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Excerpted from “Exclusive: Foreign-Funded ‘U.S.’ Chamber Of Commerce Running Partisan Attack Ads” By Lee Fang on Oct 5th, 2010 at 10:22 am, Think Progress
[SIZE="+2"]T[/SIZE]he largest attack campaign against Democrats this fall is being waged by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a trade association organized as a 501(c)(6) that can raise and spend unlimited funds without ever disclosing any of its donors. … A ThinkProgress investigation has found that the Chamber funds its political attack campaign out of its general account, which solicits foreign funding. …
This is a huge story, an American trade association that collects funds from foreign companies, running attack ads against Democrats across the country. Here's some follow up to the report.
Excerpted from “Franken to FEC: Investigate foreign cash charges against Chamber of Commerce” Posted by Jeremy Herb, Star Tribute Staff Blogs, Last update: October 5, 2010 - 5:03 PM
[SIZE="+2"]S[/SIZE]en. Al Franken is calling for the Federal Election Commission to investigate allegations from a liberal group that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — the pro-business association that’s said it will spend $75 million on the midterm elections — used money from foreign corporations for its political ads.
Excerpted from “Clean and Open American Elections,” Editorial, The New York Times, Published: October 5, 2010
[SIZE="+2"]T[/SIZE]he possible commingling of secret foreign money into these groups raises fresh questions about whether they are violating both the letter and spirit of the campaign finance laws. The Federal Election Commission, which has been rendered toothless by its Republican members, should be investigating possible outright violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act by foreign companies and the chamber.
The Internal Revenue Service, which is supposed to ensure that these nonprofit groups are not primarily political, has fallen down on the job. Last week, Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, demanded that the I.R.S. look into whether the tax code was being misused for political purposes, and, on Tuesday, two watchdog groups made the same request of the agency.
The government needs to make sure that the tax code — and American control of American elections — is not being violated.