Template:ALEC News

ALEC News

Don't Let Them Smear Us as "Fake News" Last Friday night, ALEC posted an op-ed trying to smear the Center for Media and Democracy as "fake news," a bogus attack from the Koch-backed corporate bill mill. The truth? CMD has written hundreds of stories documenting ALEC's pay-to-play operation--where corporations secretly vote as equals with legislators on “model” bills to change our rights. Our research has helped fuel thousands of stories about ALEC in news outlets across the country and the globe, like the New York Times, the Guardian, the BBC, the Washington Post, PBS, and many more. ALEC's "fake news" smear is designed to minimize the impact of our investigations. Don't let them get away with it. Read the rest of this item here. Betsy DeVos Ethics Report Reveals Ties to Student Debt Collection Firm Public education advocates are demanding another hearing on Trump nominee for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, after her dismal performance in front of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee (HELP) January 17th and after the late release of her ethics report on January 20th. The report, available here, details some 102 companies that might pose a conflict of interest for DeVos and sheds new light on the nominee’s investments and ethics. While most Secretaries of Education have an extensive resume as school administrators or as educators, DeVos has neither. Read the rest of this item here. Scott Pruitt: Trump’s Pick for EPA Scott Pruitt Image: Gage Skidmore CC BY SA 2.0 Scott Pruitt is President-elect Donald Trump's nominee to be Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Since 2010, he has been the Attorney General of Oklahoma, having previously served in the Oklahoma State Senate from 1999 to 2006. Pruitt was the subject of a Pulitzer prize winning New York Times investigation in 2014 ("Energy Firms in Secretive Alliance With Attorneys General") which described "the unprecedented, secretive alliance that Mr. Pruitt and other Republican attorneys general have formed with some of the nation's top energy producers to push back against the Obama regulatory agenda". He describes himself as "a leading advocate against the EPA's activist agenda." Many fossil fuel funded groups responded to Pruitt's nomination with delight. The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) also expressed its own support for Pruitt, who is a former ALEC member, stressing that he would "work constructively with industry" as well as the states to "spur economic growth." Read the rest of this item here.