Efforts include paid and earned media as well as grassroots organizing to hold Trump accountable on campaign finance reform
End Citizens United (ECU) today launched the “Hold Trump Accountable” project to hold the President-elect accountable on campaign finance reform, and to expose his hypocrisy and broken promises.
The first major initiative of ECU’s new Advocacy program, ECU Action Network, will call out President-elect Trump when he’s not supporting reforms and when he’s proactively weakening our laws. It will mobilize ECU’s 3 million members to pressure his administration to follow through with reforms to our campaign finance system and act on behalf of the American people – not his Big Money allies or Republican leadership in Congress. The initiative will be a multi-pronged effort combining paid communication, earned media, and grassroots organizing.
“President-elect Trump called the system rigged and claimed that he would fix it. If he doesn’t follow through, there will be a price to pay while he is in office, during the 2018 midterms, and in his reelection campaign, said Tiffany Muller, ECU Executive Director. “The overwhelming majority of Americans – across all political ideologies – agree that there’s too much money in politics. Nonetheless, every indication from Donald Trump is that he will oppose popular, common-sense campaign finance reforms.”
Throughout the election, Trump repeatedly railed against the outsized role of money in politics. He often boasted about manipulating the broken system and offered personal testimony about the power of writing campaign checks to candidates. He called his opponents “puppets” and said that Big Money donors exercise “total control over these candidates.” Trump promised to “drain the swamp” and fix the “rigged system.”
Now, he’s appointing some of the worst abusers of the system to his administration, including White House counsel designate Don McGahn, who helped dismantle the enforcement power of the FEC.
ECU Action Network’s Hold Trump Accountable initiative will push his administration to clean up the system and will oppose efforts to dismantle our remaining campaign finance rules; push back on Trump’s nominees who have a history of skirting and weakening campaign finance laws; and expose Trump’s hypocrisies to make sure voters are aware of his actions.
The Hold Trump Accountable website will serve as a clearinghouse of news and information about Trump’s record on getting Big Money out of politics – from the promises he’s made to the steps he’s taking on the issue. It will include information on bills and upcoming executive actions, and serve as a hub for members to learn more about ways they can act and stay informed.
End Citizens United, a grassroots-funded political action committee (PAC), was established in March 2015 to counter the disastrous effects of Citizens United and reform our campaign finance system. To date, more than 3 million grassroots members from every state and territory have taken action to support End Citizens United.
Read more on ECU from the San Francisco Chronicle: End Citizens United Aggressively Seeks Campaign Finance Reform.