The American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, is convening in Austin from Aug. 14-16 at the JW Marriott for their 46th annual meeting.
Progress Texas, and a range of progressive organizations from workers’ rights to environmental groups, will be protesting their conference in an effort to keep ALEC out of our laws and take back our state.
Who is ALEC?
ALEC is a corporate “bill mill” that drafts conservative bill templates and shops them around to state legislatures across the country. Republicans, and even some Democrats, are on board with this and copy ALEC's model legislation.
For a more in depth explanation about who ALEC is and how they influence our lawmakers, check out the video below:
Why is this bad?
ALEC is a powerful, unethical, and highly conservative institution that is borderline illegal. It is a secretive lobby for corporate interests to bypass the will of the people.
The organization is responsible for producing bills such as “Stand Your Ground” gun legislation, voter ID laws, and a bill that aimed to strip licenses from any health insurer that does business via the Affordable Care Act’s federal health care exchange.
ALEC uses corporate contributions to sell prepackaged conservative bills that hurt our communities.
TLDR: ALEC is just another way for corporate interests to control our government by taking power away from everyday people and putting it into the hands of the wealthy few.
How does ALEC impact Texas?
Here in Texas, corporate and special interests are influencing our state politics by putting profits before people and Republicans are letting them. Corporate and special interests like ALEC have too much power at the state level and they are leveraging it to silence Texans.
ALEC’s underhanded dealings and influence over state lawmakers is a total affront to our democracy. We must take a stand to let our state’s conservative leadership know that we will not tolerate their shady business with ALEC.
Our government is meant to be a government of the people, by the people, for the people. ALEC makes that vision impossible. That’s why we’re fighting to take back OUR Texas.
For more on ALEC, please read:
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