What is Citizens United?

What is Citizens United (CU)? We've all heard that term and vaguely know that it has something to go with money and speech. Right? First of all, Citizens United is a non-profit group that is dedicated to promoting conservative issues. On the main page it says, "Dedicated to Restoring Our Government to Citizens' Control" http://www.citizensunited.org/ It is strictly a Republican organization with a purpose to promote Republican candidates and values. According to the website it is the Citizens United Foundation (CUF) that is the affiliate that " is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt non-profit dedicated to informing the American people about public policy issues which relate to traditional American values: strong national defense, Constitutionally limited government, free market economics, belief in God and Judeo-Christian values, and the recognition of the family as the basic social unit of our society. " Therefore, they claim the CUF does not involve itself in any political activities. This is how they use our tax laws to further their political goals. 

This group successfully sued the Federal Election Commission (FEC) in 2008 and won in a landmark decision at the US Supreme Court. The SCOTUS ruled that the Federal government cannot limit "corporations - or, for that matter, unions, associations or individuals - from spending money to influence the outcome of elections. The ruling led to the creation of super PACs."  http://uspolitics.about.com/od/firstamendment/a/Citizens-United.htm We already covered that topic in a previous post.   http://pageposts1123.blogspot.com/2014/08/money-and-politics-and-super-pacs.html?spref=tw

So how did it get to the point that this group sued the FEC? One of the affiliates of CU called the Citizens United Productions (CUP) produced a film entitled, "Hillary: The Movie" and the FEC ruled that it represented electioneering communications and that it was prohibited under Federal Law, specifically the bipartisan McCain-Feingold Campaign Reform Act of 2002. After their appeal of the decision was turned away by the Federal court, CU appealed the decision to the US Supreme Court, which ruled 5-4 in favor of CU.  For more detail on the case, see:  http://uspolitics.about.com/od/firstamendment/a/Citizens-United.htm

Just to illustrate how ludicrous the whole Super Pac situation has become thanks to the CU ruling, Jon Stewert and Stehpen Colbert taped a segment that has become a classic:   http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/3pwzi5/colbert-super-pac---not-coordinating-with-stephen-colbert

But the good news it that Democrats can also use this ruling to set up their own CU type groups and they have. Because money has become speech, we must all know who is funding our candidates. That is why a group like Open Secrets is so vital to an informed electorate. We must make the effort to find out.
Other relevant links include:  https://movetoamend.org/ and https://www.opensecrets.org/ and http://www.citizensunitedagainstcitizensunited.org/


Pat Taylor Fuller is an Editor for Progressive Democrats - Moving Forward, Not Back, and she has a blogspot named Pat's Commentaryhttp://pageposts1123.blogspot.com/