Here<\/a> is how to start.)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nCongressman Doyle<\/b><\/h3>\n
Congressman Doyle has two committees that raise and spend money. His Principal Campaign Committee is \u201cDoyle for Congress\u201d.\u00a0 His Leadership Political Action Committee (PAC) is named \u201cThe Keystone Fund\u201d.<\/p>\n
In 2013-14 election cycle, Congressman Doyle was challenged in the primary election by a candidate who spent a total of $1,037.\u00a0 Doyle won.\u00a0 He faced no Republican challenger in the general election.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s look at the Federal Election Committee reports filed by the committees and posted on the FEC website for 2013-14.\u00a0 Both committees, together, raised $1,006,050 <\/b>during the cycle. \u00a0 Doyle for Congress and the Keystone Fund spent a total $352,800 <\/b>helping to elect other candidates in other districts.<\/p>\n
Here is the breakdown of the spending to elect other candidates by both committees together:
\nPayments to national, state, and local Democratic Committees = $214,900
\nPayments to congressional, state, and local candidates = $137,900<\/p>\n
Total =\u00a0<\/b> $352,800 <\/b>spent by Congressman Doyle\u2019s committees to elect other candidates in other districts.\u00a0 Once Congressman Doyle commits to being a reform leader, it is this money that he would commit himself to give exclusively to other committed reform candidates and to groups that fund only committed reform candidates.<\/p>\n
\nCongressman Murphy<\/b><\/h3>\n
Congressman Murphy has two committees that raise and spend money. \u00a0His Principal Campaign Committee is \u201cTim Murphy for Congress\u201d.\u00a0 His Leadership Political Action Committee (PAC) is named \u201cCome Back Political Action Committee\u201d.<\/p>\n
In 2013-14 election cycle, Congressman Murphy was unopposed in the primary election and unopposed\u00a0in the general election.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s look at the Federal Election Committee reports filed by the committees and posted on the FEC website for 2013-14.\u00a0 Murphy raised total of $1,916,960 <\/b>during the cycle.\u00a0 Together, Tim Murphy for Congress and the Come Back Political Action Committee spent $307,258 <\/b>helping to elect other candidates in other districts.<\/p>\n
Here is the breakdown of the spending to elect other candidates by both committees together:
\nPayments to national, state, and local Republican committees = $253,258
\nPayments to congressional, state, and local candidates = $54,000<\/p>\n
Total =<\/b> $307,258 <\/b>spent by Tim Murphy\u2019s committees to elect other candidates in other districts.\u00a0 Once Congressman Murphy commits to being a reform leader, it is this money that he would commit himself to give exclusively to other committed reform candidates and to groups that fund only committed reform candidates.<\/p>\nOur Representatives Need to Spend this Money\u00a0to Elect Reformers<\/b><\/h3>\n
Both of these members of Congress made payments of about a third of a million dollars to the campaigns of other candidates in other districts .\u00a0 You will\u00a0not find many other people in your district who have that kind of political spending power.<\/p>\n
This is not an unusual pattern for incumbents in safe districts.\u00a0 They are expected to raise and then pass on campaign money.\u00a0 Let\u2019s use this process to advance reform.\u00a0 To reform our democracy and shift power from the few to the many, we need our representatives to be real reformers; to give money to only those candidates who are also reformers.<\/p>\n
If your representative is making payments to candidates or groups or parties who oppose reform, then your representative is part of the problem, even if he or she claims to be part of the solution.<\/p>\n
(Want to check your own Representative or Senator\u2019s political spending?\u00a0 Here<\/a> is how to start.)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who’s the biggest campaign spender in your area? George Soros? The Koch Brothers? It might be your own Member of Congress! by Frank Kirkwood October 2015 Members of Congress who live in a district where their party is dominant and the other party is very unlikely to field a competitively funded challenger, still collect large […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-178","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=178"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":468,"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/178\/revisions\/468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trustworthygovernment.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}