World News Korner

Shadowy conservative lobbying network which works behind the scenes to impact policies, ALEC, has fallen on hard times following the furor over the Trayvon Martin shootings.

Courtesy of The Guardian:

An influential US lobbying network of Republican politicians and big businesses is seeking to avert a looming funding crisis by appealing to major donors that have abandoned it over the past two years following criticism of its policy on gun laws.

The Guardian has learned that the American Legislative Exchange Council (Alec), which shapes and promotes legislation at state level across the US, has identified more than 40 lapsed corporate members it wants to attract back into the fold under a scheme referred to in its documents as the "Prodigal Son Project".

The target firms include commercial giants such as Amazon, Coca-Cola, General Electric, Kraft, McDonald's and Walmart, all of which cut ties with the group following the furore over the killing of the unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in Florida in February 2012.

Alec was embroiled in the controversy surrounding Florida's 2005 "stand-your-ground" law under which George Zimmerman, the neighbourhood watch volunteer who shot and killed the 17-year-old Martin, initially claimed self-defence. The Florida law was picked up by Alec, and, working in partnership with the National Rifle Association, used as a template for one of its "model bills", which was then taken up by other states across the country.

The Guardian has learned that by Alec's own reckoning the network has lost almost 400 state legislators from its membership over the past two years, as well as more than 60 corporations that form the core of its funding. In the first six months of this year it suffered a hole in its budget of more than a third of its projected income.

I find it interesting that such a powerful group found themselves so terribly damaged by an association with Trayvon Martin's shooting and the Stand Your Ground law. It almost makes it seem that Americans really are ready for tighter gun control laws, and that ALEC and the NRA are losing their influence over lawmakers they have put in place to stop them.

But fear not their influence is by no means completely dried up.

Alec reconvenes for its next nationwide meeting, described as a "states and nation policy summit", on Wednesday in Washington. The three-day event will be attended by hundreds of state legislators and corporate representatives.

In a sign of the influence the network holds with Republicans, it will be addressed by rising stars of the party including US senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who led the push for the recent government shutdown, and the party's budget guru, Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.

The network also counts among its former members the two highest ranking Republicans in the House of Representatives, John Boehner and Eric Cantor, as well as prominent Republican governors such as Scott Walker of Wisconsin and John Kasich of Ohio.

Paul Ryan and Ted Cruz, well isn't that interesting?

So the organization loses support from the establishment conservatives and simply lures in the new kids on the block to replace them. Everything old is new again.

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