SierraScape October 2016 - February 2017
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by Caitlin Zera
Executive Committee Alternate Secretary
In 2010 when the Supreme Court ruled on Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission that corporations had full rights to spend unlimited sums of money on federal, state, and local candidate elections, the state of our American democracy changed. Corporate influence in politics challenges our ability as a democratic society to protect our environment, public health, and communities who are most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and environmental threats. In this post-Citizens United political climate, corporate profit can fully take precedence over the interests of human communities, biodiverse ecosystems, and our shared resources of clean water, air, and land.
Corporations can use campaign spending strategically to influence public policy, individual politicians, and the overall political process disproportionately to individual citizen voters. By influencing and even manipulating pieces of policy, corporations can roll back environmental protections, justify unsafe environments for workers, and implement industry-friendly standards which allow polluters to discharge more toxins and wastes all in the interest of increased profit. Practices like regulatory capture, revolving door hiring procedures, and recommendations to allocations committees create lax environmental regulations and undermine existing standards for exposure to toxins and pollutants.
In August 2016, the Eastern Missouri Group signed on to a letter put forth by the Missouri Coalition for the Environment's Democracy in Action program supporting a St. Louis City Council Resolution to "establish that money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights." EMG's support is a way to build awareness about corporate influence as an environmental justice issue and is an act of solidarity to express a growing, united discontent with decisions like Citizens United that prioritize corporate profit over people and our planet. Seventeen states and hundreds of cities across the country have already passed similar resolutions to get big money out of politics.
When communities cannot fight for their right to a healthier planet and when community needs are not being represented in our government, we do not have an environmentally just and equitable society.