… The capabilities we have now can take us to a whole new level.” The network has pledged to spend an additional $400 million on the 2018 elections … including elections at the local and state levels.Īnd that’s just for this year’s elections.
#Corporate plutocracy free
The Koch-affiliated web of gazillionaire allies, The Seminar Network, aims to unite “the country’s top business and philanthropic leaders behind a shared commitment to a … free and open society.” When some 500 donors gathered at a posh resort in January, Charles Koch boasted: “We’ve made more progress in the last five years than I had in the previous 50. And because that money is privately held, much of that spending is not publicly revealed.Īnd it’s not just the brothers themselves at play here. Transforming their inherited fossil fuel fortune into Koch Industries, they freely tap this revenue directly and massively to finance their political agenda. The Koch brothers understood early on that they would need to invest millions of dollars (their combined wealth is over $120 billion) over many years to package, perfume and surreptitiously push their unpopular anti-majority ideas on the public. It adds up to a coup - and yet, because it has been built slowly and with deliberate stealth over decades, the public has not yet fully grasped the enormity, complexity and effectiveness of this unprecedented conspiracy of billionaires. The effect of these and hundreds of other national, state and local attacks is that the wealthy few are now grabbing evermore societal wealth and power, shattering America’s commitment to the Common Good. Subvert democracy through gerrymandering.
Suppress the voting rights of students, people of color, the elderly and others who tend to oppose Republican policies and candidates.