With a need to reform campaign finance laws, Proposition 32, if passed, would only make matters worse. While promising that it would limit special interest money in statewide elections, it fails to disclose the disproportionate affect it would have on public sector unions.
Proposition 32 prohibits political contributions by payroll deductions, which is exactly how unions have always deducted funds for collective bargaining with their employers, for livable wages, safe working conditions and reasonable hours. The way in which it’s structured specifically targets unions but not corporations which use treasuries and executives for peddling their interests.
California Common Cause and the League of Women Voters said in a joint statement, “Proposition 32 claims to be ‘political reform’ but in reality was intentionally written to create special exemptions for billionaire businessmen and business special interests, giving them even more political power to write their own set of rules.”
Proponents champion the proposition as “paycheck protection” because it bars an employee’s opportunity to contribute to a union endorsed candidate, who is most likely of the Democratic Party. In 1998 and 2005 voters rejected such a measure in California, only now corporations are included in the language to give the disarming illusion of equality between the two political party surrogates.
After Citizens United-the 2010 Supreme Court decision that granted personhood to corporations- six out of the 10 groups that spent the most on campaigns were corporations for Republican Party candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, while three were unions which spent money on the Democratic party.
One need not look far to find the funders supporting Prop 32. The money trail leads to the America Future Fund, an arm of the right-wing conservative machine led by Charles and David Koch, who are both ranked fourth on Forbes World’s Billionaires list.
Unions have spent $284 million  on candidates and initiatives from 2001 to 2011, an evidence of their tremendous political power in California, according to the Center for Investigative Reporting. But that pales in comparison to the $931 million wealthy business interests have spent. Should political spending by unions become banned, corporations will have an even greater hand in shaping politics by sidelining 2.5 million middle-class union workers from the debate.
We need credible campaign finance reform. Proposition 32 would only make matters worse. Vote NO.