The phrase “Buy American” may be taking on a new connotation in the rough-and-tumble battle over corporate financing and the midterm congressional elections.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has been pumping lots of cash into the campaign, received multimillion dollar donations from some major companies as it fought against government policies, the New York Times reported Thursday.
“They give new meaning to the term “Buy American”… they want to buy these elections,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said when asked about the article in an MSNBC interview.
“If they win — which I fully intend to stop them from doing — but if they were to win, it would mean that we are now… a plutocracy and oligarchy,” Pelosi said. “Whatever these few wealthy, secret, unlimited sources of money are can control our entire agenda,” she added.
The Chamber is tax-exempt and not obligated to disclose it donors.
The New York Times says what it found offers a glimpse of how the business network raised money as “it ramped up an orchestrated campaign to become one of the most well-financed critics of the Obama administration and an influential player in this fall’s Congressional elections.”
In a case that most believe the U.S. Supreme Court will ultimately have to decide, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker on Wednesday ruled that California’s voter-approved Proposition 8 was unconstitutional because it unfairly singled out gay and lesbian couples as being forbidden to legally wed, violating their rights to due process and equal protection under the Constitution.
