ALEC at 40: Turning Back the Clock on Prosperity and Progress
For this report, which focuses on ALEC’s 2013 legislative agenda, the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) researched five areas: 1) Voter ID and Stand Your Ground legislation, 2) wages and worker rights, 3) public education, 4) the environment, and 5) citizen access to the courts. Research continues on other areas of ALEC’s agenda.
Key Findings:
CMD identified 466 ALEC bills from the 2013 session. 84 of these passed and became law. ALEC bills were introduced in every state in the nation and the District of Columbia in 2013. The top ALEC states were West Virginia (25 bills) and Missouri (21 bills).
Despite ALEC’s effort to distance itself from Voter ID and Stand Your Ground by disbanding its controversial Public Safety and Elections Task Force, 62 of these laws were introduced: 10 Stand Your Ground bills and 52 bills to enact or tighten Voter ID restrictions. Five states enacted additional Voter ID restrictions, and two states passed Stand Your Ground.
CMD identified 117 ALEC bills that affect wages and worker rights. 14 of these became law. These bills included so-called “Right to Work” legislation, part of the ALEC agenda since at least 1979, introduced in 15 states this year. Other bills would preempt local living or minimum wage ordinances, facilitate the privatization of public services, scrap defined benefit pension plans, or undermine the ability of unions to organize to protect workers.
CMD identified 139 ALEC bills that affect public education. 31 of these became law. Just seven states did not have an ALEC education bill introduced this year. Among other things, these bills would siphon taxpayer money from the public education system to benefit for-profit private schools, including the “Great Schools Tax Credit Act,” introduced in 10 states.
CMD identified 77 ALEC bills that advance a polluter agenda. 17 of these became law. Numerous ALEC “model” bills were introduced that promote a fossil fuel and fracking agenda and undermine environmental regulations. The “Electricity Freedom Act,” which would repeal state renewable portfolio standards, was introduced in six states this year.
CMD identified 71 ALEC bills narrowing citizen access to the courts. 14 of these became law. These bills cap damages, limit corporate liability, or otherwise make it more difficult for citizens to hold corporations to account when their products or services result in injury or death.
CMD identified nine states that have been inspired by ALEC’s “Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act” to crack down on videographers documenting abuses on factory farms. These so-called “ag-gag” bills erode First Amendment rights, and threaten the ability of journalists and investigators to pursue food safety and animal welfare investigations.
CMD identified 11 states that introduced bills to override or prevent local paid sick leave ordinances, such as the one recently enacted in New York City. At least eight of these bills were sponsored by known ALEC members. Although ALEC has not adopted a preemption bill as an official “model,” ALEC member the National Restaurant Association brought a bill to override local paid sick leave ordinances to an ALEC meeting in 2011, along with a target map and other materials.
ALEC’s Agenda in Chicago
As ALEC convenes in Chicago for its 40th Annual Meeting, CMD has discovered through open records requests that ALEC has more bad bills on the docket. The new or amended bills being considered in Chicago include:
Renewing ALEC’s objection to efforts to link the minimum wage to the consumer price index,
New hurdles that could prevent or delay benefits to temporary workers, one of the most vulnerable classes of workers in the economy,
New efforts to eliminate occupational licensing for any profession, which help guarantee that people who want to call themselves doctors, long-haul truckers, accountants, or barbers meet basic standards of training and expertise to guarantee that consumers are safe and get what they pay for (under the bill, the state would have to show a compelling interest and that licensing was the least restrictive means to regulate),
More corporate tax write-offs for ALEC’s school privatization scheme,
New ways to thwart local democratic control by prohibiting city or county governments from regulating genetically modified plant seeds, which benefits the companies ALEC member CropLife America represents,
More pressure to prevent any type of carbon tax that would help address global warming (but would increase taxes for the oil companies that fund ALEC),
More efforts to undermine renewable energy initiatives and maintain reliance on coal and other fossil fuels.
In Chicago, corporate sponsors plan to “educate” lawmakers on a variety of topics. Some of these workshops carry a $40,000 price tag for sponsors:
Expanding virtual “schools,” which enriches ALEC’s online school corporate funders, such as K12 Inc.,
How fracking America can lead to increased profits through exporting natural gas and the risk posed by local bans on fracking,
Defeating efforts to regulate bee-killing chemicals like Dinotefuran, a neonicotinoid type of pesticide, courtesy of one of the corporations whose chemicals resulted in a massive killing of bumble bees in Oregon: Valent USA (a subsidiary of the Japanese mega-firm Sumitomo Chemical),
Blocking GMO labeling that would allow consumers to know if they are buying genetically engineered food, one of the goals of agribusiness and chemical firms that bankroll ALEC.
Read the full report with charts of ALEC bills here.
ALEC Open Records Lawsuit
CMD Files Open Records Suit Against ALEC Board Member Sen. Leah Vukmir
Wisconsin State Senator Leah Vukmir
In June, the Center for Media and Democracy filed suit against Wisconsin State Senator Leah Vukmir, a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and the treasurer of ALEC's national board, over her failure to disclose ALEC-related materials under Wisconsin's public records law -- possibly because ALEC told her to keep the documents secret.
CMD has discovered that ALEC has started stamping its materials with a disclaimer asserting "[b]ecause this is an internal ALEC document, ALEC believes it is not subject to disclosure under any state Freedom of Information or Public Records Act." There is no provision in Wisconsin law allowing private organizations to declare themselves immune from the state's sunshine-in-government statutes. Read the full article here.
