Andy Kroll

Reporter

Andy Kroll is Mother Jones' Dark Money reporter. He is based in the DC bureau. His work has also appeared at the Wall Street Journal, the Detroit News, Salon, and TomDispatch.com, where he's an associate editor. He can be reached at akroll (at) motherjones (dot) com. He tweets at @AndrewKroll.

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Americans for Prosperity Lures Michigan Right-to-Work Fans With Gas Cards, Free Food

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Dec. 11, 2012 11:50 AM PST

Many right-to-work protest signs wait for protesters to take them before the march to the state capitol in Lansing, Michigan.

The conservative group Americans for Prosperity is enticing supporters to rally at the Michigan state capitol in support of right-to-work legislation with $25 gas cards and free food and drinks, according to a staffer for the organization's Michigan chapter.

AFP's Michigan chapter also used gas cards and free lunches to lure supporters to a lobby day on December 6, the day GOP Gov. Rick Snyder and Republican lawmakers abruptly unveiled their right-to-work bills. Greg George, a government affairs associate with AFP-Michigan, says no one has taken the group up on its most recent gas card offer, but that the offer remains. "We've offered to gladly give them out," he says. (Because it is a nonprofit organization, Americans for Prosperity, which is partially backed by the Koch brothers, does not publicly disclose its donors.)

Despite what its supporters claim, right-to-work legislation does not prevent so-called "forced unionization." That's because forced unionization is a myth: No worker can be forced to become a full-fledged union member. What right-to-work would do is ban unions from collecting dues from nonunion members for representing them with management. After all, nonunion members can benefit from contracts negotiated by unions. Right-to-work allows those nonmembers to receive union representation without paying for it—unions deride those folks "free-riders." The result of right-to-work laws is that unions see their treasuries diminish and membership take a hit.

Michigan's Republican-controlled legislature fast-tracked three pieces of right-to-work legislation last week that would allow nonunion members in workplaces in the public and private sectors to receive representation without paying any dues. The bills would likely deal a killer blow to the state's unions. (Police and firefighters are exempt from the proposals.) Snyder's public support for the legislation signaled a whiplash-worthy turnaround for the governor—he previously said right-to-work was not a priority, and tried to stand apart from the rest of the union-blasting class of 2010 governors like Wisconsin's Scott Walker and Ohio's John Kasich. Snyder is expected to sign the right-to-work legislation as early as Tuesday.

Just as AFP lured supporters to Lansing, unions bussed in members and supporters to protest the right-to-work bills, according to Chris Fleming, a spokesman for the American Federation for State, County, and Municipal Employees. A We Are Michigan spokesman adds that union allies are paying for their own lunches. Thousands of union members and supporters packed into the Michigan state capitol and the surrounding grounds to demand that Snyder veto the right-to-work bills.

AFP wanted the right-to-work fight. The group played a visible role in supporting other GOP governors pushing anti-union agendas in Wisconsin, Ohio, and elsewhere. Now AFP stands on the cusp of a major win in a cradle of organized labor. AFP-Michigan director Scott Hagerstrom said last week that passing right-to-work in the state would be "the shot heard round the world" in the battle against unions. "A victory over forced unionization in a union stronghold like Michigan," Hagerstrom said, "would be an unprecedented win on par with Wisconsin that would pave the way for right to work in states across our nation."

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Obama for America's Magic Number: $1.4 Billion

—By Andy Kroll

| Mon Dec. 10, 2012 9:02 AM PST

Barack Obama.

There is no disputing it: Barack Obama and his campaign juggernaut are the kings of political fundraising.

Obama for America, the president's own campaign, raked in $1.4 billion in campaign donations during his two bids for the White House, according to the Huffington Post's Paul Blumenthal, who crunched the numbers. That $1.4 billion tally—which does not include spending by the Democratic National Committee or the other groups that backed the president—is the biggest presidential haul in history.

During the 2012 campaign cycle, when you include Obama's campaign and the Democratic groups backing him, Obama and his allies topped GOP nominee Mitt Romney and his GOP backers in the fundraising fight. Team Obama banked $1.2 billion for the 2012 campaign cycle, making the president the first billion-dollar candidate in history; Team Romney pocketed $923 million. By comparison, Sen. John McCain, the GOP's 2008 presidential nominee, raised a little more than a third of that, $368.1 million, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

McCain's haul was so small compared to Romney's because the Arizona senator accepted taxpayer-provided public funding in 2008. Romney opted out. As did Obama during both of his campaigns. Which leads to one of the big takeaways from the 2012 campaign season: Parsing the spending and fundraising tallies for 2012, it's obvious that the current public financing system—funded by taxpayers, capping the amount of money presidential candidates can raise and spend—is horribly outdated and badly in need of a reboot. The way it works now, it's dead as dust.

Obama is the first billion-dollar presidential candidate. But until public financing gets a facelift, he's unlikely to be the last.

Michigan's Own Scott Walker-Style Showdown Is Coming

—By Andy Kroll

| Fri Dec. 7, 2012 10:12 AM PST

Union members rallied at the state capitol to protest sudden right-to-work legislation backed by GOP legislators and Gov. Rick Snyder.

The GOP's crusade against unions is taking center stage in Michigan, a stronghold of organized labor.

On Thursday night, with the blessing of Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, Michigan's Republican-controlled Legislature passed a trio of so-called "right-to-work" bills targeting unions in the public and private sectors. The bills would ban unions from collecting dues from nonmembers to pay for wage and benefits negotiations that benefit unionized and nonunionized workers. Right-to-work laws have the effect of draining labor unions of money and members, as seen in the 23 states where such laws are on the books. Snyder says he will sign the measures into law when they arrive on his desk, despite saying last year that right-to-work could divide the state. Michigan would become the 24th right-to-work state.

[Read more in the MoJo blog]

Will Big Oil Keep Its Subsidies in a Fiscal-Cliff Deal?

One of America's most profitable industries banks billions in subsidies—but there's little talk in Washington of putting these handouts on the chopping block.

—By Andy Kroll

| Fri Dec. 7, 2012 4:03 AM PST

Democrats and Republicans are duking it out in Washington over a deal to avert the slew of spending cuts and tax increases—the so-called "fiscal cliff" you've heard so much about—that will take start to effect on January 1. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have argued that "everything should be on the table" in negotiations toward a deal that trims the nation's debt and avoids the cliff. Yet notably absent from the debate over what to cut and what to spare in a deal are the tens of billions of dollars in subsidies, tax breaks, and other perks for the hugely profitable oil industry.

That silence begs the question: Will Big Oil's subsidies go untouched in the fight over a fiscal-cliff deal?

[Read the full article]

Stephen Colbert to America: I'm "Honored" and Ready to Serve in the US Senate

—By Andy Kroll

| Thu Dec. 6, 2012 1:41 PM PST

Stephen Colbert has his opening. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), the tea party icon, announced Thursday that he will retire from the US Senate in January, leaving Republican Gov. Nikki Haley the task of handpicking DeMint's immediate successor. A Colbert for Senate Twitter account, @ColbertforSC, sprung up almost immediately, and fans have called for Colbert, the author of such classics as I Am America (And So Can You!) and America Again: Re-becoming the Greatness We Never Weren't, to replace DeMint in the hallowed halls of Congress.

Brace yourselves, Colbert Report fans: Colbert, who has made no secret of his desire to hold higher office, says through his publicist that he's ready and willing to step up for his home state. "Stephen is honored by the groundswell of support from the Palmetto State and looks forward to Governor Haley's call," his personal publicist, Carrie Byalick, writes in an email to Mother Jones.

Colbert first tried to run for president in 2007, and then again in 2012, when he boisterously announced his candidacy for the "United States of South Carolina." In between those failed campaigns, Colbert started his own super-PAC, Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and his own dark-money nonprofit, Colbert Super-PAC SHH!. In all seriousness, his money-in-politics skits lampooned the ragged state of campaign finance regulation better than anyone. He bagged a Peabody award for his skewering of the state of political money today.