As corporate lobbyists and state legislators from across the country meet in Salt Lake City for the 39th annual meeting of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a group of open government advocates have released a report called "ALEC in Florida" that sheds further light on ALEC's "unprecedented influence over Florida."
This week politicians and corporate lobbyists will descend on Salt Lake City for the 39th annual conference of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). While there, ALEC politicians will be schooled on ALEC's portfolio of "model" legislation, which they will be asked to bring home to their state for introduction -- sans ALEC letterhead.
The brilliant Pulitzer-prize winning cartoonist, Mark Fiore, does it again with another cartoon video skewering the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). The video focuses on how a bill becomes a law ALEC-style. Warning: this is not School House Rock. This is Fiore's second video on ALEC. Previously he shined a light on the NRA's Stand Your Ground" legislation implicated in the Trayvon Martin slaying that ALEC deemed a model bill and helped get it passed in over two dozen states. Many folks may remember the original School House Rock! version of how a bill becomes a law.
A letter from a Louisiana state representative asking a corporate representative for money is another example of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) "scholarship" program at work, and how it creates an overly cozy relationship between corporations and legislators that allows for improper influence. The "scholarship" program has allowed corporations to do what lobbying laws in most states prohibit -- give legislators expensive gifts of flights through ALEC which can buy increased influence over public policy.
Two more corporations have publicly left the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC): EnergySolutions, a nuclear services company based in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Connections Education, LLC, a private school entity based in Baltimore, Maryland, that contracts with charter schools, school districts, or governmen
Madison, WI -- Three months after the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) issued a PR statement that it was eliminating its Public Safety and Elections Task Force, which was previously led by the National Rifle Association (NRA), the NRA announced that it would still be hosting its regular annual shooting event at ALEC's summer convention, in Salt Lake City on July 28. For the past several years, on the Saturday of ALEC's annual meeting, the NRA has regularly hosted an outing for ALEC legislators and lobbyists to go shooting together -- with complimentary guns and ammo plus plenty of food and drink (this time it is a barbeque).
BREAKING NEWS: The University of Wisconsin Board of Regents on Friday filed a precedent-setting breach of contract claim against sportswear brand Adidas, after the company failed to comply with anti-sweatshop provisions requiring they provide certain benefits to workers who produce goods that bear the mark of the university. This is the first time a U.S. university has sought to enforce a global anti-sweatshop code of conduct in a U.S. court of law.
Pharmacy benefits manager Express-Scripts told the Center for Media and Democracy today that it has ended its membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), making it the twenty-sixth business to dump ALEC in recent months.
When it's not sailing along on government largesse -- like the $2.7 billion granted by U.S. Virgin Islands to help sell rum -- the global corporation that owns Captain Morgan flies a very different flag. It is a corporate leader of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), flying the flag of "limited government."
Just in time for summer, Americans can cut their grass with a John Deere mower, drink a cold Miller High Life, and buy sunscreen from CVS without fear that their consumer dollars will be used to fund policies like voter suppression and climate change denial, now that Deere & Co., MillerCoors, and CVS have dropped their membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Also cutting ties with ALEC are top computer maker Hewlett-Packard (HP) and electronics retailer Best Buy.
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