Mitt Romney Quotes

Without putting the brakes on out-of-control campaign contributions from individuals and corporations - it will be business as usual, with 1 percent of Americans pulling the strings.

The [teachers’] unions and the [school] districts have very different stakes in local control. The districts want the money and the programs that higher level governments can provide, but they also want autonomy in determining how resources are allocated. The unions are much less wedded to local autonomy. Indeed, much of their lobbying at the state level is to limit the autonomy of the districts.

I am not going to make any commitments to the teachers union to do anything until they do something that's other than in their own self- interest. And everything they have done so far is in their self-interests, and that's it.

The unions no longer control the education agenda of the Democratic Party.

Do the elected officials in Washington stand with ordinary Americans - working families, children, the elderly, the poor - or will the extraordinary power of billionaire campaign contributors and Big Money prevail? The American people, by the millions, must send Congress the answer to that question.

What we have now is a situation where politicians get a whole bunch of money from mainly business interests. Then once they hold that office, they spend all their time in office paying back over and over again those campaign contributions through various favors and contracts and that sort of thing.

I didn't get a phone call from Bill Clinton before I jumped in the race ... maybe it's because I hadn't given money to the foundation or donated to his wife's senate race.

I'm convinced that unless you have some public financing of elections, you are never going to remove the power of wealthy interests over elected officials.

It starts with campaign finance reform.

The American system of political spending is so unregulated that it might make Adam Smith rethink free markets.

Now, I learned soon enough, that among the three, two don't trust the third one - the third one is the government. Both industry and unions feel the government is a talking organization and a spending organization.

The kind of corruption the media talk about, the kind the Supreme Court was concerned about, involves the putative sale of votes in exchange for campaign contributions.

He [Donald Trump] buys and sells politicians of all stripes.

Five years ago, the Supreme Court, by a 5-4 decision in the Citizens United case told the richest people in America, "You already control the economy of the country. We are now going to let you control the political system as well".

It is very important at this juncture to eliminate the influence of big money and special interests in politics.

You ought to spread campaign contributions around so that you're not beholden to any one contributing group.

It challenges a linguist to define modern campaign contributions as something other than bribery.

The effective supervision and surveillance of the lobbyist remains as the continuing challenge to the people and the Congress.

Corporate power in the political process is a reality.... Why violate the law by bribing public officials when there are legal and more traditional methods of persuasion that are more effective? Among these methods are campaign contributions, advertising, lobbying, and government-business job exchanges.

While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics.

The most misguided, naïve, uninformed, egregious decision of the United States Supreme Court … in the 21st century. To somehow view money as not having a corrupting effect on an election flies in the face of reality. I just think that just one of the five had run for county sheriff. I guarantee you … there will be scandals. There is too much money washing around political campaigns today, and it will take scandals and maybe the Supreme Court will go back and revisit this issue

The only true solution to the campaign money problem is a return to a proper constitutional government that does not control the economy. Big government and big campaign money go hand-in-hand.

Redistricting makes the inequities in campaign financing even worse. Most elections are so noncompetitive due to how the lines are drawn that big donors already know who's going to win. So they give to the likely winners to curry favor.

Politicians don’t have a spine any more. They pander to whoever will give them money

The Federal campaign contribution limit of $2,500 is way too low. You can’t even buy a Democrat for $2,500.