Organizing for America | One Million MySpace Friends for Obama'08 in Ohio: Obama Endorses Senator Durbin's Fair Elections Now Act!

Post from One Million MySpace Friends for Obama'08 in Ohio:

Obama Endorses Senator Durbin's Fair Elections Now Act!

By One Million MySpace Friends for Obama'08 in Ohio! - Apr 7th, 2007 at 12:34 pm EDT

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Presidential Hopefuls on Public Financing and FENA
The three front-runners for the Democratic nomination for
President are on the record in support of public financing of
elections. John Edwards, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama have
all come out strongly in favor of a change to the system. You
can see Edwards' endorsement here
Link and Clinton's here
Link. See this clip
Link of Obama's recent endorsement
of Senator Richard Durbin's Fair Elections Now Act, and
exhortation for public pressure on the issue here. Republican
presidential hopeful, John McCain, meanwhile has been less
supportive of public financing while on the campaign trail this
year, but has supported it strongly in the past
Link at the state level as well as
for the Presidential race. He has joined Obama in promising to
run under public financing in the general election if his
opponent agrees to do the same. It's encouraging to see
discussion of and support for this policy from the presidential
field; nobody knows better than the candidates racing to raise
the millions they'll need to get to the White House that
campaign financing needs an overhaul.

Speaking of the Fair Elections Now Act, it's been popping up in
the news left and right drawing positive editorials and LOTS of
attention on the letters to editor page
Link thanks to efforts of Public
Campaign Action Fund members. You can write your own letter to
the editor using our tool here
Link />
New Mexico Close to Judicial Public Financing
Great news! New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson plans to turn
his endorsement of public financing for judicial races into
action when he signs the bill recently passed out of the state
legislature in special session that would expand the state's
public financing program to include state Supreme and Appellate
court races: Link. He plans to
line-item veto the "poison pill" provision in the bill that
would require voters to amend the state constitution to
eliminate retention elections (making those judges run in
partisan races) before the public financing system could take
effect. New Mexico already has public financing available to
candidates for the state's Public Regulation Commission, and the
city of Albuquerque approved public financing for municipal
elections by ballot initiative in 2005. Many thanks to New
Mexico Common Cause and Public Campaign Board member Richard
Romero, for their efforts in passing this bill!

Maryland Campaign in Final Days
Thousands of emails, hundreds of calls, and a pair of lobby days
later we are in the last week of the Maryland legislative
session: the moment of truth for a Clean Elections win in the
state this year Link. In fact, the
Senate is schedule to vote today on the bill that would bring
full public financing for legislative elections in Maryland --
the state Assembly is already in support. Though Senate
President Mike Miller (D) is notoriously opposed to Clean
Elections, the gossip in Annapolis is that grassroots organizing
(all those emails, all those calls) and the tireless efforts of
Progressive Maryland, Maryland NAACP, Maryland Common Cause,
Maryland Sierra Club, and The Reform Institute, have really
boosted support among previously ambivalent legislators for
passing Clean Elections. It's going to be quite a showdown -- as
soon as we get the results of the vote we'll let you know!

April Showers?
Did Uncle Sam give you a refund on your federal tax return this
year? How about turning a little bit of that around with an
investment in winning Clean Elections through a gift to Public
Campaign Action Fund Link Your tax
dollars fund the policies of the country, what better way to
ensure they are spent responsibly than by establishing Clean
Elections systems that make elected officials accountable to
you?

VOICEing Support
Public Campaign staffers checked their inboxes a few weeks ago
and found an email from National Field Director Jeannette
Galanis: "I think we need to go to Iowa." Why? Because a
dedicated group of legislators and activists from Iowa Citizens
for Community Improvement and the Clean Elections Coalition had
advanced full public financing legislation, the Voter-Owned Iowa
Clean Elections (VOICE) Act, farther than they ever had in the
state: far enough to make a win this year a real possibility.

A pair of bills, HSB 105 championed by Representative Pam Jochum
(D-Dubuque) and SSB 1173 headed up by Senator Mike Connolly
(D-Dubuque) have passed out of their respective State Government
committees and are moving on to Appropriations, where they look
to face formidable opposition. We are gearing up for a full
court press grassroots field effort; getting calls in to
legislators in support of VOICE, getting the word out through
door-to-door canvassing and phone banking, and ramping up
lobbying efforts in Des Moines to win Clean Elections for Iowa!
You can find out more about the campaign here
Link />
Blog/News Roundup
Have you been reading Paid For By?, Public Campaign Action
Fund?s blog? In case you missed this week, check out the stories
we've been following on?

- New Jersey Governor John Corzine signing the bill continuing
his state's Clean Elections Pilot project
Link />- Presidential candidates raising money any way they can --
ethics? What ethics? Link
- Energy for change: watch Senator Durbin's passionate speech
Link introducing the Fair Elections
Now Act on the floor of the Senate here.

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