About ALEC Exposed
Welcome to ALEC Exposed!
On July 13, 2011, the Center for Media and Democracy unveiled this trove of 867 "model" bills secretly voted on by corporations through the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). These bills reveal the corporate collaboration reshaping our democracy.
ALEC bills, which largely benefit the organization’s corporate members, have been introduced in legislatures in every state—but without disclosing to the public that corporations previously drafted or voted for the bills via ALEC.
Before our publication of this trove of bills, it has been difficult to trace the numerous controversial bills popping up in legislatures across the country directly to ALEC and its corporate underwriters.
The Center obtained copies of the bills voted on by corporations and politicians behind closed doors through ALEC, after one of the thousands of people with access shared them, and a whistleblower provided a copy to the Center.
We have analyzed and marked up the bills and resolutions to help readers understand what the bills do, beyond the PR in the names of the legislation. We hare them to help the public identify the bills and resolutions in state legislatures across the country. We have also included information about the corporations that bankroll ALEC and other information to help understand the bills.
These bills and resolutions reach into almost every area of American life: worker and consumer rights, education, the rights of Americans injured or killed by corporations, taxes, health care, immigration, and the quality of the air we breathe and the water we drink. Only by seeing the depth and breadth and language of the bills can one fully understand the power and sweep of corporate influence behind the scenes on bills affecting the rights and future of every American.
Please join us in exposing ALEC, its corporations and politicians, and how money has corrupted the democratic process. You can read the bills without signing up to be a contributing editor of this site. But, we hope readers will team up with reporters to dig through the cache of documents and help add to the analysis. You can do this by writing about the bills or writing about your state's experience with the bills, on the ALEC Exposed site, which is a collaborative wiki like Wikipedia but more specialized. You can also join us in documenting information about the corporations, politicians, and others involved in ALEC through our sister website, SourceWatch.org, which focuses on corporations and people trying to influence the media and our democracy. (A "how-to" explains more on our help page.)
To learn more about ALEC, click here for a letter Lisa Graves, the executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, publisher of ALEC Exposed.
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