Restoring Election Integrity

Floor Speech

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, today marks 16 years since the Supreme Court's disastrous decision in Citizens United.

The decision overturned critically important limits on political spending by corporations and billionaires. We said it at the time, and it has come true: The decision has unleashed unprecedented spending by dark money groups on our elections. Now campaigns are often defined not by a candidate's record or their ideas but, rather, by their access to dark money.

The wealthiest individuals and corporations can now help skew elections singlehandedly by giving millions to their preferred candidate. They can block progress that they don't want to see. In fact, the world's richest man spent more than $250 million to help President Trump get elected in 2024. Let's talk about that 2024 cycle.

Super-PACs spent $4.5 billion. That is up from $2.3 billion in 2022, almost double in 2 years. That is more money than the GDP of Greenland.

In the 2024 Presidential election, the biggest super-PACs supporting majority party nominees raked in $865 million from donors who contributed $5 million or more alone. Each year, our elections are increasingly defined not by big spenders but by the biggest spenders. Between 2010 and 2024, the percentage of Federal election spending by the top 100 individual donors has jumped from 2 percent to almost 15 percent. That is eight times as much.

This has resulted in Americans losing faith in the integrity of our elections and the integrity of our democracy because our democracy is predicated on the idea that every voice matters, regardless of how much money you have. When the wealthy few can drown out the many, we lose sight of who we are supposed to serve. Policymaking gets overshadowed by these special interests.

Yet, after Citizens United, it is too often small groups of corporations and billionaires tipping the scales based on who serves their business interests. This can and must end. The American people have a voice, and if the majority supports a candidate or a reform, that should win the day alone.

We must limit super-PACs, dark money, and excessive campaign spending. We must restore trust in the political process. We must restore democracy to the way our Founders intended, centered on equal access to government, and we must overturn Citizens United. We have that power.

I thank my colleagues for joining me today and for Assistant Leader Neguse for organizing today. I look forward to hearing from my many colleagues in the next hour about how we can tackle this important issue.

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of reforms that people have proposed to overturn the damage done by Citizens United. I introduced legislation, the Campaign and Election Accountability Act. One of the things that Citizens United did was make it easier for foreign nationals to funnel money into U.S. elections.

The Federal Election Campaign Act currently prohibits foreign nationals from contributing to U.S. elections and political campaigns. However, it does not prohibit Americans from assisting foreign nationals from seeking to do so. We don't know if they are wanting to donate for nefarious reasons or if they just like a candidate, but we must ensure that our elections are free and fair from foreign influence.

It is a small tweak, but my bill will prohibit Americans from assisting foreign nationals who want to contribute to U.S. elections. This way, we can all have faith that only Americans are contributing to our campaigns.

For now, this is a step in the right direction as we all work toward the larger goal of overturning Citizens United.

I hear from a lot of constituents about what is the disconnect between Washington's policies and what is happening for everyday Americans because Americans are living through one of the worst cost- of-living crises in modern history. Working families are struggling with rising expenses, like healthcare, housing and utilities, and groceries, yet they have representation that seems to reflect the very wealthiest. We just passed a tax cut for the very wealthiest Americans this last summer, and people don't understand why.

If you look back at what happened with Citizens United, you realize that that influence on our campaigns and elections is why you end up with policies like that. This is why we have to make sure that we overturn Citizens United.

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Tokuda).

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for a lot of great points there.

I yield to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Foushee).

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, the concentration of political power has often led to the concentration of wealth in this country.
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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's remarks.

It is the cycle and the concentration of wealth because of Citizens United that has led to the concentration of political power that you can see even more concentration of wealth. It is the cycle that Citizens United has created that is hurting our country and leading to record income inequality. It is reflected in some of the policies that we have passed that have hurt everyday Americans, working Americans.

While the long-term goal is to overturn Citizens United, certainly through a constitutional amendment--that is a very difficult goal, but certainly one that we should aspire to--Congress does have the power to act immediately to curb some of its damage.

We are talking about bills like the Freedom to Vote Act, the DISCLOSE Act, the Protecting Our Democracy Act, and the Ban Corporate PACs Act. These bills will help reduce and mitigate the influence of big money, strengthen transparency around it, and limit corporate power. This is a moment to draw a line between a political system that serves donors and one that serves the American people. What we really want in the end is to serve the American people.

If you just look back at the past couple of decades since Citizens United, since 2010--in 2010, in that cycle, $3.6 billion in total cost of Federal elections by election cycle, then it goes up to $6.3 billion. By 2022 it is at $8.9 billion. By 2024 it is at $15.9 billion.

This past cycle was a record high. Again, all of that is because of Citizens United and because of the ability to just flood these PACs, these super-PACS, dark money super-PACs, with as much money as they want with no accountability. Now there are ways to hide some of these donations, as well.

We have to do something. We have to act now, otherwise this is going to continue the cycle of pain for so many Americans.

Stansbury).

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague and all the speakers today. This is the 16th anniversary of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. It was a 5-4 ruling. This decision overturned longstanding precedent that we had in this country, where we had clearly established limits on independent political spending by corporations and billionaires, and it was working.

For many years, political spending had essentially flattened out. Sometimes, it had gone down when it comes to the contributions of billionaires and the largest corporations, and we were able to have an election system where there was a lot of money in the system, but not to where we are today, where it has completely engulfed all of our actions and all of our campaigns.

There has been so much damage caused by Citizens United, as many of my colleagues explained today. We are talking about wealthy donors now dictating election outcomes, potentially, with the amount of money they can flood into these elections. Americans have less information about who is influencing those campaigns and politicians.

A lot of times, it is very easy to hide your contributions to these PACs and super-PACs. Because of that, we see a system now where we don't even know where the money is coming from. We see the names of some of these cleverly named PACs in the disclosures, but you can have PACs hiding PACs and chains of money. That is why I felt the need to even try to address the influence of foreign money, because it has become easier than ever for a foreign entity to also infiltrate our elections.

These reforms we are talking about here, campaign finance reform, have broad support from the American people across both sides of the aisle. In fact, they have felt that they cannot trust D.C., they cannot trust this administration, and they can't even trust this body, Congress, because of the influence of all this money in our politics today, in our campaigns today.

The dynamics show up repeatedly in the issues that we are working on that directly affect people's lives. We are talking about our efforts to lower prescription drug costs and healthcare costs, and how we see all the money spent by some of those groups to prevent legislation that will help the American people.

My colleague from New Mexico talked about the influence of oil and gas and that money on trying to address the environment--clean air, clean water, and climate change. We are talking about efforts that we are trying to make to crack down on corporate price gouging and how it has become incredibly difficult, an almost uphill battle when it comes to some price gouging efforts, because of the influence of all of this money on our politics.

Then, we talk about strengthening worker protections, as well. We are becoming a country that is not looking out for the average worker, and we are talking about times where workers are seeing their wages flatten, and lower if you take into account inflation, and the increase in income inequality as a result of it.

People are fed up, and they understand that part of the reason why they can't trust the policies coming from Washington, D.C. is because of the influence of this money on our policymaking and elections, and it needs to stop. It needs to stop.

Unlimited outside spending gives special interests the ability to threaten lawmakers with massive advertising campaigns, well-funded challengers, and relentless negative messaging. I have been through it, and I know many of our colleagues have been through it, where these super-PACs come in and change the dynamics of an election with millions and millions of dollars.

The one bit of good news is that many of us, like me, are here still. We fought that uphill battle and won it, but now we have to look at what is going to happen in the future, at what kind of political system our kids will have to endure. Will they feel like they have a voice in our politics, or will they feel like they are seeing a political system that is corrupted by all this money? It is about which side will be able to spend the millions of dollars to win, not which side has the right policies and right things for the American people and to serve the American people. This is all about service. This is not about money and the influence of the most wealthy corporations and groups.

We have outlined a lot of different ways that we can address this. Again, I go back to the Freedom to Vote Act, the DISCLOSE Act, the Protecting Our Democracy Act, and the Ban Corporate PACs Act. We can work on this right now. Even if we don't think we have the votes to overturn Citizens United, we should still try. We should still put it on the floor and put it up for a vote.

In the 16 years that we have had Citizens United go into effect, we see our airwaves, mailboxes, inboxes, and digital media influenced by all this money.

One of our country's core principles is that every citizen has a vote and that every citizen has a voice, regardless of how much money they have. When you allow unlimited money to come into our campaign system, those individual voices are drowned out. A lot of people feel the despair of not having a voice in our politics today. A lot of that is because of Citizens United.

We have lost something that has made our democracy special in some ways. I think the folks who spoke up today have really made a lot of good points about how many of us feel the anger of what is going on, but we are committed to getting this dark money out of politics.

This does not have to be a partisan issue. It never has to be. I know there are folks on both sides of the aisle who want to do this.

Some of my colleagues talked about the corruption today in our politics and how there is this perception of corruption and the reality of corruption. They are talking about what has happened in this administration as well, and all the corruption that has happened in this administration. It is disheartening to see some of the stories that we see every week about how foreign governments are influencing our policies now, and how foreign leaders, wealthy people, and wealthy corporations can easily buy some of our policymaking. That is the appearance, and that is the reality in some cases. That needs to stop. We need to do something about it. We need to do something now.

Again, we are all committed to making sure that people trust our institutions and our Congress. I thank my colleagues today for speaking up and being willing to take on this fight. This is not an easy fight. The easy thing to do is just to go with the flow and go along with the system that we have today. Instead, my colleagues have decided to speak up. My colleagues have decided that they will not accept the status quo.

I know many people were not able to come today. I know we have a few more still on their way, but the reality is that my colleagues understand that the system is not good for our democracy. It is not good for our country. It is not good for the perception of this institution or the reality of this institution. So, we have to continue to keep fighting.

If we look at the cycles, in the 2010 cycle, as I mentioned before, the top 100 individual donors spent 2.1 percent of all the spending in 2010. By 2024, it was 15 percent. If you extrapolate that, by 2038, about half of our spending could end up being from the top 100 individual donors. I mean, that is sort of where we are headed right now, where you are going to have such a concentration of wealth.

There are countries that have that right now, today, and those democracies are not functioning democracies. Some of them don't even call themselves democracies anymore, or don't even try to consider themselves democracies, where you have the few governing the rest.

When you see some of the spending that we have today, again, the 2000 cycle had $18 million in spending, and the 2004 cycle had $13 million in spending. The 2008 cycle had $16 million. It kind of leveled off.

Then, you look at the 2012 cycle, after Citizens United: $231 million in spending. In the 2016 cycle, there was $682 million in spending. By the 2020 cycle, we are in the billions now, $1.2 billion.

We are at a point now where you need a billion dollars to run for President at this point.

The 2024-cycle was $2.6 billion. I think we are at a point now where some of our elections, the money is just outrageous. People want to feel trust in our institutions and our systems, but you want to get to a place where you can do that. What we are experiencing now is affecting our policymaking. It is affecting every single part of the way this institution runs today.

The other thing we, at least, want is disclosure. That is why I have talked about some of the bills that we can do right now, like the DISCLOSE Act, because at least we could have more clear understandings of where the money is coming from and a better ability to follow the money so that the American people can understand who is paying for that commercial that they keep seeing on TV, right? Is it actually the PAC? Who paid for that ad and where is the money coming from? What do they want and who received that money, right? It is very unclear right now to a lot of people.

There are a lot of issues right now that we can solve even without overturning Citizens United, although overturning Citizens United is our main goal. We have an opportunity and we have to act now. We can't wait.

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Mr. SUBRAMANYAM. Mr. Speaker, I will definitely look into that bill. There are more solutions that we can act on right now while we try to overturn Citizens United. I thank all the speakers today. I thank Representative Neguse for helping organize this. I thank my staff, including Matt Fisher, for helping get everyone together today.

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