecedented ties to the secretive organization, which recently drew nationwide fire for its role in implementing radical policies across the country like "Shoot First" laws and voter suppression laws, and anti-worker measures. ALEC's extreme agenda has recently led companies such as Pepsi, Coca-Cola, McDonalds, Wendy's, KRAFT and Intuit to withdraw from the organization. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on Monday also withdrew its support from ALEC.

Ticketmaster Hot and Bothered About ALEC

Association with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is becoming so toxic that even being listed on ALEC Exposed as a former supporter of the organization is rattling corporate cages. The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) has received a letter from the online ticket sales company Ticketmaster referring to the list of "ALEC Corporations" on our site Sourcewatch.org.

Ticketmaster's letter does not directly deny any current or former involvement with ALEC, but "advises" CMD to "cease and desist from including Ticketmaster on your site," objecting to "the suggestion that Ticketmaster is somehow affiliated with ALEC" and threatening to sue CMD for libel and defamation.

Mars and Arizona Public Service Dump ALEC

The seventh and eighth corporations to publicly state that they cut ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) are candy-maker Mars and the Arizona Public Service Company (APS), Arizona's largest electric utility. Mars had been an exhibitor at ALEC's 2011 annual meeting in New Orleans. Mars is the maker of Skittles, the snack Trayvon Martin had purchased before he was shot by George Zimmerman, whose arrest was delayed due to an NRA-backed gun law that became an ALEC "model" bill.

A Police Officer Speaks on ALEC and "Stand Your Ground"

-- by Brian Austin, originally posted on Badger Blue, Times Two.

"The world, that understandable and lawful world, was slipping away."

-- William Golding, Lord of the Flies

Brian AustinQuestion of the day: What interest would a corporate lobbyist group have in expanding the rights of citizens to shoot and kill each other?

A great deal has been written about the shooting deaths of Trayvon Martin and Bo Morrison over the past several weeks. I don't need to rehash that conversation, as there is little I can offer regarding specific facts of those cases. What I would like to do instead is examine why these Castle Doctrine/Stand Your Ground Laws have been promoted with such enthusiasm by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

I have written about ALEC in several prior posts, including Enemy at the Gates and Contempt, thy name is Fitzgerald. In short, ALEC is a corporate lobbyist group that writes model legislation favorable to its corporate members and presents this legislation for passage in statehouses across the nation. The conduit for this legislation are the legislators who are also members of ALEC. This partnership between corporate lobbyists and politicians has been very fruitful for the corporations hawking their legislation. This is fact, not conspiracy theory, as evidenced when ALEC legislation was recently introduced in Florida still bearing the ALEC mission statement.

Fox's Michelle Malkin Goes to Bat for ALEC

In the face of a successful relay race of corporations dropping their membership with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a Fox News contributor has called for her own campaign against these same corporations. Michelle Malkin asked her readers in the Washington Examiner to not "do business with progressive appeasers" and to boycott businesses that have decided to sever their relationship with ALEC.

Bloomberg Denounces NRA/ALEC "Shoot First" Laws

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg held a press conference Wednesday in Washington, DC to denounce the "Shoot First" law conceived by the National Rifle Association and promoted through the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). The law, pushed by its supporters under the name "Stand Your Ground," had been cited in Florida to potentially allow Trayvon Martin's killer to escape liability.

CMD Documents ALEC’s Contradictory Claims to Wisconsin Ethics Board

On April 11, the Center for Media and Democracy filed a letter with the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board documenting how the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, provided the ethics board erroneous information about corporate-funded gifts to ALEC legislative members. This letter supplements the complaint CMD filed last month.

Wendy's is the 6th Firm to Say It is No Longer a Member of ALEC

Wendy's International, the parent company of Wendy's Old Fashioned Hamburger, is the sixth corporation to say that it is no longer a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in the past week. Wendy's International sent an email to the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) this morning stating that the fast food chain had decided not to renew their membership at the end of 2011. CMD
launched ALEC Exposed and named Wendy's as corporate member in July 2011.

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