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Citizens United Increases Negative Political Advertisements, New Public Citizen Analysis Shows

Nov. 2, 2012

Citizens United Increases Negative Political Advertisements, New Public Citizen Analysis Shows

We’d like to draw your attention to two things: 1) a new analysis from Public Citizen linking Citizens United to an increase in negative advertising in elections; and 2) a new coordinated effort to push back on dual threats to our democracy — excessive money in our political process and voter suppression.

New Analysis: The deregulation of outside spending caused by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision appears to have led to increased spending on negative advertising in our elections, according to a Public Citizen analysis released today.

More than 85 percent of unregulated independent expenditures made by the 15 biggest outside groups in the 2012 election cycle financed negative messages. Outside spending is typically more negative on the whole than candidate-sponsored spending, research shows.

New Effort: A new initiative entitled “Money Out, Voters In,” launched today to highlight the threats to our participatory democracy caused by the overwhelming influence of money in politics and the suppression of the vote.

To read the statement from the group, visit www.moneyout-votersin.org.