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Support Real Election Reform: Public Financing of Federal Elections!

Target: U.S. House of Representatives
Sponsored by: Americans for Campaign Reform

In the wake of the Abramoff scandal, Congress is racing to enact lobbying reform measures. But lobbying reform alone cannot fix our broken democracy. Again and again, we see how financing elections with private money has led to corruption and lack of public confidence in the Congress.

There is a solution to the problem of influence peddling in Washington. The time has come to implement voluntary public funding of all federal elections.

If Congress spent Just $6 per citizen per year to publicly fund federal elections, candidates would be able to spend more time communicating with voters instead of begging for campaign donations. And once elected, instead of having to worry about financing their next campaign, our leaders would be free to focus on our nation's challenges. Public financing of campaigns would also mean that more of our most able leaders would run for federal office, because financing a campaign wouldn't be such a daunting obstacle.

As citizens we can complain about the corrosive influence of our election finance system, or we can do something about it. Help make public financing of campaigns happen in all elections by adding your name to our petition.

deadline: 5-1-2007
goal: 40,000

27,037
signatures!

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Dear Representative,

I am writing to ask you to support real campaign reform that moves beyond just lobbying reform by supporting public financing of elections.

The way we finance our elections today has led to extraordinary corruption, and incremental reforms cannot stop the peddling of access and influence in Washington. The time has come to drastically change how we elect our leaders, and the solution we need is public funding of federal elections.

Public funding is already working at the state level in Arizona and Maine and was just passed by the Connecticut legislature. With public funding of federal elections, our leaders can focus on our country's significant and immediate problems rather than wasting far too much of their time raising money for their next election. And, more able leaders will be able to run for office -- not just millionaires or those with access to big money.

The cost to make public funding of federal elections a reality comes out to just $6 per citizen, for a total of $1.8 billion a year -- just a fraction of the wasted federal expenditures given as rewards to special interests and distributed through "pork barrel" spending every year.

I urge you to support public funding of federal elections. Our democracy depends on it! And just imagine, with public funding you'll never have to make those degrading calls to donors ever again.

Sincerely,

[Your name]
[Your address]

We signed the “Support Real Election Reform: Public Financing of Federal Elections!” petition!

# 27,049:

12:14 pm PDT, Mar 22, Erin Shelly, New York

# 27,048:

10:29 pm PDT, Mar 18, Shannon Sultan, Wisconsin

# 27,047:

6:50 pm PST, Feb 26, Maureen Primerano, California

# 27,046:

6:50 pm PST, Feb 26, Shiu M. Hung, California

# 27,045:

12:51 pm PST, Feb 14, Indian Hat, United Kingdom

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8:23 am PST, Feb 8, Kevin Kreiss, Washington

# 27,043:

6:00 pm PST, Dec 29, Jessica Eldridge, Australia

# 27,041:

11:08 am PDT, Oct 7, Kaytie Irvine, California

# 27,040:

3:27 am PDT, Oct 4, Dogan Ozkan, Turkey

# 27,039:

10:58 am PDT, Oct 3, Chris Korczak, Massachusetts

# 27,038:

12:35 am PDT, Aug 20, Jacolin Schultz, Wisconsin

# 27,037:

12:35 am PDT, Jul 25, Jan Sokolovits, South Dakota

# 27,036:

1:49 am PDT, Jul 24, Dana Szemereta, North Carolina

# 27,035:

10:50 pm PDT, Jul 7, Name not displayed, Connecticut

# 27,034:

9:15 pm PDT, Jun 28, Cindy Andersen, Illinois

# 27,033:

4:58 pm PDT, Jun 20, Kathy Mattingly, Indiana

# 27,032:

1:07 pm PDT, Jun 13, Juliana Farah, Lebanon

# 27,031:

10:53 am PDT, May 25, Lisa Haas, Minnesota

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3:08 pm PDT, May 14, Kaye Fissinger, Colorado

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6:43 pm PDT, May 3, Kelsey Cormier, Massachusetts

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2:58 pm PDT, Apr 29, Muriel Koyce, Ireland

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6:21 am PDT, Apr 26, Ann Gunn, Florida

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1:03 pm PDT, Apr 25, Melissa Bardwell, Washington

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8:10 am PDT, Apr 25, Nicky Elizabeth, Maine

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6:35 pm PDT, Apr 23, Gonzalo Hurtado, Peru

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6:43 pm PDT, Apr 19, Meri V., New York

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1:06 am PDT, Apr 10, Victoria Thomas, Wyoming

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7:54 pm PDT, Apr 7, Pam Wilkinson, Michigan

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1:19 pm PDT, Apr 4, Fredi Ricci, Pennsylvania

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2:23 pm PDT, Mar 23, Debbie J Pruiett, Georgia

# 27,018:

2:06 am PDT, Mar 20, Kit Chang, Massachusetts

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6:13 pm PST, Mar 8, Deborah Barclay, Connecticut

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2:34 pm PST, Feb 27, Shelli Hundley-Barber, Alabama

# 27,015:

6:12 pm PST, Feb 24, Brooke Stone, Michigan

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7:30 pm PST, Feb 15, Jeremy Spohn, Pennsylvania

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5:27 pm PST, Feb 3, Kimberly Mosher, Texas

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3:23 pm PST, Jan 31, Jennifer Morris, Oregon

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3:06 pm PST, Jan 24, Kathleen Roby, Ohio

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9:19 am PST, Jan 24, Maria Beatrice Barberis, Italy

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4:07 pm PST, Jan 14, Name not displayed, Ireland

# 27,008:

11:25 am PST, Jan 13, Dave Sennett, Pennsylvania

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9:11 pm PST, Jan 12, Kristin-Noelle Russo, Michigan

# 27,006:

8:11 pm PST, Jan 6, Ron Goodman, Idaho

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8:07 am PST, Jan 6, Andrea Leary, Florida

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6:20 am PST, Jan 3, Theresa Peck, Illinois

# 27,003:

12:09 am PST, Jan 3, Melanie Leary, Texas

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Support Real Election Reform: Public Financing of Federal Elections!

This petition has been closed.