Andy Kim Sen
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january 16, 2026
WATCH: On Senate Floor, Kelly Leads Colleagues in Marking 16 Years Since Citizens United Ruling, Highlighting Impact of Big Money in Politics on Working Families
*“The loudest voices in Washington became billionaires, not every day Americans.”
In case you missed it, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly led a series of floor speeches with his colleagues marking the 16th ^anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United v. FEC decision, which opened the floodgates for big, dark money in our politics.
In their remarks, Kelly and his colleagues connected the rise of dark money and super PAC spending to real-world consequences for Americans, highlighting how unlimited corporate and billionaire spending has warped priorities in Washington and driven up costs for working families, underscoring the need to restore accountability and transparency so that our democracy answers to voters—not special interests.
*Sen. Kelly speaks on Senate floor.
Watch Kelly’s full speech here. See key excepts from Kelly and his colleagues below:
*Sen. Kelly: “In 2010, the Supreme Court handed down a decision that put a ‘for sale’ sign on our democracy. The Citizens United ruling opened the door for corporations and billionaires to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence our elections, often without the public ever knowing who’s behind it. The Court decided that spending money in elections is the same as political speech, and that corporations should have the same political rights as individual Americans. The result was predictable – and it wasn’t limited to a courtroom. It changed how this place works. The loudest voices in Washington became billionaires, not every day Americans.
*Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI): “I was here before the Citizens United decision. When robust meaningful bipartisan climate legislation was constant here in the Senate. I can think of four major bipartisan bills here in the Senate. And I remember my friend, John McCain, carrying the Republican banner into the presidential election with a respectable climate platform. Well, right after Citizens United, all of that stopped. The barrage of fossil fuel dark money into our politics killed bipartisanship on climate change instantly. It is still a problem today.”
*Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR): “The growth in dark money has been stunning because there’s so much money among the oligarchs and billionaires, they want to spend it to create laws that favor the oligarchs and billionaires and they are spending at an extraordinary rate. Six years ago, it was about $300 million, but according to the Brennan Center […] dark money hit a record high of $1.9 billion in the 2024 races. That’s a six-fold increase in six years. That’s the rich and powerful buying their government. It is an absolute travesty. No one in our founding community of our nation who wrote the Declaration of Independence, who wrote the Constitution, wanted to design a system where the mega rich ran the place as a cabal of elites. But that’s what we have and that’s what we have to change.”
*Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN): “In the 2024 elections, secret money groups spent $1.9 billion – nearly double the amount spent just one cycle before. This undermines our democracy and shakes the public’s trust because unlimited, anonymous spending in our elections doesn’t encourage free speech – it drowns out the voices of American people who are seeking to participate. We must fight for a more transparent democracy where every voter’s voice is heard.”
*Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ): “We live in the time of the greatest distrust in modern history. It doesn’t have to be this way. We can have a politics that restores and grows trust, instead of actively degrading it. This year is the 250th anniversary of the independence of our nation. This is our moment to free Americans from the influence of big money and give them their voice back in their democracy.”
*Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ): “Since the Citizens United decision, I have watched how this body has seen clearly corrupt forces beginning to overrun the commonsense and the will of the people and policy, more and more be bent to the whim and the will of the wealthiest of the wealthy in our country, in the world, as well as corporations, many of them multinational corporations. We are in crisis. Our nation is in crisis. […] Trust is vital for a democracy to thrive. And there has been nothing more powerful in undermining that trust in the years I’ve been in the Senate that I’ve seen than the destructive force of money in our politics.”
*Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL): “Under the current system that’s described by my colleagues on the floor, there is so much entrenched money that they virtually control the agenda and scare the living hell out of average individuals who don’t have a fortune to spend. And that’s the reality of what we face.”
*Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT): “Individuals today make up to 16% of total spending in elections. 16%. 84% of all the spending in elections today are not done by citizens. 84% of spending are corporations and organizations. Much of that money is anonymous. You have no idea where that comes from. Let me tell you what the impact of that. The impact is corruption. Let’s just call it what it is.”
*Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA): “Citizens United didn’t just change campaign finance law — it fundamentally altered our democracy. It was the moment where the voices of everyday Americans began to be drowned out by a small and powerful few, armed with unlimited money and unprecedented access. As Trump completely sidelines the Federal Election Commission — our country’s top campaign finance watchdog — we are entering a midterm election season with unlimited money allowed in our elections and a President who has regularly used the powers of the office to benefit his billionaire donors. I will continue to push my colleagues to enact legislation to overturn Citizens United so that our elections reflect the will of the people instead of corporations and the highest bidder.”
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September 17, 2025
NEWS: Sen. Schiff, Reps. Neguse, McGovern, and Lee Introduce Constitutional Amendment to Overturn Citizens United
On Constitution Day, lawmakers resume push to ensure Congress and states can set reasonable limitations on political spending and influence by corporations on U.S. elections
Washington, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and U.S. Representatives Joe Neguse (D-Colo.-02), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.-02), and Summer Lee (D-Pa.-12) introduced the Citizens Over Corporations Amendment, a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would overturn Citizens United v. FECand limit corporate influence and spending in American politics.
“The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United opened the door for corporations to pour billions of dollars of dark money into elections. This anonymous and unrestricted spending cripples transparency in the political process and weakens our democracy. Our amendment will keep big money out of politics and restore power where it should belong — with the American people,” said Senator Schiff.
“The time to confront political corruption and clean up government is now,” said Congressman Neguse.“The Citizens Over Corporations Amendment works to renew people’s faith in our democracy by ensuring transparency through campaign finance reform and preventing unrestrained spending and dark money in elections.”
“Elon Musk poured millions into electing Donald Trump and then used the influence he bought to fire federal workers, dismantle USAID, and strip health care from millions,” said Congressman McGovern. “Citizens United gives billionaires like Musk even more power to rig the system for the well-off and well-connected. That’s not a democracy—it’s an auction. I’m proud to support the Citizens Over Corporations Amendment, which will overturn Citizens United, get big money out of politics, and put power back where it belongs—in the hands of the people.”
“Some say the beginning of the collapse of our democracy was when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Citizens United, giving the green light to corporations and billionaires to pour hundreds of millions into our elections and drown out the voices of everyday people. At the root of why we cannot make progress on so many urgent policies is a system where money speaks louder than people. The Citizens Over Corporations Amendment is about changing that. It is about putting power back where it belongs, with the people, so we can build a government that works for all of us, not just the wealthy few and their corporate interests,”said Congresswoman Lee.
Senator Schiff has introduced his constitutional amendment in the U.S. House of Representatives to overturn Citizens Unitedsince 2013 and has been a strong proponent of fixing America’s broken campaign finance system since he was first elected in 2000, after a race that was at the time the most expensive in the history of the House of Representatives. The first bill he cosponsored in Congress was the bipartisan McCain-Feingold Act to regulate the financing of political campaigns, which was later passed and signed into law.
The proposed Constitutional amendment will:
- Make clear the Constitution does not restrict the ability of Congress or states to set reasonable, viewpoint-neutral limitations on the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections
- Distinguishes between natural persons, corporations, or other artificial entities, including by allowing Congress or the State to prohibit such entities from spending money to influence elections
- Allow public financing of campaigns when states choose to enact such laws, which can restrict the influence of corporate or private wealth = public fund election
- Take further steps to protect the freedom of the press in the case of future campaign finance-related legislation
Earlier today, Senator Schiff and lawmakers rallied for Constitution Day to underscore the need to protect our democracy and curb influence by special interests on American politics. At the rally, Schiff highlighted his proposed amendment reversing the 2010 Supreme Court ruling that ended restrictions on corporate campaign spending, eliminating decades of legal precedent.
The Senator’s full remarks at the rally can be viewed.Schiff’s remarks can be downloaded here.
The bill is co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H), Angus King (I-Maine), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Andy Kim (D-N.J.), and Cory Booker (D-N.J.).
The bill is endorsed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Democracy Defenders Action, Public Citizen, End Citizens United, People for the American Way, Common Cause, and Free Speech For People.
“Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v FEC 15 years ago, unlimited and untraceable money has flowed from the pockets of corporations and the ultra-wealthy into political campaigns”,said Stuart McPhail, Director of Campaign Finance Litigation, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). “In the 2024 federal election cycle alone, over $2.7 billion was funneled through super PACs to various political campaigns. This dark money corrodes our democracy by allowing corporations and billionaires to hide their identities while greatly influencing elections and policy. CREW is proud to endorse the constitutional amendment introduced by Senator Schiff and Representatives Neguse, McGovern, and Lee to overturn Citizens United and ensure that the voices of average citizens are not drowned out by moneyed interests.”
“Democracy Defenders Action wholeheartedly endorses Sen. Adam Schiff and Reps. Joe Neguse, Jim McGovern, and Summer Lee’s constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United,” said Virginia Canter, Ethics and Anticorruption Chief Counsel and Director, Democracy Defenders Action. “This crucial step will ensure that all Americans, not just the super-rich and corporations, have an equal voice in our elections–and true representation in our democracy.”
“Citizens United has turned our democracy into a government that serves the ultra-wealthy. Political spending by billionaires has surged an astonishing 160-fold since the 2010 Supreme Court decision, and working families are paying the price like never before as self-enriching politicians bankroll tax breaks for their biggest donors. Senator Schiff’s amendment is a bold and commonsense step to reclaim government for the people. We applaud his leadership to challenge the billionaire class, fight corruption in Washington, and get Big Money out of politics,” said Tiffany Muller, President, End Citizens United.
“Citizens United destroyed our nation’s safeguards against the undue influence of money in politics. For 15 years now, dark money has flowed freely, allowing the rich and powerful even more influence over our elections. This amendment is essential to preventing that continuing assault on the integrity of our elections. People For the American Way is proud to support this amendment as we work toward building a democracy truly of, by, and for the people,” said Svante Myrick, President, People For the American Way.
“The vast majority of Americans want the real voices of real people to matter more than the money that corporations and the super-rich funnel into our political system. The devastating Citizens United decision 15 years ago dramatically altered the landscape of our politics—unleashing a flood of cash and deepening the outrage that regular people feel at the inequities baked into our democracy. We must overturn this decision. Senator Schiff, and Reps. Joe Neguse, Jim McGovern, and Summer Lee have remained focused and continue pushing for a constitutional amendment to do just that. Public Citizen strongly supports their efforts,” said Lisa Gilbert, Co-President, Public Citizen.
A fact sheet on the legislation can be foundhere.
Full text of the bill is availablehere.
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Pharmaceutical industry likely to shatter its lobbying record as it works to shape Democrats’ spending bill
A years-long battle over prescription drug prices reaches its apex as the industry spends tens of millions to alter the plan.
By Yeganeh Torbati and Jonathan O'Connell
November 5, 2021
In September, Rep. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) began noticing mailers arriving at homes across his district, including his own and that of his parents, with an alarming message. The mailers alleged that Kim was intent on preventing Medicare patients from getting the drugs they needed.
That was news to Kim, who has made lowering seniors’ health-care costs and expanding their access to Medicare a signature issue.The mailer, along with a slew of digital ads and text messages, was sponsored by a group called A Healthy Future, LLC, and claimed that Kim and other New Jersey Democrats wanted to cut off “access to lifesaving medicines” and shift Medicare money into other social safety-net programs.
Soon after the mailers landed in New Jersey mailboxes, Kim’s office began receiving calls from puzzled constituents.
“I’ve been attacked before, but I’ve never seen one as egregious as this one in terms of ‘Andy Kim’s trying to cut Medicare,’” Kim said. “That’s just so absurd, and I actually think that has affected how the district has responded.”
Watershed or watered down? Democrats’ drug pricing deal leaves many unsatisfied.
Kim was certain the attacks were coming from the pharmaceutical industry, but it was hard for him to be sure. A Healthy Future’s website includes no contact information, and a message to its Facebook page went unanswered. But a nonprofit group called A Public Voice listed A Healthy Futureas being under its control in its 2018 and 2019 tax filings and described the LLC’s primary activity as “supporting a vibrant health care system.”
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A Healthy Future and its anonymous funders, it turned out, had fought previous efforts in Washington to reduce the cost of prescription drugs. According to Google digital ad data, A Healthy Future also paid for ads in fall 2020 arguing against a Trump administration attempt to address prescription drug costs.
Brian Newell, a spokesman for PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry’s chief lobbying arm, when asked whether the organization had ever had any financial or other relationship with A Healthy Future or A Public Voice, said: “Like most industries and associations, PhRMA engages with groups and organizations that have a wide array of opinions and priorities, including those who do not want the government to come between patients and their medicines.” DENIAL NON-DENIAL ~ WATERGATE b&wOODWARD
The ads targeting Kim and others were one strand of a massive, months-long advertising, lobbying and political donation blitz undertaken by the pharmaceutical industry and its allies, perhaps the strongest of all corporate voices in Washington, to kill a Democratic proposal to lower the cost of prescription drugs by empowering the federal government to negotiate their prices.
That provision to control drug prices became a focal point of the $1.75 trillion spending package Democrats are trying to move through Washington. The measure was in, then out, then watered down, going through a fierce ping-pong of backroom negotiations that is likely to continue once the Senate considers the bill in coming weeks.
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Pharmaceutical industry lobbyists defended their effort, alleging that the Democrats’ proposal would stifle research. They also said many other groups poured millions of dollars into the other side of the debate.
“As we’ve said repeatedly, our advocacy has focused on delivering solutions that will lower what patients pay out of pocket for prescription medicines, while opposing reforms that would ultimately leave patients trapped in a broken insurance system, restrict access to lifesaving medicines, and destroy the development of new treatments,” Newell said.
The influence campaign at times worked through groups whose funding sources are hidden. At least 20 different advertisements were run on television and online across the country. The advertisements were augmented by a campaign byPhRMA, which spent nearly $23 million on lobbying through the first nine months of 2021, according to data compiled by OpenSecrets, which tracks corporate spending and political influence. That puts PhRMA on track this year to beat its own spending recording of $29.3 million in 2019.
“The intensity right now of K Street and the deployment of lobbying and dark money is extraordinary,” said Nick Penniman, chief executive of Issue One, which advocates for transparency in Washington. “It is a frenzied state right now.”
The intense effort is reflective of just how much many companies have at stake in the Democrats’ evolving tax-and-spending bill. This article, which is based on interviews, documents and lobbying and ad spending data, offers a window into the efforts one sector took to shape the bill, much of which was crafted in secret.
The drug pricing provision agreed to by House Democrats this week does not go as far as many Democrats including Kim had hoped. But it still delivers reforms that could cut costs for millions of Americans bycapping out-of-pocket spending for seniors at $2,000 a year, capping insulin costs, preventing price increases that exceed the rate of inflation, and allowing Medicare to begin negotiating prices for some drugs.
“What we’re trying to do is defying one of the most powerful special-interest lobby groups in Washington, D.C.,” Kim said. “The fact that we were able to get something that will meaningfully help people was important.”
Other industries, including tobacco and electric vehicles, have worked aggressively to pare down or reshape parts of the bill in their favor, too. But the effort to fight back on drug-price increases stands out because of the enormous scope of the campaign waged by the pharmaceutical industry and its allies, which have derailed similar proposals for the past two decades, despite how popular many of the changes are with voters, according to polling data.
“They’re the Goliath,” said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of OpenSecrets. She said that aside from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, of which pharmaceutical firms are members, the industry had spent more than any other by a wide margin so far this year, deploying so many lobbyists — 1,600 — that they outnumber members of Congress 3 to 1.
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The industry made $90.6 million of political contributions during the 2020 election cycle, according to OpenSecrets,61 percent of that to Democratic candidates and groups.
The industry’s focus on drug pricing has increased dramatically in recent years as the issue became more top-of-mind for voters. In 2012, lobbyists registered to work on the issue of “drug prices” 69 times for 20 different clients. In 2021 so far, they have filed to lobby on the issue 1,192 times for 242 different clients, according to OpenSecrets data.
While the industry lobbies on many different issues in a given year, the Democratic bill H.R. 3 that would have given the government more expansive power to negotiate drug prices was the bill PhRMA cited most often for lobbying; the bill appeared in its reports 35 times so far this year, OpenSecrets found.
Research by Patients for Affordable Drugs Now, which advocates for lower prices, found that PhRMA and its allies spent at least $26.5 million on television and digital ads attacking proposals on price negotiations between July and early November. That included $2.7 million spent by PhRMA, but also $4.5 million in ads by the 60 Plus Association, which bills itself as a conservative version of AARP anddid not respond to a request for comment.
Also lining up behind the effort was the American Action Network,a major conservative nonprofit advocacy group, with $7.9 million in ads. PhRMA gave the American Action Network $4.5 million in 2019, along with $75,000 to the 60 Plus Association, according to tax filings.
Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) holds one of Congress’s most competitive seats, having wrested it from Republican control in 2018 and narrowly winning reelection in 2020. She shaped her campaign around a platform of tackling rising health-care costs and has maintained focus on that issue, inviting a Type 1 diabetes patient with sky-high insulin costs to be her guest at the 2020 State of the Union address.
According to data tracked by Patients for Affordable Drugs Now, the American Action Network funded an ad in Slotkin’s district starting in August that accuses Democrats of pushing a “socialisthealth-care plan to control what medicines you can get.”
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Her office is now accustomed to fielding calls from constituents who see ads like that one on television, Slotkin said.
“We can really tell the first couple of days those ads run because that’s when we’ll see a spike in the number of people calling our office,” she said. “We literally write a response that our staff can use to forcefully push back and try to contradict the purposeful misinformation.”
Asked about the accuracy of the advertisement targeting Slotkin, American Action Network spokesman Calvin Moore reiterated its message, saying such proposals amount to “socialist price controls” that could limit development of new prescription drugs. “Stifling innovation to this degree has profound consequences,” Moore said.
Many of the backers of these efforts are difficult to identify because of rules allowing anonymous funding of political groups. A Public Voice, which described itself on its 2018 and 2019 tax forms as the “direct controlling entity” of A Healthy Future, is based in Thornville, Ohio.It listed nearly $5 million in contributions in 2018, though it declined to name its donors, and spent the money on consulting, marketing and funding conservative causes across the country. That year, its donations included $240,000 to Fund for a Working Congress, a political action committee that supported Republican candidates, and $370,000 to Ohio First PAC, which supported a challenge by Republican James B. Renacci against Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio).
A voice mail left at a number listed on tax filings for A Public Voice received no response. Documents filed with the state of Ohio show that the entity originally formed in 2012 as Protect Your Vote Ohio and show its registered agents as lawyers with Langdon Law, a Cincinnati-area law firm known as a nexus for “dark money” groups on the right.
David Langdon of Langdon Law did not respond to an email and voice mail requesting comment.
The approximately 20 digital and television video ads compiled by Patients for Affordable Drugs Now and reviewed by The Washington Post warned viewers about an array of crises that could befall them should Congress allow Medicare to negotiate prices for drugs, among them that the industry could no longer develop new medications, that the government would limit access to prescriptions, that Medicare would be cut or that millions of jobs would be lost.
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“They call it negotiation, but it really means government decides what medicines I can get,” says “Sue,” awoman labeled in one ad as a diabetic from Ohio.
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“Imagine a future in which a vaccine for covid-19 was never discovered,” says a voice in another spot.
Pro-industry advertising ran during opinion shows on Fox News, CNN and MSNBC, as well as during college football games, according to the advertising data firm iSpot.tv.
Once the drug cost proposal was added to President Biden’s larger legislative package, some advertising took direct aim at Democrats’ spending priorities. One claimed the proposal called for “gutting Medicare” in exchange for “pie-in-the-sky special-interest kickbacks.” It depicts House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) riding atop an animated unicorn, she and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) sliding down rainbows, and Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) at a dessert buffet. Another depicts the proposal as a shell game that “loots Medicare.”
Jayapal says Democrats almost have the votes to pass Build Back Better
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) described her frustration with lengthy negotiations on the Build Back Better act in an interview with The Washington Post Nov. 5. (Zach Purser Brown/The Washington Post)
Previous presidents, including Barack Obama and Donald Trump, vowed to pass bills to lower prescription drug costs, only to see their efforts die on Capitol Hill, in part because of a relentless lobbying blitz.
When Montana’s Brian Schweitzer ran for Senate in 1999, he elevated his long-shot campaign by busing senior citizens to Canada so they could illegally buy drugs at lower prices.
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He got his first taste of the pharmaceutical lobby shortly afterward, when he said television ads started attacking him for trusting medicines made in other countries. He said in his case, the attacks helped make his political career. “Virtually everybody in America has a friend or family member who is taking that expensive medicine,” he said.
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Rep. Susan Wild (D-Pa.) holds anothercompetitive seat, representing an Allentown, Pa., district that narrowly favored Biden in the 2020 election. She said that as she began supporting drug price reform early in her career, lobbyists began relentlessly calling her office, even though she had vowed not to take corporate PAC donations.
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“If they’re calling me nonstop, imagine what they’re doing to those who actually do take their money,” she said.
During the most recent negotiations, Wild began receiving automated emails from constituentsworried they wouldn’t be able to get their medicines if the government could negotiate prices. But on Sunday she joined 14 colleagues from other competitive districts, including Kim and Slotkin, to urge Democratic leadership to deliver on their promise to reduce drug prices.
She said she knows what comes next.
“I am quite certain that because I have been so outspoken on this issue, that I am going to face an attack ad,” Wild said. “I have an idea for what it could be, but I don’t want to tell you in case they see it. I don’t want to give them any ideas.”
Patriotic Millionaires
https://www.alternet.org/2022/01/wealthy-progressives-back-primaries-against-dems-tanking-party-agenda/
cmn dr
A group of wealthy progressives announced Thursday that it will support primary challenges against Rep. Henry Cuellar, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, and other right-wing Democrats who have actively obstructed President Joe Biden's legislative agenda and, in the process, potentially boosted the GOP's chances of retaking Congress.
"These radical moderates have done more damage to President Biden’s agenda than Mitch McConnell and Ted Cruz combined," Erica Payne, president of the Patriotic Millionaires, said in a statement announcing the organization's endorsements for the looming 2022 midterms—and its plans to back campaigns to unseat right-wing Democrats in this year's elections and beyond.
"We must stop contributing to and endorsing candidates who are actively sabotaging the president's agenda."
"Their outright sabotage of President Biden’s Build Back Better Agenda, likely done on behalf of their donors, left us with no choice—it's time to draw a line in the sand," Payne continued. "It's time for the American people to expect better from Democrats, and for the party to hold its elected officials to a higher standard."
Founded in 2010 in opposition to then-President Barack Obama's extension of Bush-era tax cuts for the rich, the Patriotic Millionaires had never waded into the realm of congressional primaries before Thursday, when it officially endorsed Cuellar's progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros as well as Rep. Lucy McBath (D-Ga.), who is taking on Rep. Carolyn Bourdeaux (D-Ga.) in Georgia's newly drawn 7th Congressional District.
But the group doesn't intend on stopping there, pointing to a list of 15 congressional Democrats it characterizes as "The Problem(s)." In a press release, the Patriotic Millionaires said they plan to follow the endorsements of Cisneros and McBath with "further challenges to some of the Democrats who have spent the last year sabotaging the Biden agenda at every turn."
The group told CNBC that its members will be providing financial support to the Democratic primary challengers it endorses.
The Patriotic Millionaires' list of Democratic obstructionists includes prominent figures such as Sinema and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who for months have stood in the way of the Build Back Better package and defended the archaic legislative filibuster, which Republicans have wielded repeatedly to block voting rights legislation.
Sinema and Manchin are both up for reelection in 2024.
Also featured on the organization's list are Democratic Reps. Richard Neal (Mass.), Jared Golden (Maine), Josh Gottheimer (N.J.), and Ed Case (Hawaii).
"Our country is becoming unstable, largely due to rapidly growing inequality," Morris Pearl, the chair of the Patriotic Millionaires, said in a statement Thursday. "A small number of radical so-called moderates have stood in the way of even the most commonsense reforms because they are too beholden to a few shortsighted ultra-wealthy people. They have decided to have people who work for a living fall further and further behind to preserve the wealth of millionaires and billionaires."
In addition to backing candidates challenging right-wing Democrats, the Patriotic Millionaires endorsed seven Democratic incumbents, includingReps. Katie Porter(Calif.), Andy Kim (N.J.), and Deborah Ross (N.C.).
"It's time for Democratic donors to stand up for working people," said Pearl. "We must stop contributing to and endorsing candidates who are actively sabotaging the president's agenda."
"If Democrats want to convince voters to support them, they need to show voters that being a Democrat means something," he added. "The people we are endorsing are the tireless champions of working people that the party needs more of. It’s time to focus our support and resources behind candidates like them, rather than ones that will actively undermine their colleagues and the country."
Shortly before the Patriotic Millionaires unveiled their endorsements, another progressive organization—Progressive Democrats of America (PDA)—announced its official support for the reelection campaigns of Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), and several others who represent the flipside of "The Problem(s)."
"Nothing is more essential for our movement than returning all of these progressive champions to Congress with resounding victories—just as nothing would please our opponents more than their defeat," said Alan Minsky, PDA's executive director. "They will pour money into any campaign challenging AOC, or Rashida Tlaib, or Jamaal Bowman, et al., but we can defeat them with an avalanche of small donations."
"Over the next several days, we will announce endorsements for additional incumbents," Minsky continued. "Many excellent progressives will be added to this already-impressive list, a clear sign that progressive power and influence is growing in Congress and across the country."