Peter Schweizer Quotes

Members of Congress don’t want anyone to have more influence than they have—that’s why they hated Harry Hopkins.

It is no secret that Washington, D.C., is a tempest of people and institutions relentlessly seeking power over the lives of everyday Americans.

The crush of lobbyists on Washington and purchase of the media by corporations has created a big business-run government and a worthless press leaving Americans screwed and ill-informed.

Wall Street's outsized influence in our nation's capital is something I've talked about for a long time - long before I even thought about running for office. But where I see a problem - an infestation, really - a lot of others in Washington, both Democrats and Republicans, seem to see government working just fine.

The railroad men did not hesitate to dominate government where they could.

The oil companies legally bribe members of Congress to allow them to drill for oil in the ANWR.

The special interests are protected in Washington and the public interest is submerged.

The only accountability-free zone in America: Washington DC.

The real scandal in Washington is not what is against the law. It is what is not against the law.

Every economy exists, no matter what the level of democracy, has elements of crony capitalism. It's - given human nature and given the democratic structures, which we all, I assume, adhere to, that is an inevitable consequence.

A politician's goal is always to manipulate public debate. I think there are some politicians with higher goals. But all of them get corrupted by power.

You think that somehow they didn't come after me to get rid of me because my vote is the deciding vote in the health care bill? Then, ladies and gentlemen, you live today in a world that is so innocent as to not understand what's going on in Washington, D.C.

Now you have people in Washington who have no interest in the country at all. They're interested in their companies, their corporations grabbing Caspian oil.

Wall Street, the banks, and corporate America, has been able to call the shots here. They control our members of Congress and they get what they want.

Obviously no one wants to give members of Congress a lot of money, because they barely do anything, and many of them are terrible, but a Congress that is made up of rich-but-not-super-rich people is going to be more corruptible than a Congress of really rich people.

I'm fascinated by politicians, because I suspect the huge majority of them go into it full of ideas and for the best possible reasons but end up being hijacked.

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

There can be no complete and permanent reform of the civil service until public opinion emancipates congressmen from all control and influence over government patronage ... No proper legislation is to be expected as long as members of Congress are engaged in procuring offices for their constituents

The host of contractors, speculators, stockjobbers, and lobby members which haunt the halls of Congress, all desirous ... to get their arm into the public treasury, are sufficient to alarm every friend of this country. Their progress must be arrested.

Politicians have no politics.

Those guys [congressmen] lived on the basis of getting their little tidbits and their perks.

The assumption has to be that members of Congress are, like eunuchs in a harem, physically incapable of a conflict of interest.

A congressman would rather be called a pervert than a protectionist right now. And he'd probably get better treatment from the press if he was.

One thing about a pig. He thinks he's warm if his nose is warm. I saw a bunch of pigs one time that had frozen together in a rosette, each one's nose tucked under the rump of the one in front. We have a lot of pigs in politics.

Twenty years ago, outside income was a means of keeping the Congress a citizen legislature. Today, outside income is a corrupting influence.