Big news!
On Monday, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation withdrew their support for ALEC, caving under intense grassroots pressure from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), Color of Change and CREDO Action. As reported by Think Progress, "PCCC garnered more than 28,000 signatures in a matter of hours."
Nearly 60,000 people have signed the petition so far... Join the momentum and help pressure AT&T, State Farm and Johnson & Johnson to withdraw their support for ALEC as well!
The Gates Foundation now joins the ranks of major corporations like Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Kraft, McDonald's and Intuit...all of whom have pulled their support for ALEC after pressure from progressive momentum. After Coke's announcement, civil rights group ColorOfChange said, "The clear and simple message was that you can't come for black folks' money by day and try to take away our vote by night." Amen to that! Our friends at ColorOfChange led last week's activism and were assisted by CREDO, a progressive phone company which engages in progressive campaigns.
ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council, is the corporate-funded right-wing lobby that spearheaded union-busting laws in states like Wisconsin, voter-disenfranchisement laws in states like Maine, and Florida's "Shoot First" law that let Trayvon Martin's killer go free.
After Monday's Gates Foundation victory, Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, released a a statement saying, "The dominoes are falling and the curtain is closing for ALEC. People power has worked and this is a major step in the right direction." If we can get other dominoes to fall, we can dramatically reduce ALEC's ability to do evil.
And that is exactly where you come in: Sign now to join the progressive momentum and pressure AT&T, State Farm, and Johnson & Johnson to stop funding ALEC.
After you've signed, share this post with your Friends on Facebook and Twitter to spread the word about this powerful --and effective-- grassroots momentum!
UPDATE 4/12/12:
Two more dominoes have fallen this week! Wendy's and Mars Inc. have also withdrawn their support for ALEC, as reported by Color of Change. Over 362,000 have signed petitions from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), Color of Change, CREDO Action and others encouraging organizations, like AT&T and the Gates Foundation, to defund ALEC. In light of this incredibly successful progressive coalition effort, ALEC issued a statement complaining about the "well-funded, expertly coordinated intimidation campaign" against them. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee issued this response:
"While ALEC may find it 'intimidating' to see Americans standing up and taking action against them, their erratic statement today confirms that even ALEC knows their union-bashing, voter-suppression, and shoot-first agenda can't stand up to public scrutiny."
Common Cause also issued
this response to ALEC's statement this week:
"The truth is that many Americans find ALEC's secretive efforts to push public policy for the economic and partisan interests of its corporate sponsors both undemocratic and unsavory. That's why companies like Coca Cola, Pepsi, Intuit, Kraft, and McDonalds are exercising their free market right to pull out. Good corporate managers know that attaching their brand to radical and divisive legislation is not in the best interest of their shareholders, and Common Cause applauds their leadership."
Let's keep the dominoes falling:
Sign now to join the momentum!