00:01 - The following program is sponsored in part by

00:04 - customer's bank.

00:14 - We're joined today by Jeff kaiser organizer with march on Harrisburg in early may

00:18 - march on Harrisburg made a sixty mile walk from reading to Harrisburg

00:22 - to draw attention to the practice of lobbying

00:25 - lobbyists giving gifts to elected officials

00:27 - why do you find that practice

00:29 - problematic.

00:31 - Gifts are well and

00:33 - I mean if

00:34 - if the

00:35 - lobbyists have the ability to give

00:38 - as much as they want

00:39 - any type of gift to our lawmakers

00:42 - that might influence their decisions

00:45 - they would be

00:46 - the lawmakers would be working

00:48 - or probably be working for the people with money

00:50 - and the people give the gifts and hiring the lawmaker or the lobbyists

00:54 - as opposed to the people that they represent

00:57 - so yeah I mean it's been.

00:59 - It's illegal in.

01:02 - Forty seven of the fifty states

01:03 - in the united states to

01:06 - to have unlimited gifts given to our lawmakers

01:08 - were one of three that does not have such a limit.

01:12 - Other states think it's a problem and we agree with them.

01:15 - Following this three day march to Harrisburg what kind of

01:18 - reception did you receive what happened at the capitol.

01:21 - It was a four day march actually

01:23 - and.

01:24 - What kind of reception do we get.

01:26 - From the

01:28 - people in the capital that

01:30 - saw our press conference out front

01:33 - and hurt us

01:34 - chanting and singing and whatnot in the building

01:37 - we got

01:38 - we got a pretty positive.

01:40 - Reaction from the public.

01:42 - Actually there were some people

01:43 - who were watching us and ended up joining in

01:46 - with us and in singing and

01:49 - making noise and.

01:51 - Enchanting

01:52 - yeah so.

01:53 - Yeah it was it was a good turnout it was good

01:55 - good feeling to see that.

01:57 - What kind what do Pennsylvania laws currently dictate

01:59 - regarding lobbyist influence and gift giving to lawmakers.

02:03 - So.

02:05 - The

02:06 - the laws say that.

02:10 - The definition of lobbying and the ethics law

02:13 - actually lists

02:15 - giving gifts to lawmakers to influence their opinion.

02:19 - As a part of lobbying.

02:21 - We

02:21 - Also see

02:23 - that as that's the definition of bribery

02:25 - in the debt in the

02:26 - dictionary so

02:28 - and

02:29 - so so

02:30 - and then the ethics law says you can do that it it's

02:32 - encouraged actually and there's no limit on what can be given

02:36 - there are just.

02:37 - Reporting requirements

02:39 - that are somewhat lax

02:41 - actually quite lax

02:42 - so we don't

02:43 - all get to see what these gifts are or how much they are

02:46 - all the time but

02:48 - but that's that's the the the structure of the laws around gifts in Pennsylvania.

02:53 - Is it possible to put a dollar figure

02:56 - to the the value of how many gifts or how much

02:59 - that lobbyists give to lawmakers in any given year

03:02 - so there was a study done in two thousand and eighteen by the house of

03:06 - representatives and in that study.

03:09 - They just

03:10 - they determined that a million and a half dollars worth of

03:13 - gifts was given by

03:15 - lobbying groups to our lawmakers

03:18 - but they also in the same report discovered that

03:21 - only forty thousand of that

03:23 - was reported as.

03:25 - This gift was given by this person to this person and this was the value

03:29 - and that

03:30 - goes back to the lax reporting requirements that

03:33 - I talked about earlier so only three percent of the value of the gifts

03:37 - have

03:37 - reported

03:38 - an invisible

03:40 - so million and a half dollars is a lot of money

03:42 - what kind of gifts to lawmakers typically receive.

03:47 - We don't know

03:48 - all of the gifts that are given

03:50 - a lot of them for the

03:51 - reason I just stated they are not reported

03:53 - but

03:54 - when.

03:56 - When reporters spot our lawmakers going off on a trip.

04:00 - They

04:01 - you know they investigate that they can see that.

04:04 - We know of

04:05 - trips to

04:07 - Europe

04:07 - I believe as a wine trip to Europe once there was a

04:11 - rodeo trip out to Oklahoma or maybe it's Colorado.

04:14 - Trips are easy to spot because you can see the person leaving

04:18 - and

04:19 - we also know about.

04:21 - Recently someone received golf clubs several thousand dollars worth of golf clubs

04:26 - and those are the types of gifts that we know about and have been reported are there

04:30 - certain circumstances or types of gifts that you find reasonable versus others that

04:34 - you might find more offensive oh absolutely.

04:38 - So the types of gift band bills that we support

04:41 - are the one ones that

04:43 - we like to say you know the lawmakers should be able to

04:45 - live their life and do their job.

04:48 - Without

04:49 - undue burden

04:50 - but without having

04:51 - really over the top gifts that might be extremely influential so.

04:56 - Governor wolf

04:57 - when governor wolf was in

04:59 - his and as governor he had a gift band for hit the administration

05:03 - and

05:03 - the people that worked in the administration at that time could not go to the capitol

05:07 - and accept a bottle of water

05:09 - during a meeting they had to go and buy one

05:11 - and

05:12 - whenever we talk about the gift bad we hear about that

05:15 - a lot.

05:16 - That's some of the concern that they have

05:18 - and

05:19 - we are absolutely not concerned with those types of gifts that

05:21 - you know that ridiculous.

05:23 - If I'm ridiculous to try to ban that I mean.

05:26 - If a girl scout

05:27 - troop comes in and wants to give some cookies.

05:30 - You know that's fine

05:32 - but

05:33 - you know

05:33 - trips overseas and other things like that and.

05:37 - Those are more problematic.

05:39 - Are there legislative models that exist in other

05:41 - states that you'd like to see Pennsylvania emulate.

05:45 - I'll be honest I personally am not aware of the models of

05:49 - legislation in other states

05:51 - and

05:51 - the gift ban legislation that's currently in place was in place before I got here

05:56 - and I know that

05:57 - that was worked through with the lawmakers in Pennsylvania

06:00 - to find something that would work for Pennsylvania.

06:05 - And

06:05 - the

06:06 - legislation it's there now I know that the

06:08 - one that was introduced by Solomon and rig by.

06:11 - Hb seven forty four was

06:13 - specifically pared back a little bit

06:15 - to make it more

06:16 - acceptable to Pennsylvania lawmakers

06:19 - and

06:20 - so we don't really have a model that we're working off of

06:23 - that I'm aware of because that's before my time

06:25 - but

06:26 - how do you convince a legislative body to support a gift ban that would

06:29 - potentially negatively impact them directly.

06:33 - Well

06:33 - yeah that's that's an interesting question

06:35 - how do you get the legislature to ban it's one

06:38 - of

06:39 - What might be considered bad practices

06:41 - and

06:42 - so I would say this

06:43 - most of the legislature

06:45 - agrees

06:46 - that.

06:47 - The exorbitant gifts

06:49 - are very you are wrong

06:51 - and

06:52 - and and the they

06:54 - most of the legislators

06:56 - don't take those gifts themselves

06:58 - are generally not offered those gifts themselves

07:00 - but when they see others take it they they don't like that

07:02 - and

07:03 - so

07:04 - There's a lot who agree with this legislation or

07:07 - the style or this.

07:09 - Type of legislation

07:11 - and

07:12 - it's it's getting the ones that maybe benefit

07:14 - from it

07:15 - to convince

07:16 - try to

07:17 - either convince them

07:18 - which is very difficult

07:19 - or find a way to get around them

07:22 - to get this to happen that's

07:24 - that's the job that we have.

07:25 - For those that are unfamiliar which drove us to know about march on Harrisburg and

07:29 - the mission of this organization.

07:30 - So march on Harrisburg we are a

07:33 - worse statewide

07:34 - volunteer-driven nonpartisan good government group.

07:38 - So we are working

07:40 - to get money out of politics

07:42 - and improve democracy so it's not just anti corruption

07:44 - that we work on we try to improve the Democratic process.

07:48 - So.

07:49 - We're trying to prevent

07:51 - billionaires corporations and whatnot from buying policy

07:54 - from our legislators

07:56 - and.

07:58 - Also allow the people of Pennsylvania to hold them accountable

08:01 - with

08:01 - robust Democratic practices so so that's

08:04 - effectively our mission and we feel that.

08:08 - Money in politics and lack of democracy are the root

08:11 - problem for most of the other problems that people have.

08:16 - In life

08:16 - that could be fixed with public policy.

08:19 - Healthcare coverage

08:21 - climate change and

08:23 - childcare

08:24 - no minimum wage increase

08:26 - all of those things we can pretty much point

08:28 - back to money in politics as a reason why

08:31 - they do not get fixed.

08:33 - How did you personally get involved with the organization.

08:36 - So.

08:37 - I

08:38 - I was

08:39 - at home home listening to the radio listening to npr no offense

08:44 - to.

08:45 - Us to Carol I'm sorry

08:47 - I'm forgetting her last name she's with fair districts pa

08:50 - from

08:50 - Oklahoma yes yes yes.

08:52 - So she was on.

08:54 - Smart talk

08:55 - on npr one afternoon I was listening to her talk about the work she was doing and as

08:59 - part of that conversation she was also talking about the other groups in Pennsylvania

09:03 - trying to do other things besides

09:05 - redistributing refer warm which is what

09:07 - they're doing and I had decided at that moment

09:09 - that you know I'm tired of

09:11 - worrying and complaining

09:13 - about the problems in government

09:15 - you know here's somebody who's doing something

09:17 - and.

09:18 - You know I wanted to find a way that I could get involved as well

09:22 - so I originally found ranked-choice

09:24 - I'm sorry originally found

09:26 - march on Harrisburg through their ranked choice voting campaign

09:29 - and that's how I got involved initially

09:31 - so I'm a math guy I'm a former software engineer

09:34 - I love math

09:35 - ranked-choice voting just makes a whole ton of sense

09:38 - and

09:39 - that's how I got involved and

09:41 - working within the organization I discovered all of the money out stuff

09:44 - that they're working on

09:46 - and and when it really occurred to me that as I said earlier.

09:51 - Money in politics is the cause of a lot of the problems

09:54 - that we care about for me it's climate.

09:57 - Do

09:58 - We have to fix that first.

10:00 - So I got heavily involved in that side of it and

10:03 - and here and here I am.

10:05 - March on Harrisburg has been in existence for over a decade it's made

10:09 - several marches to Harrisburg what keeps your organization coming back to Harrisburg

10:14 - to march for years it's concerns.

10:16 - Well this is

10:17 - I swear the problem is going to get fixed it has to be fixed with legislation.

10:23 - We have to convince our lawmakers that the whole legislature to solve these problems

10:28 - so.

10:30 - Yeah the there's no external solution to this we have to do it in Harrisburg

10:34 - have you or other members of the march in Harrisburg had the opportunity to meet

10:37 - directly with legislative leaders to express your concerns.

10:41 - Yes yes we have and

10:44 - and.

10:47 - I want to say this

10:48 - to the conversations.

10:50 - Come and go.

10:52 - Sometimes they're fruitful sometimes they're not.

10:55 - Sometimes we can get a meeting and sometimes we don't

10:59 - but we have periodically

11:01 - had productive conversations

11:03 - and

11:04 - and and have made some small

11:06 - progress here and there.

11:08 - I will say that

11:09 - the

11:10 - march Harrisburg was involved

11:12 - in the

11:13 - legislation that created no excuse mail-in balloting

11:16 - or mail-in voting rather.

11:18 - So

11:19 - We were involved in that so there's one success that we did have

11:22 - working with the legislature

11:24 - and with the leaders there

11:25 - so

11:26 - Yeah we'd love to work with them as much as we can

11:28 - and convinced them that these are the right things to do and it's good

11:32 - policy and it's good politics.

11:34 - As we speak in June of two thousand and twenty six and where is gift that legislation

11:38 - in the legislative process right now.

11:40 - So

11:41 - There are.

11:44 - For gift ban bills at the moment there are two in the house

11:47 - and there are two in the senate

11:49 - and

11:50 - the two

11:51 - all four of them are stuck

11:52 - at the moment and let me just give a little more background one of the bills in the

11:57 - senate is actually a companion bill

11:59 - to one in the house so they have the same language both

12:01 - chambers have the same bill to look at if they I want to

12:05 - but they're both stuck in state government committee

12:08 - in each chamber.

12:09 - There there is a fifth

12:11 - if ban bill in the senate.

12:13 - If you count the one that just bands cash.

12:16 - Because

12:17 - the cash is a legal gift

12:19 - but even that one's not moving so that's where the those bills are at the moment.

12:23 - Beyond the gift and are there other specific legislative

12:25 - initiatives that you'd like to advocate on behalf of.

12:29 - Oh we have

12:30 - we have twenty four policies

12:32 - that we want would love to see happen.

12:34 - I could go through all of them and

12:37 - I'll give you a rundown like

12:38 - I mentioned we support

12:40 - of a redistricting commission.

12:42 - For a fair test that fair districts is working on

12:45 - that's their baby but we support them.

12:48 - We are currently working on a ranked-choice voting bill.

12:52 - We would like to see ranked choice voting available in Pennsylvania

12:55 - the particular bill we're working on there

12:57 - would

12:58 - make ranked choice voting

13:00 - option

13:00 - in our elections that local municipalities could choose to use if they wanted to.

13:06 - So it's very much

13:07 - modeled after the Utah model

13:09 - of ranked choice voting so we're working on that one actively.

13:13 - We have a bill that's coming through the house

13:15 - actually right now it's a bill that would.

13:19 - Define

13:20 - foreign influence corporations and prevent them from

13:23 - spending on Pennsylvania elections.

13:25 - So there is a loophole opened in

13:28 - citizens united

13:29 - that allowed that to happen so

13:32 - we're working.

13:33 - We've been working on a bill to close that loophole

13:37 - and beyond that

13:39 - we're a fan of open primaries

13:41 - were a fan of and.

13:44 - Ending some of the per diem rules so that

13:47 - they have to

13:47 - submit receipts to get their podiums instead of just getting

13:50 - the full amount and.

13:51 - I

13:52 - Don't remember the whole list off the top of my head but we've got

13:54 - twenty four policies that we want to see happen

13:56 - in our money out and people in.

13:59 - Silent are areas

14:00 - on your website march on Harrisburg costs for limits to be placed on campaign

14:04 - contribute oceans yes are there instances where you can see direct links between

14:07 - significant contributions and decisions that lawmakers make.

14:12 - Ah

14:12 - Well I I don't know that we can say for certain

14:15 - that contributions have changed a policy but

14:19 - there's a high correlation

14:20 - between the two

14:22 - and

14:23 - one could argue that they're they just agree

14:24 - and they're supporting something they agree in

14:27 - and

14:28 - I know that.

14:30 - Spotlight pa did an article last year I think it was about the pigeon

14:34 - pigeon shoots there was a pigeon shoot

14:37 - a group that

14:38 - wants to keep that legal

14:40 - that gave.

14:41 - Bradford's campaign fifteen thousand dollars

14:44 - and

14:44 - they asserted

14:45 - that that fifteen thousand dollars helped get them a meeting with

14:50 - leader Bradford

14:51 - and the the bill passed committee and

14:54 - did not go anywhere did not come off the table

14:56 - and

14:57 - leader Bradford has control of the table so.

15:01 - It looks

15:02 - isn't look good

15:03 - but we can't say for certain that made a difference

15:05 - and that's a very very small example

15:06 - we know that there are many many much larger contributions

15:10 - from larger organizations that have big policy idea is

15:13 - like Jeff he has his push for.

15:17 - School vouchers and stuff we know he contributes very heavily to.

15:21 - Republicans

15:23 - and

15:24 - so I believe some leaders

15:25 - on the Democratic side as well to to try to push that policy so and there are.

15:31 - Many other examples that I could

15:32 - probably look up

15:33 - but there's lots and lots of money that moves around

15:36 - during campaign season

15:37 - yeah I'm going to go you mention citizens united yes and you talk about what you'd

15:41 - like to make it known by entering what you call

15:43 - the Montana plan can you explain for those that

15:45 - are unfamiliar with citizens united and what would the Montana

15:48 - and tail

15:49 - sure and so citizens united that decision effectively said that

15:55 - us corporations

15:56 - are collection ns of

15:58 - us citizens and should have the same rights as

16:01 - those citizens and be able to spend on elections

16:05 - and

16:05 - part of the discussions around that decision

16:08 - was said that you know as long as

16:11 - the corporate charters allow.

16:14 - Companies to spend money on elections

16:15 - they should have the right to do that

16:17 - and

16:18 - now corporations and nonprofit entities and all of these

16:22 - what we call

16:23 - artificial people.

16:25 - Not flesh and blood people

16:27 - there they are all legal creations created by state law

16:31 - to exist they wouldn't exist without

16:33 - us state laws

16:34 - that

16:35 - define them.

16:37 - What the Montana plant oh and states also have the ability to and the right to

16:42 - decide what those.

16:44 - Are artificial people

16:45 - can and can't do by their charters.

16:47 - The Montana plan effectively uses that

16:50 - power that the states have

16:52 - and says the state can

16:54 - withdraw or remove the power

16:56 - of artificial people to spend on elections

16:59 - so it doesn't change the right

17:01 - that

17:02 - citizens united

17:03 - said that they have

17:04 - but it changes there

17:06 - but it removes their ability

17:07 - to do that sort of attacks said.

17:09 - That spending from a different angle

17:12 - from much higher up the

17:13 - chain of of

17:14 - powers of the corporations so

17:17 - so that's how that particular

17:18 - legislation works

17:20 - and we've been working closely with transparent election initiative

17:23 - in Montana who are doing this

17:25 - and they're doing a ballot initiative

17:28 - in Montana to do this

17:29 - we've been working with the center for American progress who created their bill

17:34 - and they created the bill that was recently passed in Hawaii.

17:38 - Several weeks ago

17:40 - and

17:40 - bills for several other states and we march on Harrisburg have gotten a copy

17:45 - he's written one for us as well

17:47 - for Pennsylvania

17:48 - and we're currently looking for a sponsor

17:50 - and

17:51 - we were just in the capital yesterday and there was a

17:53 - senate office that heard that we had a copy of it and

17:56 - they are very anxious to get a copy and they've asked us to send that to them so

18:00 - after we're done here I'm going to be doing bad.

18:03 - Well as we're in the month of June right now lawmakers are scheduled to be in session

18:06 - quite a bit throughout the next couple of weeks

18:08 - as they deal with the state budget process

18:10 - what will march on Harrisburg do to make sure that you have the attention of those

18:13 - law makers while they were here in town.

18:15 - Ah well we were we did a lobby day or lobby week actually this week.

18:20 - So

18:20 - Several of us were in the capital and.

18:24 - We had set up many many meetings this week

18:26 - we have a couple more meetings next week and I'm not sure I know that the

18:31 - the foreign influence corporation bill is starting to move and we're going to

18:34 - be

18:35 - Little active in the capital to make sure that people

18:37 - are aware that that's happening and make sure that

18:39 - they know where we stand on that.

18:42 - So we're going to be doing a lot of lobbying over the next few weeks around that

18:45 - and.

18:47 - Beyond that I don't know exactly what we're going

18:49 - to do we're gonna you know it's it can be very fluid

18:52 - what's happening in Harrisburg.

18:53 - We've been speaking with Jeff kaiser organizer

18:55 - for march on Harrisburg thank you for joining us

18:58 - thank you very much.

19:01 - Hmm hmm.