Conservative Lawmaker Defies Open-Records Law to Keep ALEC Dealings Secret
Conservative Wisconsin Lawmaker Defies Open-Records Law to Keep ALEC Dealings Secret
September 19, 2013
by John Nichols - http://billmoyers.com/2013/09/19/conservative-lawmaker-defies-open-records-law-to-keep-alec-dealings-secret/
This Article originally appeared at The Nation.
In the two years since the ALEC Exposed project revealed the role that the secretive American Legislative Exchange Council plays in shaping the laws of states across the nation, the group has had a much harder time hiding its meddling.
In fact, so much national attention has been paid to ALEC’s role in promoting restrictive voter ID laws and controversial Stand Your Ground initiatives that ALEC officials announced last year that they would shut down the task force that was responsible for promoting those measures.
But ALEC is still putting representatives of corporations together with state legislators to craft “model legislation” — especially with regard to economic and regulatory issues. And the group’s national treasurer has come up with a novel scheme for keeping the projects secret.
The Republican says she is exempt from open-records laws, and her state’s Republican attorney general says that’s cool with him.
Wisconsin State Senator Leah Vukmir, a key confidante of Governor Scott Walker who serves as ALEC’s national treasurer, has for months been stonewalling a legitimate open-records request from the Madison-based Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), which worked with The Nation on the 2011 ALEC Exposed project that revealed how ....
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