Campaign Donations Quotes

The donor party is the 2 million people who contribute more than $5000 to political candidates. Unless you are elected by the donor party, you cannot run for major office.

Obama's primary constituency was financial institutions. They were the core of the funding for his campaign. They expect to be paid back. And they were. They were paid back by coming out richer and more powerful than they were before the crisis that they created.

Such pushy people, the school union chiefs.It's almost not worth the campaign donations. Almost.

Because Republicans have no ideas, they want to turn elections into the battle of dollars.

If you can deregulate money in politics, then you can buy the policy outcomes you prefer.

After the 1970s, when President Nixon's illegal campaign cash was used as a secret slush fund to pay for the Watergate burglary and cover-up, Americans have demanded to know where the money fueling our elections is coming from.

Most of the men and women who vote in Congress each year to continue subsidies have taken campaign donations from big energy companies.

The reason that minorities and women don't have a better shot at getting elected to the Senate or to statewide office is because the campaign finance rules are so skewed as to make it very difficult for non-traditional candidates to raise the money necessary to get elected.

The biggest issue that we have to contend with is campaign finance reform.

With every new class of representatives that comes to Congress, there is a greater recognition of the perils of private financing of campaigns. I believe that by pulling back the curtain on the daily pressures faced by members of Congress, we can show the public how critical this reform is to the salvation of our democracy.

Spending limits not only do not work, they have the perverse effect of making special interests more powerful and more influential.

I am willing to undergo the disadvantage in order to make certain that in the future we shall reduce the power of money in politics..

So long as politicians need millions to win a seat in Congress and nearly a billion to contest the White House, they will sanctify the methods needed to raise such sums.

If I was the leader of the House of Representatives, the first thing I would do is I would put in a very clean bill on reapportionment. And I would put a very clean bill in that says that corporations are not people.

Campaign finance and ethics reform only works if it curtails all special interest groups equally and does not carve out any exceptions to benefit one party or another. 'Pay to play' reform was passed to limit the influence of big spending contractors over the public officials from whom they are trying to obtain work.

So I think that if we want to have a Congress, if we want to have government that looks like America, if we want to have government that is truly a representative Democracy, then we need to clearly address how we get our campaign laws out of the way of Democracy.

Americans want to be represented by the best candidate, not the one with the richest friends.

If the friends of the candidate choose to go to expense for committees and canvassing [campaigning] there are no means of preventing them; but such expenses out of the candidate’s own pocket, or any expenses whatever beyond the deposit of £50 (or £100), should be illegal and punishable.

The Federal Elections Commission is impotent by design.

Sam Alito replacing Justice O'Connor was a very significant change. He is much more conservative. And, as for John Roberts, he is much more in the direction of protecting the rights of very rich people to donate money to campaigns than Bill Rehnquist ever was.

Call-time has renewed my faith in the need for public financing of elections. 'Call-time' is where I as the candidate, sit in a room with my 'call-time manager,' and a phone. Then I call people and ask them for money. For hours. Apparently, I'm really good at it.

The 113th Congress has spent much of the year doing nothing but collecting campaign contributions …

I don't believe you can find any evidence of the fact that I have changed government policy solely because of a contribution.

I think there is an overwhelming support for campaign finance reform, and that includes conservatives and Republicans. Where the problem is is with the leadership; with the politicians who are benefiting from the big campaign contributions, and the dark money in the electioneering communications and so forth.

The people who believe in voter intimidation believe that the minute you make a political donation, that you immediately need to turn all your information over to the government.