The St. John Valley Times shares the text of on an October 17 speech given by outgoing Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, praising the work of the 501c4 corporation Americans Elect:
“And I want to leave you with this thought – that we do have a foundation today for rebuilding a government that works. The recent proliferation of groups dedicated in one form or another to civility in politics gives us tremendous impetus for hope. We have this extraordinarily important Civility Series. We have organizations like Third Way, which is working to bring Democrats to the middle, as is the Republican Main Street Partnership from the other side. We have No Labels, seeking to move American politics from ‘point scoring’ to ‘problem solving.’ Americans Elect has been trying to change ‘the way we elect our leaders.’”
Americans Elect has produced a great deal of talk over the last two years, but most of what it’s done has been utterly inconsequential. It looked as though Americans Elect was going to try run a presidential candidate this year, but it cancelled its presidential efforts after hardly any American voters came out in support of the idea. Americans Elect even sent out letters to secretaries of state to cancel its ballot access, worried that some Americans Elect delegates who weren’t from the DC corporate headquarters might try to help out candidates all on their own. This was a long, protracted episode of inaction.
The only actual, consequential political action taken by Americans Elect since its formation has been to:
A) take $1.75 million in cash from three Wall Street tycoons,
B) flood the state of Maine with TV advertisements opposing U.S. Senate candidate Charlie Summers,
and
C) flood the state of Maine with mailers and TV advertisements promoting U.S. Senate candidate Angus King.
Interfering in the Maine race for U.S. Senate is the only consequential political action Americans Elect has taken. And Olympia Snowe was correct when she remarked in last week’s Connecticut speech that “Americans Elect has been trying to change ‘the way we elect our leaders.’” But do you think that swamping a small-state campaign with unregulated Wall Street dollars is the right way to “change the way we elect our leaders?” Who is Olympia Snowe speaking for?
