Green Party (United States) - Fund Raising and Position On Super PACs

Fund Raising and Position On Super PACs

In the early decades of Green organizing in the United States, the prevailing U.S. system of money-dominated elections was universally rejected by Greens, so that some Greens were reluctant to have Greens participate in the election system at all, because they deemed the campaign finance system inherently corrupt. Other Greens felt strongly that the Green Party in the U.S. should develop in the electoral arena; many of these Greens felt that adopting an alternative model of campaign finance, emphasizing self-imposed contribution limits, would present a wholesome and attractive contrast to the odious campaign finance practices of the money-dominated major parties. Over the years, some state Green parties have come to place less emphasis on the principle of self-imposed limits than they did in the past. Nevertheless, it is safe to say that Green Party fundraising (for candidates' campaigns and for the party itself) still tends to rely on relatively small contributions, and that Greens generally decry not only the rise of the super-PACs but also the big-money system, which some Greens criticize as plutocracy. Some Greens feel that the Green Party's position should be simply to follow the laws and regulations of campaign finance. Other Greens argue that it would injure the Green Party not to practice a principled stand against the anti-democratic influence of money in the political process. Candidates for office, like Jill Stein, the 2012 Green Party nominee for the President of the United States, typically rely on smaller donations to fund their campaigns.