Letter: GOP has been rigged for years

Few Americans know about the American Legislative Exchange Council (www.alec.org), which describes itself as, “America’s largest nonpartisan, voluntary membership organization of state legislators dedicated to the principles of limited government, free markets and federalism.”

Their positions on regulatory reform, environmental stewardship, energy, and just about everything else, are consistent in calling for less regulation in each area. These are regulations that were enacted to protect the public.

The truth about ALEC can be found at a website called AlecExposed.org. ALEC membership is composed of about 2,000 state legislators, but also of 300 or more corporate lobbyists who get to draft and vote on over 1,000 “model” bills each year, “with one in five of them enacted into law.”

The website also points out that “more than 98 percent of ALEC’s revenues come from sources other than legislative dues, such as corporations, corporate trade groups, and corporate foundations.”

While ALEC describes itself as nonpartisan, “ALEC members, speakers, alumni, and award winners are a ‘who’s who’ of the extreme right. As of Jan. 23, 2014 — when ALEC Exposed was posted — there was, “one Democrat out of 104 legislators in leadership positions.”

Donald Trump was right, the political system has been rigged (by the Republican Party and its corporate financial backers) for years.

This story was originally published January 9, 2017 at 5:28 PM with the headline "Letter: GOP has been rigged for years."