Democrat Terry Goddard, who is facing Republican Michele Reagan in the race for Secretary of State, sent the Weekly the following opinion piece:
The 60 Plus Association describes itself as a “non-partisan seniors advocacy group,” but like anything involving Dark Money, what they say is far from true.
The 60 Plus Association, in fact, is a Koch Brothers-backed front group that floods our airwaves with political ads paid for with anonymous corporate cash designed to distort our elections and deceive voters.
But it also has another purpose: to advocate for the privatization of Social Security.
60 Plus is a major player in the fight for Social Security Privatization. That proposal was the brainchild of hedge fund managers who would profit from privatization and who write big checks to political organizations, not seniors who rely on Social Security.
The focus of my campaign for Secretary of State has been stopping Dark Money. I have made it clear from the first day of my campaign that I am running to stop the anonymous corporate cash flooding into Arizona, one of the biggest threats to our democracy.
So I can’t say I was particularly surprised when a Dark Money group attacked me. But the fact that 60 Plus chose me as a target tells you a lot about the twisted world of Dark Money.
As your Attorney General, I worked tirelessly with AARP to protect Arizona’s seniors from fraud. I started the volunteer Fraud Fighters and Seniors Strike Back programs. One major source of fraud comes from fake charities that exist only to scam seniors.
Arizona law used to require charities to register with the Secretary of State — which at least gave consumers and law enforcement a good place to start to figure out if a charity was legit. But last year, the Legislature stripped the Secretary of State of that authority — a move my opponent supported and the Arizona Nonprofit Alliance opposed.
That move created not only an opening for scam artists; it also created an opening for Dark Money. Dark Money groups are formed as charitable, rather than political, organizations in order to keep their donors hidden. Allowing them to avoid registering with the Secretary of State’s office provided even more secrecy for these groups.
If elected, I’ll fight to bring back the requirement that charities register as one important way to protect our seniors from fraud. But 60 Plus — that “non-partisan seniors advocacy group” — just spent $300,000 attacking me for holding that position.
Only in the twisted world of Dark Money does it makes sense that a “non-partisan seniors advocacy group” would want to privatize Social Security and make it easier for fraud to be committed against seniors. Dark money is a fraud on Arizona voters and we must work together to stop it.
This article appears in Oct 23-29, 2014.
If you get rid of your tv then all of their money donations are useless.:)
You would also have to get rid of your radio and most local web sites and email newsletters that include ads. It’s a lot like trying to keep your house dust-free when you live on a dirt road. You have to work at it every day because there’s more dust every day.
he was a bad AG will be a bad sec. of state, all he wants to is getting his foot in the door to and hope the elected governor to fall so he becomes the governor a round about way since we did not elect him last run, go away Goddard stay out of politics you suck and pay attention to your law suit x caliber guns case you were wrong then and you are wrong now.
Again weakly you are too late with your attack lies.
When I first came to Arizona in the mid-80’s. Terry Goddard was the Mayor of Phoenix. My wife and I volunteered our services to help the City move forward. It was a very inclusive, “Hi, what do do, let’s go to work!” experience. We were on community committees and indeed did a small part to move the City forward. Terry is a very inclusive, consensus building, leader for everybody. He is a dedicated public servant. I would welcome a way to expose “dark money”, to eliminate the inordinate influence on local politics by national business interests and self-serving special interest groups and would hope to see Terry Goddard as our Secretary of State.