Environmental megadonor Tom Steyer is trying to ban everyone else from writing fat checks to political advocacy groups.
On Tuesday, Steyer reportedly endorsed a proposition that would force California lawmakers to try to overturn the Citizens United ruling — which was about whether it was legal to broadcast a film critical of his pal Hillary Clinton, whom he recently endorsed for president.
The Supreme Court ultimately ruled in favor of Citizens United, allowing corporations and unions to spend as much money as they want to independently persuade voters to support or oppose candidates.
Steyer, who was the top political contributor in 2014 and is currently again in 2016, likes to complain about how “the other side” is using their money for evil via Citizens United.
When asked how much money he was planning to spend in this current election cycle, Steyer responded: “we believe Citizens United was a terrible decision. We believe that it should be overturned. We believe there’s too much emphasis on money in politics.”
“The other side has a lot more money,” Steyer said, despite his own $39 million in campaign contributions so far this year. “That money is not transparent, it’s self-interested, and it is much more sizable.”
Ironically, overturning Citizens United would have little to no impact on Steyer’s personal superPAC, NextGen Climate Action. Because Steyer has personally provided nearly 70 percent of NextGen’s funding, changing the rules on what political activities corporations and unions can spend money on wouldn’t significantly affect his own superPAC. It’s pretty obvious Steyer just doesn’t want anyone else to do what he is doing, because if he really cared about the influence of money in politics, he would stop dumping cash into his PAC and writing fat checks to candidates.
